Experience The South Of France In NYC With Le Pavillon

Photo by The Empire City Wire

About The Restaurant

Le Pavillon opens with a clear point of view: seasonality and sustainability take center stage. With a focus on locally sourced ingredients from both land and sea—terre et mer—the restaurant presents an innovative menu that leans into vegetable-forward and seafood-centric cuisine. It’s a refined yet grounded approach, where each dish is a reflection of what’s fresh, thoughtful, and true to the moment.

Tucked into the base of One Vanderbilt, just steps from Grand Central, Le Pavillon offers a tranquil, transportive dining experience that feels a world away from Midtown Manhattan. With soaring 50-foot ceilings, lush greenery, and a garden pathway running through the space, the restaurant evokes the open-air elegance of the South of France—reimagined for the New York skyline.

The bar has a striking view of the Chrysler building viewable from the floor to ceiling windows surrounding the bar near the entrance to the restaurant.

Helmed by legendary chef Daniel Boulud, alongside Chefs Michael Balboni and Will Nacev, Le Pavillon holds a well-deserved Michelin star. The menu is contemporary and globally inspired, with an emphasis on pristine seafood and seasonal vegetables. While refined, it never feels fussy—there’s an ease and flow to both the service and the setting that puts guests instantly at ease.

The Spaghetti Alla Chitarra. Photo by The Empire City Wire.

The Food

The restaurant offers a three-course prix fixe menu with options to expand to six courses, and wine pairings are available à la carte for those looking to elevate the evening. The servers and sommeliers are very knowledgeable of the menu and can offer a variety of recommendations depending on the preferences and dietary needs of guests.

The menu is thoughtfully organized, with each course—starters, entrées, and desserts—occupying its own dedicated page. Within each page, dishes are further divided into categories, typically separating seafood from vegetarian and meat-based options. This structure not only highlights the restaurant’s focus on fresh, seasonal ingredients but also makes it easy for diners to navigate the offerings based on preference or dietary needs. It’s a subtle touch that reflects the overall clarity and care that defines the dining experience at Le Pavillon.

One of their standout starters was the spaghetti alla chitarra tossed with ramps, Meyer lemon, Sicilian pistachios, and Bordier butter, then topped with Kaluga caviar. It was rich, bright, and impeccably balanced. It included seaweed butter which really added a unique flavor to the spaghetti alla chitarra which was cooked perfectly al dente and really absorbed all of the flavors present on the plate.

The Dover Sole. Photo by The Empire City Wire.

The Dover Sole

For the entrées, the roasted wild Dover sole is a true standout—one of those rare dishes that manages to be both elegant and deeply satisfying. The fish itself is perfectly cooked, tender and flaky with a delicate exterior that gives way to rich, clean flavor. It’s paired with earthy chanterelle mushrooms, nutty sunchoke, and crisp haricot verts, all of which add layers of texture and seasonal depth.

It’s the chicken jus meunière that quietly steals the show—silky, savory, and unexpected, it anchors the dish with a warmth and richness that elevates the entire plate. What might appear to be a light, vegetable-forward fish course becomes, with that jus, something far more comforting and substantial. It’s a beautiful example of how thoughtful, understated technique can transform a simple dish into something quietly extraordinary.

For dessert, the strawberry rhubarb sponge cake delivered a fresh, floral finish: Harry’s Berries strawberries layered into a classic fraisier with rhubarb jam, basil, and a surprising—but perfect—scoop of olive oil ice cream. The olive oil ice cream paired really nicely with the sweetness of the strawberries and the sponge cake brought everything together making for a really nice balanced light and fluffy desert.

The strawberry fraisier. Photo by The Empire City Wire.

Wrap Up

Le Pavillon isn’t just another fine dining spot, it’s an experience, a reset, a breath of fresh air in the heart of Manhattan. From the moment you step into the soaring, plant-filled space, you feel a shift, not just in ambiance, but in pace, in presence. It invites you to slow down, to savor, to engage with each dish and each moment as something intentional and elevated.

It’s rare to find a restaurant that feels both grand and grounded, polished yet warm. Le Pavillon manages that balance with ease. For anyone seeking the calm, cultivated energy of the Côte d’Azur without leaving the city, this is as close as it gets. Whether you’re celebrating something special or simply seeking a few hours of escape, it’s a place that reminds you what dining out can truly be—transportive, memorable, and quietly magical.