Ze Kitchen Galerie — Restaurant in Paris

Last month while in Paris we made a reservation at Ze Kitchen Galerie, based on recommendations from dear friends that love trying top restaurants in all the cities we frequent. So it was time to try out Ze Kitchen. We walked in at our appointed time and we were transported to our corner table giving us the opportunity to watch the kitchen staff work in harmony turning out very creative and uniform dishes in very precise order. We both ordered the 8 course tasting menu, and after pondering the wine list for an extended period of time we compromised an a 2014 Chassagne Montrachet Premier Cru which was excellent. It was a compromise because candidly I was looking for a Burgundy that would have been well rounded. They started us with a delightful amuse bouche that had a lovely mushroom composition.

It's important to realize that the theme for the menu is a mixture of French and Asian flavors and the entire offering will have that theme throughout. Every dish that we had during our meal was excellently presented, beautifully plated and thoroughly explained. The first offering was Sea bream, with lemon coconut milk marinade, mango-turemic conciment. It was very flavorful and quite tasty. The next serving was Iberian pork, eels, mushroom broth nori condiment. Each of the elements of the dish were wonderful, but the flavor profile was very similar to the prior offering. We then had Truffles, celeri Thai broth, nuts vinaigrette. This dish was a bit perplexing only because I couldn't get my mind around what the chef was trying to do here. The next presentation was Pasta, stewed lamb, harissa-papaya condiment, this dish was easily the jewel of the night, it definitely left you wanting more.

Our next dish was the fish of the day, watercress, oyster juice and seaweed butter, my only issue is it kept repeating the same theme from earlier same flavor profile. From here we journeyed to a beautifully plated Black Angus beef, cherry morello and a hibiscus condiment. It looked marvelous, however after one mouthful I was done the amount of salt that was applied made it inedible. Mistakes happen to the best kitchens, my only question was why the so attentive servers didn't ask if there was a problem. From here we segued into a Poultry from Cour d"armoise, with a lime a gros fruit-mostardo condiment. I was still in recovery mode from the last offering so it was difficult in being objective about this plate. It looked beautiful and the chicken was cooked perfectly but I'd lost my focus by now. The next 2 dishes were served together and they were both desert offerings. The first was a White chocolate-wasabi ice cream, mango-passion fruit and pineapple. The second was a chestnut soup, season fruits, date-wine nut condiment. This brought us to the end of our journey at Ze...

Ze Kitchen Galerie is a very casual set menu dining experience. With a smaller dining room and a view into the kitchen it is definitely a comfortable situation for locals and international clientele alike. The food was absolutely amazing using fresh, local ingredients. Since the menu seems to change frequently I will not mention details on each dish but let you know that it was worth the money and, compared to other set tasting menu restaurants, was rather prompt. That being said, I have two reason they arent getting 5 stars and if you have a food allergy, for your saftey, I would never suggest going here. First issue is the service is not very formal nor prompt, beyond serving the food, for a room with 5 waiters and only 12 tables. If you have ever worked in the restaurant industry, or have ever been thirsty, you would be perplexed as to why this restaurant has a Michelin star. With such a small room and large staff it took 30+ minutes for the wine to arrive, and thats after requesting it twice not to mention certain drink orders never showing up. A wine pairing should be paired with food, not given after the meal by an uneducated som. Secondly, if you have a food allergy, high end tasting menu restaurants are usually very accommodating to your needs. However on almost every dish they would describe it and I would have to remind them that pistachios and Peanuts were in fact a life threatening issue for me and big surprise fall under my nut allergy. By the time the final dish came out with yet another pistachio garnish i gave up on letting the waitress know about my allergy and skipped it. For those of you that think "well, maybe its a communication issue" I speak french, made them aware of my allergy one month in advanced, reminded them each course, and had the hotel make them aware of this issue. Pretty much covered every possible outlet. In summation the Michelin one star rating is absurd however, if you dont have any allergies and are willing to sit through sub par tasting menu service, the food is quite good. My one suggestion, get a new Sommelier and dont hire cafė waitresses in bulk when 2 quality servers could do a better job. 4 Stars overall but based on a the standards of michelin star and set menu restaurant 3 stars. Honestly blows my mind that they...

If you find this review helpful in any way, please give it a Like. Thanks ...

Excellent food incorporating local & seasonal ingredients to its ever revolving menu. The place billed itself as modern French and it fully lived up to its name. All the creations were substantial & made sense - none of the pretentious modern creations hiding behind high concept or heavy sauces. Trust yourself to the assured hands of the chef/crew & the mission of the restaurant & simply go with the tasting menu. You will be glad you did. My friend & I enjoyed the evening's dinner comprising of the most delicate fish, succulent pork, seafood plate with prawns & the most delectable of dessert capped off with cappuccino. The kitchen staff operated and prepared the food behind glass enclosure which you can view as they ran from station to station. Fun to watch. There was no outdoor seating. The seating was intimate - tables were small & close to each other - typical of most Paris restaurants. The dining room felt a little closed in even though there were some large windows to the street. The host for our table was perfect - he really knew all the dishes, explained them to us in detail and recommended an excellent wine. We did feel bad about one of the servers. He had a really hoarse voice, coughed consistently with sniffles and he tried to explain the dishes in detail even when we dropped hints he didn't need to. He was not wearing a mask either. He was replaced after two dishes at our table but we did see he was still assigned to other tables throughout the evening. It was a bit awkward. We didn't want to bring it up with management in case it impacted his employment. Management should have been more self-aware & took precautions to make sure the server was healthy & minimize the exposure...