Several years ago, a series of serendipitous events led me to temporarily swap houses with a stranger. The fortuitous exchange would introduce me to an area of Paris I had never previously heard of, and one that I would subsequently revisit numerous times. Compact enough to explore on foot but large enough to regularly reveal new treasures, its unrefined charms, the eclectic array of local residents and, perhaps most prominently, the range of delicious and affordable food to be found all captivated me.
Straddling four arrondissements, Belleville has a rich history steeped in working-class rebellion. Its former residents were among the staunchest supporters of the Paris Commune, and when the Versailles army came to reconquer Paris in 1871, they faced some of the fiercest resistance from this vibrant quartier.
The neighbourhood’s more recent battle is a modern one: the struggle against creeping gentrification. Though it has largely managed to withstand the sweeping changes felt in the neighbouring 18th arrondissement, plans to add a further six stations to the Métro line on which Belleville lies, combined with preparations for the 2024 Paris Olympics, are likely to accelerate the process.
Belleville has long been a gathering place for immigrants. Armenian, Greek and Polish communities came and settled prior to the second world war. Sephardic Jews from Tunisia and Algeria soon followed. In the 1970s, Chinese and Vietnamese migrants arrived, and now cohabit with diverse communities from north and west Africa. Little more than a century ago, it was considered a particularly “Parisian” part of Paris, with more than half of its residents born in the area. Now, more than a third of its inhabitants come from outside Metropolitan France. This vibrant mix makes for one of the most interesting places to eat in the capital. The diversity of the district’s inhabitants is evident in the shops that line Boulevard de Belleville. Shelves are stacked high with edible delights from across the globe. Lamb heads replete with teeth turn beneath rotisserie chickens outside halal butcher shops. Store fronts groan with boxes of Chinese cabbage, cassava, okra, yams, plantains and a multitude of chillies.
As home to the city’s second Chinatown, Belleville has countless eating options. Among the most authentic is La Tour de Belleville on Rue de la Présentation. The star of the show at this inauspicious canteen is undoubtably the soup. Lamian wheat noodles are expertly stretched to order in cat’s cradle fashion, before being swiftly blanched and added to a long-simmered aromatic broth, redolent with ginger and star anise, and adorned with meltingly tender beef, duck or pork.
Amid a smattering of trendy newcomers on the 20th-arrondissement side of the boulevard sits a clutch of restaurants and cafes catering to the Tunisian Jewish community. Longstanding institution Chez René et Gabin attracts a loyal following, particularly on Fridays, when a brisk takeaway trade takes place in preparation for Shabbat. The menu features familiar Sephardic staples such as shakshouka (spiced eggs and peppers poached in tomato sauce), sitting alongside lesser-known daily specials like mloukhia, a vivid green herbaceous casserole of braised beef, and akoud, a slow-simmered and subtly spiced tripe stew. Although the signature casse croûte, a traditional Tunisian sandwich, is a bestseller for good reason, an arguably better version can be found on the other side of the street.
The ever-present queue at Di-napoli is testament to the perennial popularity of this hole-in-the-wall, home to one of this notoriously expensive city’s culinary bargains. The small team operates tirelessly behind the tiny counter, churning out a relentless stream of orders, filling sandwiches abundantly with tuna, or minced beef with a mechouia, a tomato and pepper paste, and making fine omelettes on the cast-iron hotplate with a scarlet dollop of fiery harissa.
A little further towards Ménilmontant lies the bright yellow facade of Spécialités Antillaises. While Covid has temporarily curtailed the attached restaurant, the shop does a thriving trade in ready-made dishes from the French Caribbean, with large queues lining up to receive special orders of stuffed sucking pig, creole-glazed ham and lobster fricassee, alongside other items unique to the islands.
Midway up Rue de Belleville sits a community stalwart that has been in operation for more than 30 years. The perpetually packed dining room of Lao Siam accommodates an eclectic crowd of devotees.It stands out among a slew of fairly forgettable Thai restaurants by steadfastly sticking to the family’s roots, offering a selection of hard-to-find northeastern Thai and Laotian dishes, such as nem thadeua, a grilled rice salad with fermented pork, home-made sai oua, a spicy sausage flecked with turmeric, lemongrass, chilli and kaffir lime leaf.
So far, Belleville’s defiant disposition remains – for how much longer it is hard to say. The collective community view seems to be that, no matter how many natural wine and organic grocers move in, the strong spirit of multiculturalism will endure.
This pocket of Paris retains its allure partly because it is bereft of the mass tourism that characterises the more popular parts of the city. A far cry from the incredulous assertion made by Fox News that the neighbourhood was a “no-go zone”, it continuously reveals its diverse charms. At the benches outside Moncoeur Belleville, beers are sipped as the sun dips. Local kids kick footballs, the Eiffel Tower visible in the distance past Parc de Belleville. Women in traditional west African dress sell foil-wrapped pastels (doughnuts) from a bench for a few euros. Definitely Paris, but for now still defiantly Belleville.
Christopher English is a writer and private chef
