Riviera Fuga, an Italian-Japanese restaurant floating on the Seine as beautiful as it is delicious

Barely open, the Riviera Fuga floating restaurant is already a firm fixture on the banks of the Seine, with its cuisine combining Italian and Japanese influences.

Riviera Fuga, the new floating restaurant from Pierre Doublet and Quentin Garreau de Labarre, aka the Fuga Family, already behind Laïa and Francette, offers a vacation atmosphere on the water's edge. Moored just a stone's throw from the Alexandre III Bridge, opposite the Grand Palais, the restaurant offers a breathtaking view of the Seine and the monuments of Paris.

Here, the art of Mediterranean living is at its best. Decorated with great care in a 70s riviera spirit, the barge is the work of Belgian decorator Jean-Philippe Demeyer. Blue and yellow striped fabrics, a gigantic carpet custom-created for the premises, a majestic central bar and a sumptuous glass roof that bathes the restaurant in natural light - it's sure to make you feel right at home.

Chef Daniel Ortiz Maldonado's menu impresses with its finesse and mastery. It has to be said that in Paris, restaurants on the banks of the Seine have the harsh reputation of existing solely for the pleasure of the eyes of tourists, who are potentially less attentive to quality and price upon arrival.

Not so here. For starters, prices could not be more affordable for the setting and the neighborhood - for lunch, €29 for a starter/main course or main course/dessert, €35 for a starter/main course/dessert; for dinner, €60 for a 7-course menu. Secondly, because the Brazilian chef's Italian-Japanese cuisine is anything but banal fusion cuisine, a term that has been misused for the past fifteen years.

Having worked in the kitchens of William Ledeuil at Ze Kitchen Galerie and Greg Marchand at Le Frenchie, the chef has retained his iconic specialties and the way he divides his menu into antipasti, primi and secondi. From Japan, he draws techniques, flavors and ingredients with which he transcends his transalpine dishes.

Beef tartare cannoli (€8) is paired with grilled shitake and ume kosho mayonnaise; lean sashimi with tomato ponzu; heirloom tomato salad (€11) with dolce ricotta and rhubarb tosazu; brocoletti (€12) with yuzu kosho and puffed buckwheat.

In the glasses, the happy marriage continues with signature creations in Japanese hues, such as the Mi Amore cocktail (gin, vine peach liqueur, lemon juice, meloncello, prosecco; 16€) and the Matcha Gin Fizz cocktail (house yuzucello, gin, sudachi juice, sugar syrup, matcha tea, sparkling water; 15€). As for wines, the 300 or so references are purely French or Italian.

To accompany these clever beverages, there's nothing like small sharing plates to get things off to a good start, like thespecial Isigny n°2 oyster (8€ for two) with its ume vinaigrette. Then it's on to the primi and secondi, including the delicious agnolotti stuffed with squacquerone cheese (16€) topped with an orange sabayon and grated bottarga; the cod (23€) and its leek-wasabi sabayon; or the beautiful poultry and its miso eggplant.

Before taking off like James Bond aboard the little boat that Riviera Fuga offers for hire for a cruise on the Seine, you'll be delighted by the desserts, a babasaké (11€), a delicate reworking of the traditional baba, with diplomatic cream with sudachi; and a light dessert (12€) with coffee praliné and whisky gel.

Riviera Fuga has everything you could wish for: a pretty place on the waves, a menu that makes you travel.