La Table de Colette -- 17 rue Laplace, Paris 5

La Table de Colette describes itself on its website as a restaurant gastronomique eco-responsable. The chef, Josselin Marie, originally is from Brittany and had training in some of France’s prestige restaurants before becoming the head chef at the Hôtel Vendôme in 2012, and then opening this one in 2019. One aspect of his cuisine is that the focus is always on the vegetables in a dish, with any fish or meat being treated as a condiment or otherwise in a secondary role. A fully vegetarian alternative is available, and arrangements can be made for other dietary options such as vegan, gluten-free, and lactose-free.

The restaurant is located just downhill from the Panthéon on its northern (Seine) side:

The street on which the restaurant is located has the look of old Paris that has not changed in a century or more:

Nevertheless, the interior of the restaurant is modern and airy:

And in times of warmer weather, there is a garden in back for eating outdoors:

The diners for this Monday lunch were split between French and Americans, with a few more French than Americans. They ranged in age from twenties to seventies, with most clustering around thirties and early forties.

The restaurant has 3-, 5-, and 7- course menus at lunch and 5- and 7-course menus at dinner.

The wine list is not especially large and a peculiar aspect is that it often features several wines from a given producer, thereby limiting alternatives in a given region if one of the producers is not to your style. The producers are all or mostly natural, but not aggressively so. The list of wines by the glass:

I generally do not like to order the selected wines to go with a meal, but as I was dining alone and did not know the cuisine here, I chose to do that in this instance. The wines were more than satisfactory, although on returning to this restaurant with another person, I will likely go the bottle route.

The amuse bouche selection got right into the vegetable theme: clockwise from the top: a fermented carrot made to taste like charcuterie, another vegetable preparation made to look and taste like an oyster, and confit beet:

These were all interesting and in the first two instances, the flavor similarities were apparent.

The excellent bread was offered with buckwheat “butter” and excellent lightly-salted butter:

With the amuse bouches and carrying over to the entrée was a glass of 2022 Beaujolais Blanc (Chardonnay) from the Hoppenot family poured from magnum:

This wine was fresh and lively with apple and pear fruit. It was good wine and a nice match.

The entrée was a purée/soup from butternut squash with various fruit mixed in, including a confit apple in the middle:

This was a good dish with some unexpected fruit flavors that distinguished it from the usual butternut soup/purée that is so common in Paris in winter.

The plat principal was a roasted cauliflower accompanied on the side by trout from the Pyrénées covered with confit shallots:

These were satisfying dishes, each showing good flavor, texture, and purity.

The wine to go with this course was a white St-Maurice Côtes-du-Rhône-Villages from Domaine La Florane made from the following grapes: Grenache Blanc, Marsanne, Roussanne, Clairette, and Bourboulenc:

This wine had peach and apricot flavor with a round texture and went well with the cauliflower and trout.

Dessert was a mousse with citrus that was light, refreshing, flavorful and not overly sweet:

A dessert wine from the Côtes de Gascogne in Southwest France and the Petit Marseng grape was served with it:

Although the wine was somewhat sweet, it was not sweet enough to accompany the dessert (the wine must always be sweeter than the dessert or it gets lost), so I preferred to drink it on its own after finishing the dessert, and that worked well.

Mignardises after the meal:

And the bill:

Irritatingly, when I paid with my credit card, the credit card machine asked if I wanted to leave a supplementary tip in amounts typical of American restaurants, that is, 15, 20, 25, or 30%. I of course declined. This is a disgusting new add-on that seems to have come in with the Olympics last year, preying on tourists who don’t know any better. Unfortunately, it seems to come with the program used to process credit cards, and not infrequently, restaurant staff is embarrassed by it.

Because a mandatory 15% service charge is included by law in the stated price of a meal and because servers in France are paid a living wage and do not need tips to survive, the standard for restaurants in France is to leave 2-5% in cash where service has been unusually good, but there is no expectation or obligation to do so.

La Table de Colette provided a good meal, and I especially like the emphasis on vegetables. I look forward to returning in warmer weather when I can sit in the garden and enjoy spring and summer vegetables.

La Table de Colette, 17 rue Laplace, 75005 Paris

Monday through Friday, lunch and dinner

Telephone: 01 46 33 18 59

website: latabledecolette.fr

Métro: Cardinal Lemoine(10), Maubert-Mutualité(10), Luxembourg(RER B)