Restaurant Review: La Vague d’Or, Saint-Tropez

For a once-in-a-lifetime dining experience, Saint-Tropez’ La Vague d’Or Michelin-starred restaurant is worth every penny.

The question I’m asked more often than any other is where to go for a special-occasion meal that’s really worth the money. If find it a bit harrowing to answer this one, too, since no one wants to splash out hundreds of euros on a meal that disappoints.

This is why it is both a pleasure and a relief for me to suggest that anyone who wants a truly spectacular meal in the south of France should do everything they possibly can to score a table at chef Arnaud Donckele’s three Michelin star restaurant La Vague d’Or at the Hôtel Cheval Blanc in Saint-Tropez.

I recently dined there in the company of several of the most distinguished French food critics, and we were all astonished by the elegance, originality and beauty of the eight-course prix-fixe Balade Épicurienne, which cost €435 a person.

This is a lot of money, but every penny was well spent during a meal that starred such spectacular dishes as grilled rougets with a gelée d’escabèche, a stunning dish for its beauty and the equilibrium of its tastes and textures; and red prawns with artichokes and a lemon-verbena flavoured jus made with the juice of the prawns heads, a spectacularly succulent dish.

“Sincerity creates emotion,” chef Arnaud Donckele remarked to us at the beginning of our meal, and the truth of this was that the pleasure and sensuality of the meal we shared is something none of us will ever forget.

Plage de la Bouillabaisse, Saint-Tropez.

Tel. (33) 04 94 55 91 00,

From France Today Magazine