LE CHANTECLER

I will preface that this review is very unpleasant, just like my experience here. Since the restaurant put so much effort to this meal, I think it would be a disservice to not leave a meaningful review. Maybe the dishes were not suited for my taste, but I was surprised to discover that I did not enjoy any of the courses. I found the taste to be so unpleasant that I felt as though I was being held against my will to finish the meal. In the end, my family left dinner before completing the final course. Perhaps this kind of cuisine and preparation is too sophisticated for us but I beg to differ.

I believe flavor in food is somewhat universal in the sense that flavors can be broken down to the five basic flavors: sweet, salty, sour, spicy, or bitter. When something tastes good, it is because each ingredient or combination of flavors and textures complement each other. In my opinion, every dish failed in some aspect such that ingredients, textures, or flavors were too dissonant to each other. Moreover, there was a recurring theme where one flavor overpowered all the others (for example majority of dishes were very salty). One could say the dishes were like abstract art such that the flavors and textures did not match; I had no idea what to interpret of each dish. In a sense, the creativity went too far that flavors became too convoluted and chaotic. One could say that if the food was prepared in a more simple way that it would be much more palatable. Sometimes “less is more.”

The silver lining to this meal was the service staff; they were all extremely cordial and professional so I applaud the team for their excellence. It’s a shame that service was so amazing despite my disappointment in the meal. If you enjoy something very exotic or very abstract/dissonant flavors, then this will be the place for you. For me however, you would need to pay me to eat here again.

Such a wonderful and memorable Michelin restaurant. We did the surprise menu and were not disappointed! Service was excellent and the live piano player was a great touch.

Wonderful

전체적으로 음식이 맛이 없었다. 서비스는 만족스러웠지만 음식 자체의 비주얼만 좋을뿐 맛은 좋지 못했습니다. 재방문의사가 없다. 분위기는 최상급이었습니다. 와인 리스트가 좋음

Overall I had a good experience at the Chantecler. My husband and I dined there while visiting Nice in July, 2025. We arrived early for our reservation and were graciously welcomed into the restaurant. We chose to go with the chef's choice 8 course tasting menu and wine pairings. The meal was mostly spectacular with some of the highlights being the marvelous bread service, the duck and beetroot dish, the trout and caviar(my husband had this dish), the veal sweetbread dish, the CHEESE oh my god the CHEESE!, as well as the olive oil and orange blossom ice cream dish. Another stand out experience there was the sommelier and his wine pairings. You could tell he had extreme passion and expertise for his profession, and took a lot of thought and care in choosing the perfect wines to pair with our meal. I absolutely loved the fortified wine that he siphoned from a large jug, it was such fun!

There were however a few things that detracted from the experience which is why I gave them only 4 stars. The first being that I immediately informed them that I do not eat any seafood, and the first "surprise" that they sent out was little bites with things like trout and anchovies in them. I know that this was not officially part of what we ordered, but it did make me feel uncomfortable not eating them and they did not remove them from the table for at least two courses following that and it just felt wrong. The second item that really took away from the experience was the music. They had a pianist playing throughout our meal and he was playing American pop music from the 70s-90s. It was cringeworthy to be eating in such an opulent restaurant and then having Billy Joel songs or My Heart Will Go On bridgerton style blasting into the dining room. For a long time it was all we could talk about during our meal and it was super distracting. I think classical music or jazz would have been less tacky. Finally was the restroom situation. You had to exit the restaurant, walk upstairs, and then when you entered the ladies room you were greeted with an odd airport style toilet in the stall. It was bizarre, and I have certainly been in more luxurious bathrooms in less luxurious restaurants. It was particularly annoying because during a lengthy 4 hour meal, you may need to use the bathroom more than once. Our bill came to right around 1300 euros, and you would expect perfection at that price point. They came a little short of perfection.

(side note, they had originally requested a review via tripadvisor, but when I attempted to post this exact review verbatim, it blocked me from posting it saying they do not accept vulgar language, but nothing in my review is vulgar. It seems like they pad their reviews on tripadvisor from speaking negatively about them.)