The Hottest Seasonal, Sustainable Tasting Menu in Paris

Fine dining in Paris generally comes with very few surprises. A smirk when presented with a riff on a classic dish, sure; an impressed glance at tweezer-precision plating, of course; a nod to the chef for an excellently executed flavor balance, always. The city is filled with talented chefs and creative concepts, but, overall, the expectations are well-established on what a fine-dining experience should look like in the city of gastronomy, and there’s little room for shaking things up too much. 

Thankfully, Alex Francis and Barney O’Kane are highly skilled shakers.

This celebrated bartending duo — most known for their work at Little Red Door, a bar in the Marais that has consistently been ranked among the top bars in the world — surprised everyone as they parlayed their farm-to-table cocktail reputation into a fine dining concept in Paris’ Montorgueil quarter. Recent collaborations with restaurants like Central & Kjolle played a role in their evolution into the restaurant space, but the idea for a fine dining component had been circulating for years during their tenure at Little Red Door and was finally brought to life in early March when they launched Comptoir De Vie (de vie is French for “of life”). Don’t worry LRD fans, they’re launching Bar De Vie later this year.

The restaurant is as much an incubator for innovation as it is a realization of everything they love (i.e., design, sustainability, France, food, cocktails, etc.), with a model that breaks down the barriers of a traditional fine dining experience under the belief that, at its core, eating and drinking is relational. It’s about storytelling.

Instead of a dimly lit dining room with a smattering of two- and four-tops, guests at Comptoir De Vie are welcomed into a light and airy space with an open kitchen that centers around one grand comptoir (i.e., counter). It’s there you’ll find O’Kane or Francis zeroing out scales for precision measurements as they create their art inside chilled ceramics and glassware, all while engaging with their guests similarly to how they did in a cocktail bar setting. A few tables to the side are available for those who prefer to huddle together, but the most coveted seats at this tasting menu restaurant are at the 11-seat counter because they give direct access to the highly knowledgeable and highly passionate De Vie team.

“We want guests to have a window into our world when they visit,” explains Barney O’Kane, co-founder and bar manager at De Vie, “to allow the guests to be right in front of us, interacting with the whole team, both kitchen and bar, serving things that we love. The biggest difference for us in having a tasting menu versus an à la carte offering is it affords us more time to build the relationship with our guest. Eventually we’d like to have an even longer tasting menu experience where we can look after guests more comprehensively, with shorter drinks experiences for those who can’t spend the whole evening with us.”

For now, the experience consists of a hyper-seasonal five-step dining menu (90€, inclusive of a welcome drink) with an option to add a signature drinks experience served with each course (55€, also available in a non-alcoholic format). There is also a five-step seasonal drinks experience in the style of an hour-and-a-half tasting menu including a bar snacks course and desserts course (70€).

Instead of being presented with course descriptors, guests are brought into the conversation on what is being served … and why. The intent is to put local French producers and produce in the spotlight, from the washable wool coasters to the house-distilled spirits, and the team is more than excited to talk about the story behind each detail (and there are stories behind everything, like how they’re a zero-ice establishment because ice is one of the least sustainable aspects of a bar … who knew?).

The first menu highlighted the first of the new season, starting with an Apple Sgroppino with poached apple sorbet, calvados, and dry cider and a singular raw oyster seasoned in housemade black pepper oil and topped with a lime-green kiwi granita, ending with a cacao-free chocolate truffle made from beer waste and served with a chicory cocktail with redistilled rye and tamari. 

Executive chef Adam Purcell — who earned his “rising star” reputation from his time at Frenchie and Amass — oversees the kitchen and works closely with O’Kane and Francis to develop each course in line with the overall mission for seasonality and sustainability. Unlike traditional tasting menus where the dish comes first and a pairing is chosen later, the team at De Vie truly collaborates to create a comprehensive moment at each stop along the menu.

“This is an ongoing process, but it works both ways,” explains Purcell of the creative development. “If we plan to change a dish on the menu, we work closely during the testing process to make sure we can align with the drinks offering. Likewise if the bar wishes to move into a new ingredient, we can make changes on the food offering to complement the drink. Our goal is to showcase the best of French produce and products, when they’re at their very best, which means we’re constantly adapting the offering based on what’s available to us in the market. As for sustainability, if we have fish on the menu, we use the whole fish. Likewise with fruits and vegetables, between the kitchen and the bar we can find a use for everything. The skins, the cores, the stems, everything will be processed in house.”

The menu will change with the same frequency of the seasonal markets throughout France, despite recurrent requests from diners to keep their favorite dishes and drinks on the menu, like the unpasteurized Parisian sake with yuzu from the Pyrenees or the delicately layered pommes de terre Anna with comté sauce.

“We’re aiming to create something unique in the Paris culinary scene,” says Francis. “We’re coming from a world-class bar background, and likewise for Adam in the kitchen, with Comptoir De Vie we’re looking to combine this quality of offering in an environment much closer to that of a top tier bar than a traditional fine dining environment. Our hyper-seasonal menus really aim to be a celebration of what France is at any given moment.”

And the celebration has already begun.