Book Thirty Days Out or Do Not Bother
Hogsalt's first Paris room delivers steak au poivre worth the reservation gymnastics — and a bill that asks you to defend it.
The steak au poivre arrives under a sauce dark enough to look almost black in the mahogany-lit dining room, and the first cut answers the question the bill will spend the rest of the evening asking. It is very good. The pepper is present without shouting, the fond has been reduced past the point most Paris kitchens bother with, and the meat holds together the way properly rested beef does. This is the dish the room is built around.
La Renommée opened in 2023 as the first Paris venture from Hogsalt Hospitality, the Chicago-and-New York group behind 4 Charles Prime Rib and Au Cheval. The address trades on a ‘depuis 1823’ frontage in the 1st, and the menu splits its loyalties without pretending otherwise — French classics on one side, a version of the Au Cheval burger on the other. The reservation system is where the operation gets serious, and it is where most readers will lose the argument before they ever sit down.
A Hogsalt steakhouse wearing a Parisian frontage, priced like the frontage is real and cooked well enough that most nights it is.
Editorial Deep
The Au Cheval-style burger is the thing to think twice about. Hogsalt's Chicago original is one of the most defensible burgers in the United States, and the Paris version is a competent facsimile rather than the article itself — the beef is right, the cheese is right, and the whole thing lands as a good burger dressed as a great one. Ordering it in the 1st arrondissement, at these prices, when the kitchen is clearly built to send out steak, is choosing the wrong argument.
The frontage reads ‘depuis 1823’ and gives away nothing about what is inside — the door could open onto any of a dozen tired brasseries the block still houses. Push through it and the mahogany takes over immediately: dark panelling on every wall, brass fittings catching low warm light from wall sconces, banquettes in leather that has been worn to the point of looking correct rather than new. The ceilings are high in the way old Paris rooms are high, and the sound sits below the level where you have to lean in.
This access model rewards planners with a working knowledge of drop windows and punishes almost everyone else. The reservation opens on the venue's own site, powered by SevenRooms, thirty days ahead of the date you want — set a reminder for the minute the window opens on your target date minus thirty and be logged in early. If the site is empty, call or email the restaurant directly and ask about cancellations; that is the second legitimate path in. The third is a Paris concierge with a real relationship with the room. Do not buy a reservation on AppointmentTrader. Hogsalt actively monitors resale platforms and cancels flagged bookings without warning, and the account you booked it under gets blocked too.
The steak au poivre justifies its price. Whatever it costs on the night, it is a dish executed at a level most rooms in the 1st do not bother trying for, and the sauce work alone puts it above the going rate for a Paris steak on the same block. That is the plate the money defends first, and it defends it cleanly.
The second visit reorders around what the kitchen actually does. Skip the burger — Hogsalt does it better in Chicago and there is nothing about eating it in the 1st that improves it. Lead with the veal chop instead of the strip, which repeat visitors quietly rate as the better of the two big proteins, and split the spring greens with truffle vinaigrette to open. One side, not three. A glass of something serious with the veal rather than the full pairing.
What to eat
Don't miss.
Steak au poivre; veal chop; spring greens with truffle vinaigrette and hot goat cheese toast
“Book thirty days out, order the steak au poivre, and pay for the frontage with your eyes open.”
The Infatuation rates La Renommée among the standout Paris openings, and their crowd — largely American visitors after old-world Paris at a steep price — is scoring the experience it came for. We are lower: the cooking is very good on the steaks and thinner on the sides, and the room is doing more of the work than the kitchen. For old-Paris classics without the reservation gymnastics, La Poule au Pot two streets away is the honest redirect.
The Verdict
