Qasti Green – Alan Geaam's Lebanese kitchen goes entirely vegetable

On rue des Jeûneurs, a narrow street in the Mail quarter of Paris's second arrondissement, Qasti Green is the vegetarian chapter of a Lebanese story that chef Alan Geaam has been telling across the city since 2020. Qasti Green, the latest venture by the Michelin-starred chef, is a 100% vegetarian Lebanese restaurant, opened in January 2024 on this gourmet stretch of the Sentier. Geaam put the stoves in the hands of his niece, Zeinab Hachem, whom he had been training for five years before she took charge of the kitchen here. He himself holds a MICHELIN Star for his eponymous restaurant in the 16th arrondissement, while Qasti Green is selected in the MICHELIN Guide in its own right. The result is a small, calm dining room built entirely around vegetables, pulses and the market flavours of his Lebanese childhood, with not a gram of meat or fish on the plate.

01The room and the setting

The elegant and soothing atmosphere features olive-green decor that evokes the chef's childhood memories of Beirut markets. The colour scheme pairs olive green with cool, cold-toned browns, conceived as a deliberate echo of Matisse's cut-paper leaves and a continuation of the botanical thread that runs through Geaam's other Paris dining rooms. It is a small space built for sharing rather than spectacle — closer to a family table laid in green than to a conventional restaurant room.

02The chef

Alan Geaam arrived in Paris in 1999 with almost nothing, took odd jobs in the building trade, washed dishes at a Lebanese caterer's in the evenings, and ended up behind the stove by accident when the restaurant's own cook was injured before service. Passionate about gastronomy from an early age, he taught himself to cook through that improvised start and years of reading. In 2017 he opened Restaurant Alan Geaam, fusing French gastronomy with Lebanese flavours, and a year later he obtained his first star in the Michelin Guide, becoming the first and only chef of Lebanese origin in France to achieve such recognition.

Insider tip

Lunch daily, dinner Mon–Sat, Sunday brunch buffet; near métro Bourse and Sentier.

Qasti Green, which followed the bistrot Qasti and several other Lebanese addresses, is his most radical departure yet — a fully vegetarian register for a chef best known for shawarma and kebbeh. He built the project around his niece, Zeinab Hachem, whom he had been training for five years and who offers creative, traditional dishes and mezze from the Qasti Green kitchen today.

03The cooking

The mezzés keep their Lebanese shape but lose their meat: fresh labneh is served with Kalamata olives and fried kale, and fatayers are filled with spinach and pine nuts, Lebanese staples given a vegan twist throughout. Shawarma is rebuilt from celery, mushroom and halloumi; kebbeh reappears stuffed with pumpkin, spinach or beetroot; and the hearty daoud bacha meatballs are remade as lentil, almond and bulgur balls seasoned with kefta spice. Dessert stays closer to tradition: mouhalabieh with grapefruit, achta ice cream with orange blossom and crushed pistachios from Bachir's, and a classic kneffeh.

04What to order

Read on Qasti Green's own menu in October 2026, the Formule Déjeuner (€20, Monday to Friday lunch) gives a choice of two mezzés of the day, with a dessert for an extra €8. The Menu Qasti (€42) runs to three mezzés and a dessert, served at both lunch and dinner, Monday to Saturday. On Sundays the kitchen switches to a buffet: a Lebanese vegetarian brunch (€34) of cold and hot mezzés, a hot dish, pastries, fruit and fresh-pressed juice — worth timing a visit around if the weekday mezzé plates leave you wanting the full spread.

05When to go and booking

Qasti Green serves lunch every day from noon to 2.30pm and dinner Monday to Saturday from 7pm to 10.30pm; the kitchen is closed on Sunday evening, after the brunch buffet earlier in the day. Groups of ten or more can book a dedicated lunch formula or a self-service mezzé buffet, with wine, a soft drink or a beer and coffee included. Booking runs through the restaurant's own website, which also handles its sister address, Qasti Bistrot, in the Marais.

06The neighbourhood

Rue des Jeûneurs sits in the Mail quarter of the second arrondissement, reached by the métro stations Bourse, Sentier, Grands Boulevards or Bonne-Nouvelle, all within a short walk. Bourse station takes its name from the Palais Brongniart, the old stock exchange building a few streets away. The street itself has long been part of the Sentier, Paris's historic garment district of wholesale textile shops rather than restaurants, which makes Qasti Green's quiet green dining room an unexpected find on what the press now calls a genuinely gourmet corner of the quarter.

For a weekend. For a lifetime.