Le Grand Véfour (), the first grand restaurant in Paris,Elizabeth Sharland, A Theatrical Feast in Paris: From Molière to Deneuve 2008:40ff, "Le Grand Véfour". France, was opened in the arcades of the Palais-Royal in 1784 by Antoine Aubertot, as the Café de Chartres,A compliment to the aristocratic landlord, the duc de Chartres, soon to be known as Philippe-Égalité. and was purchased in 1820 by Jean Véfour,Rebecca L. Spang, The Invention of the Restaurant: Paris and Modern Gastronomic Culture, pp. 6, 64, 182, 187, 206, 220, 224, 226, 238f and 245. who was able to retire within three years, selling the restaurant to Jean Boissier.Sharland 2008:41. A list of regular customers over the last two centuries includes most of the heavyweights of French culture and politics, e.g. Honoré de Balzac, Napoleon, Jean Cocteau, Colette and André Malraux along with le tout-Paris.Little brass plaques mark the favourite seats of notables like Colette and Victor Hugo. Sauce Mornay was one of the preparations introduced at the Grand Véfour. Closed from 1905 to 1947, a revived Grand Véfour opened with the celebrated chef Raymond Oliver in charge in the autumn of 1948. Jean Cocteau designed his menu. The restaurant, with its early nineteenth-century neoclassical décor of large mirrors in gilded frames and painted supraportes, continues its tradition of gastronomy at the same location, "a history-infused citadel of classic French cuisine."Frommer's Guide
In 1983, the restaurant was damaged in a bomb attack. It was then bought by Jean Taittinger who restored and reopened the place.
When it lost one of its three Michelin stars in 2008The third star, awarded Olivier in 1953 and lost with his departure, had been regained in the 2000 Guide Michelin ("Les étoiles du Grand Véfour" ). under the régime of Guy Martin for the Taittinger Group, it was headline news."Grand Vefour restaurant in Paris loses third Michelin star" International Herald-Tribune,, 3 March 2008
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