Henri Soulé


Henri Soulé was the proprietor of Le Pavillon and La Côte Basque restaurants in New York City. Soulé also operated The Hedges in Southampton, New York.
He is credited with having “trained an entire generation of French chefs and New York restaurant owners.” He is also credited with using Siberia to describe the least desirable seats in a restaurant.

Biography

Soulé was a captain at the Café de Paris before becoming the mâitre d’.
At the request of the French government, he came to the United States to run the Le Restaurant Français at the 1939 World’s Fair. He did not return to France at the end of the Fair due to the German occupation. He opened La Pavillon in 1941, considered the most influential French restaurant in America in the 1940s and 50's.
When he died, New York Times restaurant critic Craig Claiborne said “we had lost ‘the Michelangelo, the Mozart, the Leonardo of the French restaurant in America.’” It is said he died of a stroke at La Côte Basque. Another source says he died of a heart attack.