Racines has been getting an unusual amount of attention in the press since its relatively recent opening in one of the most picturesque arcades in Paris, where just about everything that isn’t a restaurant is a philately store.

On its business card, it bills itself as a wine merchant and deli. One of the attractions is that owner and chef Pierre Jancou sources his food only from those he considers the best: his vegetables come from three-star chef Alain Passard’s market garden in the Sarthe, and his meat from Hugo Desnoyer, reputed to be the very best butcher in Paris, patronized by the likes of Passard and fellow superstar-chef Pierre Gagnaire. Jancou’s cold cuts and cheeses are also sourced only from the most outstanding producers. More on this later.

But wine is his big thing – and not just any wine, but “natural” wines, which means not just organic, but, in his own words “more than organic” (see his Web site, whose freaky logo was invented before Dede the Indonesian tree man hit the world’s headlines late last year). The “more” actually means “less,” since the wines he sells are free from added sulfur, often unfined and unfiltered, and very much left to their own devices by the dedicated band of winemakers who are probably the bane of the Institut National de l'Origine et de la Qualité, the French organization that sets the rules for the appellation d’origine contrôlée labeling of wine.

There is a certain missionary zeal about all this, and Racines’ feisty young waiter is a very good example of it. He will rattle off the grape varieties in the wines made by the saintly winemakers at great speed, and if you can hear him over the din from the other diners, you are lucky, but, unless you’re an insider, you’re probably none the wiser anyway.

The lack of a wine list means that you either have to be in the know (elitist) or accept what he decides you should drink with your food (totalitarian). On my first visit, the first offering was completely unlike anything I had ever drunk before: a vin d’Arbois from the Jura made with a grape called Ploussard. My companion and I both struggled to find a polite way of saying we hated the brew, which I finally decided tasted more like cider (and none of the best) than anything else.

Later, with our cheese, we were ordered to drink a white, Evidence, made from the Menu Pineaugrape by one of the arch-priests of the natural wine movement, Claude Courtois. Again we tried to be polite when confronted with a bottle of white served at room temperature and tasting like nothing so much as a severely oxidized aligoté.  Apparently, this taste is much sought-after and shows a great winemaker. Our young waiter, less schooled in the hypocrisy of politeness than in the art of natural winemaking, found it hard to hide his disdain for these two foreign ignoramuses. For my part, I mused on Hans Christian Andersen’s tale, “The Emperor’s New Clothes.”

On my second visit, to avoid leaving behind two nearly full bottles of wine, my companion and I went for wines by the glass, but the only wine that gave us any pleasure was a springy Mâcon red. Again, we were found wanting by the waiter/sommelier.

The food is uncomplicated and good, of that there is no doubt. The selection is narrow. On my first visit, the choice was further limited by the fact that the kitchen had yet to be hooked up to the gas main. The pancetta di colonnata and culatello ham starter was divine, and the slow-cooked beef cheek and andouillette that followed were equally superb. On the second visit, we went back for more of the pancetta, with its delicately perfumed, melt-in-the-mouth fat, and tried the pâté du moment, a tasty concoction of blood sausage, although it did retain the slightly metallic taste of the can from which it had just been extracted.

The veal main dish had already been wolfed down by the other diners, so we were left with a choice of andouillette (again) and pasta primavera. Happily, the chef had a portion of Desnoyer’s coeur de rumsteck up his sleeve, which was everything it should have been and more, meltingly tender and tasty, and paired with good mashed potatoes. At €24, though, we found it overpriced.

My andouillette was amusingly served with potatoes de topinambour. These were in fact what we Brits would call “wedgies” – cut into wedges and oven-baked – of Jerusalem artichoke. I had a giggle at this, because, if the French know the word “potatoes” (you have to say it with a French accent), it is because this delicious creation has been popularized in France by that alleged arch-enemy of everything natural, MacDonald’s... Unexpected, to say the least, in such a temple of Nature as this.

There are several other places like Racines in Paris, all of them selling wine to go as well: Pierre Jancou is the former owner of La Crêmerie in the 6th arrondissement, which I haven’t tried, but which looks and sounds very attractive. Then there’s Le Verre Volé in the 10th, where the food and wines are much more reasonably priced and also well-sourced. The atmosphere there is blessedly free of missionary zeal, sheer food and wine pleasure being the sole object. I know where my money will go next time. 

Richard Hesse

Racines: 8, passage des Panoramas, 75002 Paris. Métro: Grands Boulevards. Tel.: 01 40 13 06 41. Nearest Vélib’ stations: 42, rue Vivienne and 21, rue d’Uzès. A la carte: around €40. Open Monday-Friday for lunch and dinner (until midnight), Closed Saturday and Sunday.

Le Verre Volé: 67, rue de Lancry, 75010 Paris. Métro: Jacques Bonsergent or République. Tel.: 01 48 03 17 34. A la carte: around €30. Closed Monday.

La Crêmerie: 9, rue des Quatre Vents, 75006 Paris. Métro: Odéon. Tel.: 01 43 54 99 30.Open 10:30 a.m.-10 p.m. Closed Sunday and Monday.

© 2008 Paris Update

More reviews of Paris restaurants.

Reader Reaction
Click here to respond to this article (your
response may be published on this page and is
subject to editing).