Charlotte Bouillon: French Cuisine for Everyone

The new Charlotte Bouillon is the kind of place that can leave you with completely conflicting emotions – sometimes all at once.

My visits there turned into the most bipolar restaurant experience I've had over the past year. By the end of them, I still couldn't decide whether I could actually recommend the place or not. So instead, I'll simply walk you through all the pros, cons and quirks of Charlotte, and let you decide for yourself whether it's the kind of experience you're looking for.

To begin with, this is easily the most beautiful Charlotte to date. The new location on Złota Street isn't just the chain's second Bouillon concept, with a broader menu and a stronger focus on main courses – it also represents a completely new approach to interior design.

Parisian vibes, perfectly balanced proportions, wide archways framing neatly arranged tables and a huge pastry display – none of it feels particularly Polish, in the best possible sense.

The second – and most important – point is the pricing. For 2026, it feels genuinely surprising. Pastries start at PLN 3, omelettes and tartines cost PLN 16, and there's a solid selection of main courses priced one and a half to two times below the current market average, including a coq au vin for just PLN 38. On paper, it all sounds excellent.

But there are several major caveats.

The biggest one is the bouillon format itself. In France, it's essentially the equivalent of a Polish bar mleczny, only with a far more elegant interior. The emphasis is on affordability, traditional dishes and an intentionally no-frills approach to dining.

So the real question is whether you're willing to play by those rules.

Ordered five dishes for two people at bargain prices? Be prepared for everything to arrive at once – desserts included – and not exactly piping hot.

Hoping for a proper cup of coffee with breakfast? Forget it. Instead, you'll get a rather odd coffee blend that will most likely have gone cold by the time you've worked your way through all the dishes, because no one asks about the order in which you'd like them served, either.

And the same applies across the menu.

The steak haché (PLN 42) is a classic chopped beef patty served with completely unsalted fries and an outstanding Gruyère and pink pepper sauce. The meat, thankfully, wasn't overcooked – which deserves a special mention – while the sauce works beautifully with both the steak and the fries, and is dangerously addictive.

The bouillon – served all day for PLN 22 – was also very enjoyable. Mine was the meat version, with noodles, carrots, whole cloves of roasted garlic and a distinctly French character.

The same goes for the Niçoise salad (PLN 26), made with green beans, decent-quality canned tuna and quail eggs. It's simple, without trying to reinvent anything, but perfectly satisfying.

Breakfast comes with very good jams, preserves and lavender honey. The canelés vary in how well they're baked (as do their prices between the menu and the pastry counter), while the service is largely limited to taking your order, bringing the food and handing you the bill.

If you think having every dish arrive at once was simply a one-off mistake, it wasn't. My second visit was exactly the same: four dishes, all served simultaneously.

The omelette (PLN 16) doesn't look particularly impressive, but it's one of those dishes that tastes considerably better than it looks, thanks in no small part to the goat's cheese filling.

The eggs with truffle mayonnaise (PLN 18) are exactly what you'd expect them to be. The croque madame (PLN 32) isn't especially memorable to begin with, but it had also spent quite some time sitting at the pass – cutting through it required less of a knife and more of an axe.

The pain perdu (PLN 18) was probably good. Probably – because by the time I finally got to it, the brioche had reached exactly the same temperature as the cream cheese and the raspberry-and-rose jam. Cold.

And that's really the dilemma. On one hand, paying PLN 84 for four dishes in 2026, especially in such a beautiful space, is undeniably impressive. On the other, not everyone is willing to accept compromises of this scale – eating lukewarm food, washing it down with equally lukewarm coffee, and then coming back to repeat the experience.

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