The cheapest meal in Paris is street
food, which tastes good, is satisfying,
and costs little because you're not sitting
down in a high-rent dining room. More...
Cheap Restaurants
Near St-Michel
First place you must learn about is a trio
of streets on the Left
Bank just southeast
of Place St-Michel and the St-Michel Métro & RER stations (map).
Rue de la Huchette, rue
de la Harpe, rue Saint-Severin
and rue Xavier Privas are
lined with inexpensive restaurants and food
shops offering three-course meals for as
little as 10€ or even less.
You can read more about these and other restaurant areas here. You might also want to learn about some of our meals and what they cost.
Take your
choice of cuisines: French, Greek, Moroccan,
Tunisian, Chinese, Thai, and more.
Check Drink Prices!
A warning is in order, however:
be sure to check drink prices as
well as food prices. As in many other cities,
many restaurants make up for low food
prices by charging more for drinks,
such as 20€ for
a bottle of wine that costs 3€ in
a shop.
Keep in mind that you can always order un
carafe d'eau (a flask of tap water)
at no charge.
The Magic Pichet
If you want wine, look for pichet (pitcher) on the drinks list. This is the house wine, a drinkable and bargain-priced if unexciting vintage which you can usually order by the glass (12cl to 14cl), a small pichet of 25cl, a medium one of 50cl, or a full liter.
Even if you don't find it listed among the drinks, ask. Some restaurants offer pichets because their regular customers demand them, but don't advertise the offering. Occasional customers (like us), not seeing pichet listed with the drinks, may then order more expensive vintages.
Street Food
For times when your're feeling less hungry
and more thrifty, there are the street
food shops: crêpe
booths, sandwich shops and souvlaki
stands.
Picnics
And of course there are Paris picnics, those memorable meal experiences where you put together the ingredients yourself at a boulangerie (bakery), patisserie (pastry shop), traiteur (gourmet shop), then find a spot in a congenial park or garden—of which Paris has an abundance. This easily solves the expensive-drinks problem because you can purchase whatever you like at retail-store prices. More...
