Ébène was opened in the fall of 2025 by Simon Plantrou and Chef Jihyun Kim who trained at the Bocuse school.    They met working at L’Arpege and formed their style from Passard’s influence serving mostly fish and vegetables.  It was a tiny place with the open kitchen on one side of the room.  At lunch there was a 3 course menu with choices for each course for €45 with some choices incurring a supplement charge.  If you want they also offer a 6 course menu with no choices or a la carte, but the lunch is by far the best value.  The 16 seats had music in the background, windows to the street, one framed poster on the wall and the small tables draped with nice white clothes and good sized matching napkins.  Service was efficient and friendly with good portion control and pacing on the tasting.  We were delighted to get a table next the kitchen with Chef Kim and her 2 female assistants but there was no interaction with any of them, which was probably due to language more than personality.   As our first meal, straight off the plane and the long cab ride into town, it was lovely.  It’s not fancy food but presented on fun different plates with good flavors.  Thumbs up here.

Set-up

 

Food

While considering your order they brought out a plate of winter radishes stuffed with butter and botarga.  There were 3 different varieties, all very thinly sliced and the tiny bit of stuffing inserted between the slices.   It was tasty but I couldn’t really discern a difference in flavor between the radishes, just color.

 

Some sliced brown bread that was doughy fresh in the middle and crispy on the crust.  It was good.

 

For the first course we both chose the foie gras with radicchio which came with a €5 supplement charge.   The foie gras was roasted and garnished with pomegranate seeds.  It’s preparation was a bit different in that it didn’t melt the foie gras.  The radicchio was from Treviso and cooked perfectly.  All was enhanced with a tasty sauce that was excellent with the bread.  A very good plate.

 

We both wanted the Magret de cannard rôti or duck breast as our main which also had a €5 supplement charge.  It was plated with raw cauliflower florets seasoned with gochugaru.  The medium rare duck slices had excellent flavor but were a bit chewy, although that would be expected with this duck.  The duck slices sat on top of the well seasoned cauliflower pieces that were mixed with sliced capers.  They were cool in temperature which brought a fun contrast to the plate.  The spiciness of the vegetable was also good when mixed in with the duck and its fine sauce. There were also some thin sliced golden beets on the plate.  A fun combination of things.

 

The choice on dessert was for cheese or Citron-flavored Crêpe Suzette which we both chose.  The thin tender pancake was flavored with candied lemon and a lemon sauce finished the plate.  It was delicious,  The texture of the crepe was perfect and the sauce strong enough to carry the dish.

 

A last treat was puff pastry stuffed with apples and cinnamon.   The many layers of pastry were divine with the apples and cinnamon.  It was to be eaten with your hands and you can bet it was finger-licking good.