Racines - Bruno Cirino – Nice's one-star vegetable table

Racines - Bruno Cirino sits a few steps from the Marché de la Libération in central Nice, and it holds one MICHELIN Star for a dining room that has done away with meat and fish altogether. Chef Bruno Cirino opened it in February 2020, his third address after L'Hostellerie Jérôme and Le Café de la Fontaine in La Turbie, in an entirely renovated quarter close to the Halle de la Gare du Sud. The kitchen draws on its own gardens in La Turbie and Èze Village and on a network of farmers, growers and market gardeners across the coast, the hinterland and Ligurian Italy that Cirino has worked with for close to fifty years. In a room that seats no more than twenty-four, the single set menu is rewritten according to what the morning's harvest allows, each vegetable treated with the precision usually reserved for a fillet of fish or a cut of meat, and recognised with three Gault&Millau toques alongside its MICHELIN Star.

01The room and the setting

Behind a quiet street close to the restored Halle de la Gare du Sud, the dining room trades grand gastronomic decor for something warmer: Prussian-blue walls, Art Deco detailing, objects from the 1970s and pale wood throughout, closer to the spirit of a bistro than a temple of fine dining. The room holds a maximum of twenty-four covers, keeping diners within easy sight of the pass and the daily rhythm of the kitchen.

02The chef

Born in Italy and once destined, by his own account, for the priesthood or for a gardener's life, Bruno Cirino became a cook on his mother's advice, so as to keep that contact with the earth and its vegetables. He trained under Jo Rostang, Roger Vergé, Jacques Maximin and Alain Ducasse, working his way through the kitchens of the Royal Monceau, the Negresco, the Juana and Château Eza. In 1999 he left Paris for La Turbie, the medieval village above Monaco, taking over L'Hostellerie Jérôme, a 1950s staging post that had once marked the final stop of the old Route Nationale 7. There he eventually earned two MICHELIN Stars and mentored a generation of chefs, among them Jean-François Piège and Christophe Pelé. Racines, opened two decades later, is his most personal project yet, built with his long-time second, José Vidal.

Insider tip

Dinner only, Tuesday to Saturday; the site flagged a closure for the 2026 season, so check ahead.

03The cooking

There is no à la carte at Racines: guests are offered a single, entirely vegetarian set menu that changes according to the day's arrivals from the potager. The weekly menu even carries its own name on the restaurant's own pages, 'Le Chant de la Terre', and each vegetable is paired with a jus, a sauce or a broth rather than built around a protein, keeping the kitchen honest to the harvest rather than to a fixed repertoire.

04Wine and drinks

The wine list draws on an exceptional cellar built up in La Turbie, filled largely with small, often family-run domaines selected to match the spirit of the cooking. In the dining room, the sommelier works course by course to find pairings for Cirino and Vidal's instinctive cuisine, adapting the matches to individual tastes rather than imposing a fixed formula. Guests who skip alcohol are offered a changing line of house-made fresh juices and herbal infusions picked by hand in Breil-sur-Roya, with fermented house drinks also in development.

05When to go and booking

Racines serves dinner only, officially Tuesday to Saturday from 7pm to 11pm, and is closed on Sundays and Mondays. At the time of research, the restaurant's own website had announced it would be closed for the 2026 season, a reminder that, with only twenty-four covers and a notoriously tight calendar, it is worth checking current dates and telephoning ahead of any visit.

06The neighbourhood

Racines sits within walking distance of the Halle de la Gare du Sud and the daily produce stalls of the Marché de la Libération, in a once-industrial pocket of Nice that has been steadily rebuilt into one of the city's liveliest, most central residential quarters, fitting territory for a restaurant built entirely around what the market delivers each morning.

For a weekend. For a lifetime.