Racines

The pass opposite the port

Fish lands nearby before Pierre Chavatte , chef at Racines in Étaples, France, turns it toward the pass with a short seasonal menu. The room faces the port d'Étaples, and the kitchen works from that proximity rather than from a decorative idea of the coast. Chavatte’s career includes Meert and Le Cerisier before this house, a line of kitchens that now resolves in his own station at Racines. What it does state clearly is the present arrangement: Chavatte leads the cooking at Racines, a Michelin Bib Gourmand address in Étaples, with local sourcing, modern French regional technique, and a dining format built around prix fixe progression. His role here is not inflated by title. Chef is enough, because the work is unusually legible: a coastal town, a small restaurant, a semi-open kitchen, and a menu that changes with the season, the supplier, and the day’s appetite for restraint.

A short menu with the port in it

Racines works best through compression. The carte stays deliberately short, which gives Chavatte less room to hide and more room to tune the details that carry a dish: a sauce, a broth, a cooked edge of fish, the point at which sweetness should stop. Reports from the table return often to seafood from the Étaples rhythm, including rouget with a bouillabaisse-style bouillon and carrelet with rice croquettes. Shrimp appears with spinach, black garlic, and cashew; pear is worked with spiced wine; tarragon moves into ice cream with honey and apple. These are not gestures of novelty for their own sake. They are adjustments of temperature, texture, and seasoning inside a regional frame. The Bib Gourmand recognition belongs to Racines itself, tied to Chavatte’s kitchen in Étaples, and it suits the program because the menu’s ambition sits inside a clear promise of generosity. The wine program is curated rather than theatrical, with the list serving the food’s coastal and seasonal changes.

Wood, warmth, and the semi-open kitchen

The room at Racines is contemporary without turning cold. Wooden touches soften the dining room, and the semi-open kitchen keeps the pass present in the meal without making a performance of it. Guests sit close enough to feel the discipline of a small house: the counter of work, the plates moving out, the quiet service style that lets the cooking remain central. The atmosphere is cozy and warm, more anchored than hushed, with the port just outside the restaurant’s field of work. That setting matters because Racines does not treat Étaples as a backdrop. The town’s fishing heritage enters the plate through sourcing and habit, while the room gives those ingredients a modern frame. At Racines, the craft here is rouget, bouillabaisse-style bouillon, and the pass.