Hotels near Bouillon Chartier Grands Boulevards

Bouillon Chartier has fed Paris from 7 Rue du Faubourg Montmartre since 1896, when brothers Frédéric and Camille Chartier opened it, and the Belle Époque dining room has been classified a monument historique since 1989. The ceiling sits on iron columns like a railway concourse, a mezzanine runs around the room, and the waiters still wear black waistcoats with a row of pockets over white aprons. Cuisine: French bouillon cooking, meaning the plain, well-simmered repertoire the format was built for. Signatures are oeuf mayonnaise, poireaux vinaigrette, escargots and the house cup of whipped cream.

Most plates sit around €10, so two courses and a glass of wine come to roughly €25 a head - the cheapest real meal in this guide by a wide margin. It opens every day of the year from 11:30am to midnight with continuous service and takes no reservations at all. Expect a pavement queue, expect to share a long table with strangers, and expect your bill added up in pen on the paper tablecloth. The cooking is simple and the room is full of visitors, and neither of those is a secret. The same group runs a Montparnasse site at 59 Boulevard du Montparnasse and a Gare de l'Est site at 5 Rue du 8 Mai 1945, both of which queue less.

Pro Tip: Arrive at 11:30am when the doors open, or after 9:30pm, and you walk straight in. Between 12:30pm and 2pm and again from 7pm the queue runs 30 to 45 minutes. If the Grands Boulevards line looks hopeless, take Métro line 8 four stops to Gare de l'Est, where the same menu is served with a fraction of the wait.