It is rare for a three-star (recently and rather cruelly demoted to two-star) Parisian restaurant to be quite so keen on wine as Taillevent near the Arc de Triomphe.
It is therefore particularly sad for us selfishly wine-obsessed followers that its owner Jean-Claude Vrinat succumbed to lung cancer earlier this week. His daughter intends to carry on this family tradition which includes not just Taillevent but also the more relaxed nearby restaurant L'Angle du Faubourg, and the wine shop Caves de Taillevent.
Vrinat did not have an easy life, but he made life more pleasurable for thousands of wine lovers the world over. At Taillevent, under a succession of chefs, the food was superlative, the wine selection much more knowledgeable than most of its peers', and prices unusually gentle. The staff, most of whom have been there many years, seem likely to carry on one of the most solid traditions of restoration.