Chez Billy Sud

Chez Billy Sud at 1039 31st Street NW is a Southern French restaurant in the residential Georgetown block between Wisconsin Avenue and the canal, in a quiet setting that the Provençal cooking feels at home in. Executive Chef Brendan L’Etoile runs the kitchen in the tradition of Southern French cuisine, specifically the Provençal and Languedoc cooking that the southern regions of France developed from their Mediterranean position and their proximity to Italy, Spain, and North Africa.

The Southern French culinary tradition differs from the haute cuisine of Paris and the grand brasseries of Lyon in its directness and its reliance on the ingredients of the Mediterranean environment. The olive oil and herbs, particularly the herbes de Provence combination of thyme, rosemary, lavender, and savory that the hills of Provence produce, are the foundation flavor of the cooking. The fish, cooked simply and served with the Provençal preparations of tomatoes, capers, and citrus, reflects the Mediterranean coastal tradition. The duck preparations, including the duck à l’orange that appears on the Chez Billy Sud menu and which is one of the most classic dishes of the French culinary tradition, use the duck that the Gascony region of southwestern France has raised for centuries.

The French wine list at Chez Billy Sud is almost exclusively French, which is the appropriate context for this food: the wines of Provence, the Languedoc, and the southern Rhone valley are the wines the Southern French kitchen was developed to accompany, and the list provides the depth to allow exploration of these regions beyond the most familiar names.

The Bar à Vin wine bar at 1035, next door to the restaurant, allows Chez Billy Sud’s customers to extend the evening with wine and small plates without a reservation, and provides the walk-in option for Georgetown residents who want a glass of Burgundy without advance planning.

Reservations for the restaurant are available online or by phone at (202) 965-2606. Chef L’Etoile’s Provençal orientation reflects the cooking that the Languedoc and Provence regions of Southern France have maintained through the full period of French culinary history, somewhat in the shadow of Parisian haute cuisine’s more celebrated reputation. The Southern French table is the tradition that produced ratatouille, bouillabaisse, tapenade, and the herb-perfumed grilled preparations that the lavender and thyme fields of Provence have flavored for centuries. Chez Billy Sud’s approach to this tradition serves Georgetown’s French-food-literate dining community with cooking that is less familiar from the standard French restaurant repertoire but no less serious in its culinary foundations. The 31st Street address, on the Georgetown residential street that has the Bar a Vin wine bar next door, produces an evening where dinner at Chez Billy Sud followed by wine at Bar a Vin is the natural conclusion to a Georgetown evening.