Zoé Bouillon

Zoé Bouillon is a little lunch place tucked away in the 19th, not far from the Parc des Buttes Chaumont. It's very unusual among Paris restaurants, at least in my experience. In some ways, it's like a tiny cafeteria: if you eat sur place (instead of choosing take-away, which will lower the price by 0,50), you order at the counter and they'll give you a tray with whatever you order (and a carafe d'eau, if you like), which you then take to the table of your choice (inside or outside, though there are only two small tables outside), and serve yourself a couvert (napkin, spoon, fork, a knife if you need one) on the way.


They specialise in soups, around which their formules are built: soup (35cl) with a savoury side (9,50), soup with a savoury side and a dessert (10,50) and so on. On my two visits so far, I've stuck with the simplest formule, and in both cases chose 2 slices of savoury cake as my side. For those who don't know, what the French call 'cake' is baked in a loaf pan and is, well, a cake. But savoury. The first one I had here was vegetable-parmesan, and the second one (today) was chevre-pesto. Both were wonderfully moist and flavourful. As for the soup, I preferred the lentil soup I had the first time to today's carrot-cumin-parmesan soup (which was a bit sweet for me), but that may just be because I prefer lentils to carrots. Both times I have gone, it's been on the later end of lunch - a bit after 2 - and the place was rather quiet (just one or two other diners). It is a pleasant, large, airy room, and the staff are friendly.

Since I mentioned the take-away option above, let me tell you about take-away food in France. First of all, it exists, and not just in the form of the sandwiches and crêpes you can buy at street stands or crêperie windows, or even the Asian traiteurs that dot the city. (There are non-Asian traiteurs, but the Asian ones seem to be the most common. And when I say 'Asian,' I mean primarily Chinese, although they refer to themselves simply as asiatique.) Real restaurants have started to offer take-away, too. But they don't just slide your meal into a plastic container, drop that in a plastic bag, and toss in a couple of forks and napkins. Oh no. Here are two examples:

• The sushi place around the corner from me (which is significantly more expensive than - and, in my opinion, not even as good as - Manpuku) puts your sushi in a sleek black cardboard box. They ask you if you want sauce sucrée or salée - sauce salée is soy sauce; I still haven't figured out what sauce sucrée is - and give you a mini plastic bottle of your choice. When you get home and open up your package, you'll discover that they've also included a small aluminum tray in which to mix the sauce and the wasabi. Adorable! 
• I once went to an Indian place that had left a menu in my mailbox. As expected, the food wasn't wonderful, but the packaging was very exciting: when I returned home, ready to eat, unwrapping my food felt like playing pass the parcel. Alone. And without music. But there were at least 5 layers of packaging, and one of them was, in fact, a bag made out of wrapping paper. It makes for an amusing story, but it's not the most environmentally friendly practice.

Speaking of environmental friendliness, I'm sorry to say that Zoé Bouillon loses points in this category. Even if you eat sur place, your soup comes in a paper bowl, the cake comes on a little paper tray, the utensils and cup are plastic, and the napkins are paper napkins. Still, it's a lovely place to splurge on lunch once in a while. (For me it is a splurge. For you it might be a normal lunch.) Here are the details:

Zoé Bouillon
66, rue Rébéval (at rue Pradier)
75019 Paris
tél. 01 72 63 60 70
Open Monday - Saturday, 11h30 - 15h30

Oh! And I must give credit to Clotilde for helping me find this place: it is recommended in her Paris book.