Marchal – a love story set with one Michelin Star

At the corner of Kongens Nytorv, Marchal occupies the ground floor of Hotel d'Angleterre, one of the first deluxe hotels in the world, and it carries forward the love story that gave the address its start. The hotel's own history begins with a romantic affair between a French servant and the daughter of the Danish royal chef, who together opened the restaurant that is now Marchal and remains the heart of the hotel today. The restaurant first earned its MICHELIN Star in March 2014, and it holds one MICHELIN Star still, carried through several changes of chef. The pass today belongs to Executive Head Chef Alexander Baert, who sets French-Nordic cuisine against a dining room that looks straight onto the city's grandest square, with the Royal Danish Theatre and the colourful quay of Nyhavn just a few steps further on.

01The room and the setting

Inside, the mood is hushed rather than grand. Delicate mauve and lavender velvet- and damask-covered banquettes and dining chairs sit against burnished wood and gleaming marble, while an open, spotless kitchen and a wall-sized wine cellar held behind glass anchor either end of the room. A glassed-in terrace extends the dining room in summer, with a pavement café spilling onto Kongens Nytorv itself.

The restaurant seats around seventy at a time, with a separate Wine Room for up to twenty-eight guests who want a private Michelin-starred menu away from the main floor. It is, by local consensus, one of Copenhagen's defining settings for proposals and anniversaries, its scale generous enough to feel occasion-worthy without losing warmth.

02The chef

Alexander Baert was born in England and raised in Jura, in eastern France, a region that still shapes his palate. He has spent a decade in some of Europe's most decorated kitchens, among them those of Alain Ducasse and Rasmus Kofoed and, for five years, Anne-Sophie Pic — the chef who introduced him to Krug Champagne and sharpened his feel for precision and finesse.

Insider tip

Book ahead; dinner nightly 18.00–24.00, Sunday brunch online only, 825 DKK.

That training shows in his instinct for seasonal ingredients, citrus and pepper, kept light enough to let each dish stay delicate and refined, and in a style built on reinterpreting classic French dishes with a contemporary eye.

03The cooking and what to order

The menu reads as a conversation between the two cuisines the hotel's history promises: Nordic produce handled with French finesse. Among the dishes that keep regulars coming back are a duck breast carved tableside and finished with its own jus, a poulet au vin jaune served with green asparagus and morels, and a carrot dish lifted with hibiscus and cubeb pepper — the same plate Baert once matched, course by sip, against the latest Édition of Krug Grande Cuvée with the hotel's management team, comparing the finesse of the Champagne to the flavours on the plate.

Dessert leans toward a chocolate crémeux served with warm waffles and caviar, a dish that sits comfortably alongside a dinner repertoire that has also featured five kinds of caviar, whole black lobster and halibut with baby leeks and beurre blanc.

04Wine and drinks

Marchal's wine list carries its own 'interesting wine list' recognition, and the sommelier's role is to match each course to the glass rather than the other way round. The cellar itself runs the length of the dining room behind glass — a floor-to-ceiling collection the kitchen can rightly call one of its set pieces.

For an aperitif or a nightcap, Balthazar, the hotel's own Champagne bar with some two hundred bottles from more than forty producers, sits only a few steps from the restaurant's door.

05When to go and booking

Breakfast runs Monday to Friday from 7am to 10.30am, and to 11am at weekends; lunch is served Monday to Saturday between noon and 3pm; dinner runs nightly from 6pm to midnight, as listed on the restaurant's own site in October 2026. The kitchen also lays a chef's six-course tasting menu every evening.

Afternoon tea is served next door in the Gallery Hall on Sunday afternoons, and the restaurant periodically hosts collaborations such as the 15-course Four Hands Dinner held with Stockholm chef Mathias Dahlgren's team from Seafood Gastro on 29 September 2026, priced at DKK 2,800 per person.

For a weekend. For a lifetime.