Mon Coco — Restaurant in Paris

Thursday May 2nd was my last night in Paris. I went to dinner with my friend Céline who lives locally to Mon Coco and comes to the bistro often.

I live in San Francisco and eat a lot of poke. I decided to try their salmon poke bowl with salad instead of rice. It was good. The fish didn’t taste bad. I have had poke bowls where the fish smelled bad where I didn’t eat them but this smelled and tasted fresh. The other food I ate on Thursday was yogurt for breakfast and 1/2 a croque monsier for lunch.

Friday May 3rd I was flying back to SFO via JFK from CDG. I woke up feeling queasy and I couldn’t get out of bed. I laid there for 20 min and then when I got up it was because I had to vomit. I threw up several times and had diarrhea several times. I tried to extend my Airbnb but it was booked. I did what I could to pack and get to the airport.

Along with the vomit and diarrhea there were these sulphuric burps. It’s like you are burping rotten eggs. This has only happened to me once before. My family has a cabin on the Delta and the cabins don’t have fresh water. The water comes from the delta. It’s maybe a tiny but filtered but you CANNOT drink the water. By mistake once I drank the water. It actually tastes normal just not amazing but for 24 hours it gave me these weird sulfur burps. Ugh it was awful but I didn’t have vomit and diarrhea to go with it.

I had those same weird sulphuric burps along with the vomit and diarrhea. I had been upgraded to business (thank goodness) so at least on the flight I was comfortable. When the food arrived I wasn’t hungry but I ate 2 bites of salad and I forced myself to eat about 5 bites of chicken. I then ended up throwing up everything I had consumed about 2 hours later. This was such a horrible experience. I had food poisoning when I was 13 from bad chicken and ended up in the hospital. I think this was actually worse.

The weird burps continued. Standing in line in immigration and customs for 50 minutes was absolutely awful and I almost didn’t make it. My second flight I was also upgraded and on AA the flagship first seats are lie flat and again I don’t think I would have flown if I had not been upgraded. I didn’t even try to eat the meal. Still had the burps and a massive headache because I couldn’t keep anything down.

I arrived home, went to bed and woke up Saturday May 4 with a headache and still burping rotten eggs and having diarrhea. Finally at about 2 PM Pacific time so 11 PM in France I was able to eat something. That was over 48 hours since I had the poke bowl at Ma Coco. And finally by Sat night the headache was gone because I was able to get food in my body.

The service at Ma Coco was awesome. The waiter was great. He kept topping off my Prosecco and making jokes with my friend and I. I do still recommend this bistro but please stay away from any food with raw fish. This experience was one of my worst. I can’t believe I actually flew while activity throwing up.

By the way, I am not the only review to complain about food poisoning though the other review was one sentence so you don’t know if they are just trying to leave a bad review as there were no details.

I didn’t take any photos as I wasn’t planning to spend time reviewing until this happened.

Edited on May 26th. I upgraded my rating from a 2 to a 4. While I think I probably got sick from the fish I really don't know. ANd the poke tasted excellent. And I still will come back because my Parisian friend loves Mon Coco. I think it is just an unfortunate...

The bar was right outside the Republique metro station which makes it perfectly located. That's a busy station, very handy for get togethers as it has multiple lines.

I was there for a business meeting. I had about a couple of hours before getting to the next one.

The terrace was freezing cold. It somehow felt colder than outside. It was dark and lacked pleasant lights. The waiter on the terrace was not that pleasant, didn't smile and was way too serious.

We moved indoor, which is a very nice area, completely different feel than the terrace. It had a very nice atmosphere, cool lighting...

The terrace waiter made us pay before we moved indoor. When I asked about the reason, they seemed to be adamant that it's the way they do it! (they probably had experiences where customers didn't pay or something).

The indoor waiter greeted us, proceeded to take our order than completely forgot us!!! I tried desperately to grab his attention multiple times, all in vain. Which distracted us from conducting the business meeting efficiently.

Another waitress salvaged the situation. She brought the drinks pretty quickly and apologized for the significant delay. She was funny and made us laugh which helped greatly. We were finally able to finalize the meeting and it all worked out.

We had to abandon our food order because of the delay, so I wouldn't know what the food is like over here.

I would go back again just to get an opportunity to correct my view.

My suggestions:

Do not make customers pay their bill when they move inside from the terrace! It feels odd and is not comfortable for the customer to go through payment multiple times in less than an hour. It's your responsibility to come up with a system internally, from the bar to the terrace, upstairs... It is not the customer's responsibility to keep up with the bill, it's up to the establishment to do this job properly.

This avoids awkward situations where two customers insist on paying the bill (it's weird enough when it happens once anyway). Or making customers feel as though they're about to run away without paying... It's just weird!

Definitely check on your tables more frequently. Be methodical about it, set timers if you have to, anything so that clients are not waving and calling on you the entire time.

Put some pleasant dimmed lights on...

So it is my first time in France and to be honest I was being treated very nicely everywhere I went in different types of restaurants and hotels. Until I came to this one , I probably wouldn’t have come here out of choice especially seeing the reviews but a friend of mine who comes here often said I should meet her here. Our drinks were fine but at some point it was over 20 mins that she had asked for another round so while I went to use the restroom on the way I saw a service personnel standing doing nothing and it was not crowded on the inside like it was outside so I just mentioned to him about her drink not with an attitude but I assumed maybe they genuinely forgot which is fine , he was rude and said don’t you see my friend outside ( the waiter serving outside ) has to serve 50 tables ? I was bit shocked because I just wanted to let him know she had been waiting that’s all. I laughed it off even though he went on about how his “friend” ( if he was so concerned he could have helped his friend out ) was busy. Anyway it was a bit strange , I respect service people for their position but have never encountered such a person before. They even make you pay after every order you place which is fine I’m assuming that is the kind of place it is. I’m willing to except that but to treat your customers with disrespect especially when I was coming from a place basic communication and not being demanding or rude myself. If you don’t want to work or have things going on personally learn to be a grown up and professional and don’t bring it to the table to manifest your insecurities...