Le Cafe des Lettres in the 7th: About as good as it gets for its genre.

5.1 Le Cafe des Lettres, 53 rue de Verneuil in the 7th (midway between Les Ministeres and the Poulpry, the Resto of the Maison des Polytechniciens - which gives you a clue as to who eats there), 01.45.44.14.69, closed Sundays is described on EatinParis.com as "a meeting-place for literary folk, located on the street where singer-songwriter-poet Serge Gainsbourg used to live" and where Dominique Villepin eats weekly.

My second French teacher (who gave up after 3 months of earnest effort) has been working for and at the Quai d'Orsay for a while and said we must go there, so why not?  We met and hugged on the street (he's seemed to have forgiven me for never having mastered the language) and entered what must be Paris's 5th oldest joint.  Nice, ancient but polished wood, reminded me of the Bistrot d'Hubert and Chez Pauline in the 1960's.  Welcome OK.

Then the bombshell; he hands me a review of a book he's just written and published "Le Chapeau de Barentsz: La route du Grand Nord" - gasp, that's what he was doing all those years when I thought he was spying on the Ruskies from Oslo and Bratislava.  A side of him I'd never seen.

We order: both having 2 dishes for 18.50 E.

I choose to start with a very nice, just spicy enough gazpacho (though it was 55°F. outside.) 

Then both of us had the daily special - the confit de canard, which was Gold Standard with terrific greens and a fine dressing and miserable potatoes and mediocre bread.

Then he had (sharing generously with me) a charlotte of strawberries or was it raspberries?  

 

With a fine bottle of wine, no bottled water and two coffees the bill was 69 E which we split, Dr. Kouchner, off in New York, not footing the bill.

 

Go?  Ah, there's the rub.  It's practically next door to Cinq Mars, a really cool, hip place, and just down the street from Poulpry, where Francois Hollande and other politicos hang out, so I'd say if you're at the Orsay and want to plotz, it's a fine alternative.