For chef Dominique Salles and restaurateur Mathieu Campion, the name Noisette comes with a story. In French gastronomy, noisette appears in beurre noisette, butter cooked until golden brown with a deep, nutty aroma, which we devoured with warm bread. For the two French-Thai childhood friends, it also recalls the hazelnut trees they grew up beneath, where they played games and traded cards long before entering hospitality.
Now, those shared roots have found a home on Soi Yen Akat 3. Noisette is their take on a neighborhood French restaurant: polished enough for a celebration, but relaxed enough for a Tuesday dinner.
Salles and Campion bring more than 15 years of experience across restaurants, luxury hotels and fine dining. Salles trained in Bordeaux before working in Bangkok's luxury hotel scene, while Campion spent close to a decade leading front-of-house operations at Sühring. The space sits between a French bistro and fine dining. White tablecloths, glassware, warm woods, soft lighting, and muted green tones create an intimate setting.
The same idea carries into the food. Noisette sticks to the foundations of French cooking, giving familiar dishes a modern presentation and lighter touch.
The à la carte menu moves through seafood, charcuterie and cheese before starters including a 64°C egg with Bayonne ham, Comté and butternut (B450), trout gravlax with gin, beets and horseradish crème fraîche (B720), and vol-au-vent with clams, razor clams and mussels (B520).
For our preview, Salles put together a tasting menu that covered much of Noisette's range. We began with a perfectly warm duck leg confit croquette, then moved to the trout gravlax, where gin, beets, and horseradish cream balanced the rich fish.
Next came L Œuf Parfait, a 64°C egg with Bayonne ham, Comté and butternut. It sums up Noisette's approach: French at its core, precise in execution, with little fuss. The slow-cooked monkfish, melting in the mouth, was next, served with Armoricaine sauce and fennel, followed by duck breast with sweet potato and port wine. On the à la carte menu, the duck also comes with a duck confit croquette, while the monkfish is B720.
Next was L’Entrecôte à la Bordelaise: an MB7 Wagyu ribeye served with a rich Bordelaise sauce and roasted bone marrow. “Nothing is wasted,” Salles explains, leaning in animatedly as he talks about the beef. Available as a 200g (B1,350) or 400g (B2,600) portion, this is French indulgence without a shred of restraint.
Our tasting moved from a 2024 Antonin Rodet Bourgogne Chardonnay to a 2023 Domaine Roche-Audran Côtes-du-Rhône. Both appear on a wine list centered on France, with bottles from Germany and the US mixed in. By the glass, the Chardonnay is B380 and the Côtes-du-Rhône is B340.
Beyond wine, four house cocktails include the cucumber and St-Germain-based Jardin (B450) and L Ancien (B550), made with Cognac, Calvados and beurre noisette. The bar also pours Kanom Exotic Botanist, a gin from Chiang Mai.
Dessert brought us back to the name with La Mousse au Chocolat-Noisette (B320), pairing chocolate mousse with hazelnut.
Noisette keeps the butter, sauces and indulgence at the heart of French cooking. Salles and Campion have taken the food they grew up around and given it a Bangkok home.
