Restaurant in Kilstett, France
Alsace village dining that earns its Michelin Plate
Au Cheval Noir in Kilstett holds a Michelin Plate for 2024 and 2025, scores 4.6 across 535 Google reviews, and operates at a €€ price point — making it a strong candidate for a special-occasion dinner in Alsace where quality-per-euro matters. Booking is Easy, and the traditional Alsatian setting pairs naturally with the region's food-friendly whites. Confirm hours and format before travelling.
If you are weighing a special-occasion dinner in the Alsace region and wondering whether to drive into Strasbourg for something with more name recognition, consider this first: Au Cheval Noir in Kilstett holds a Michelin Plate for both 2024 and 2025, sits at a €€ price point, and scores 4.6 across 535 Google reviews. That combination — recognised quality at a fraction of what you would spend at a full Strasbourg destination restaurant — makes it a serious candidate for a celebration dinner where the food matters more than the postcode.
Au Cheval Noir is a traditional cuisine restaurant at 1 Rue du sous Lt Maussire in Kilstett, a village in the Bas-Rhin department of Alsace, roughly north of Strasbourg. Visually, traditional Alsatian dining rooms tend to reward the eye: expect warm tones, structured table settings, and the kind of room that signals care without theatrical staging. For a special occasion, the setting reads as appropriate for a formal dinner without being stiff , the sort of place where a birthday or anniversary table feels marked out without requiring a private room booking.
The Michelin Plate designation, carried consecutively across two years, tells you something specific: Michelin's inspectors found the cooking consistently worth flagging as quality cooking, even if it has not yet crossed into starred territory. In a country where the Plate category separates serious kitchens from casual ones, consecutive recognition at a €€ price range is a meaningful signal. For comparison, many Michelin-recognised kitchens in rural France operate at €€€ or above; Au Cheval Noir's pricing makes the quality-per-euro ratio one of the more compelling in its tier.
The cuisine category is listed as Traditional Cuisine , which in Alsace has a specific meaning. The region sits at the intersection of French and Germanic culinary traditions, and traditional cooking here draws on both: preparations rooted in technique, seasonal produce from a productive agricultural region, and the kind of cooking that pairs naturally with wine. That wine pairing dimension matters: Alsace produces some of France's most food-friendly whites , Riesling, Pinot Gris, Gewurztraminer , and a kitchen operating in this region at this recognition level will almost certainly have a list that reflects the local appellations. For a wine-focused dinner, the geography alone is reason to engage: you are eating traditional Alsatian food in Alsace, with access to wines from producers within the same landscape. That is a different proposition from eating Alsatian cuisine in Paris, where the wine list covers the same bottles but at a significant markup and without the regional coherence.
For the guest planning a special occasion, the practical calculus looks like this: a €€ price point means you can order properly , a full menu, a bottle from the wine list , without the dinner becoming financially fraught. At €€€€ Paris restaurants like Plénitude or Le Cinq at the Four Seasons George V, a celebration dinner will run several hundred euros per person before you have made any real choices. Au Cheval Noir's tier means the wine can be a considered selection rather than a negotiated compromise.
Booking difficulty is rated Easy, which is worth noting for occasion planning. You do not need to calendar-manage this reservation weeks in advance the way you would for, say, Arpège in Paris or Mirazur in Menton. That accessibility is genuinely useful: if your celebration date is firm and you are coordinating a group, you are not competing against a waitlist.
Traditional French cuisine restaurants in Alsace , and in the broader French regional canon, including benchmarks like Auberge de l'Ill in Illhaeusern or Georges Blanc in Vonnas , tend to operate with structured service and multi-course menus. If you are familiar with the format, you know what you are walking into. If this is your first time in a Michelin-recognised traditional French dining room, expect a formal pace: courses arrive with deliberate spacing, and the experience is designed to take time. Build your evening accordingly rather than booking a later event around it.
For context on what consecutive Michelin Plate recognition at €€ looks like across France, it is instructive to compare similar-tier traditional kitchens: Cave à Vin & à Manger - Maison Saint-Crescent in Narbonne and Coto de Quevedo Evolución in Torre de Juan Abad sit in a comparable quality band. Each operates with a distinct regional identity; Au Cheval Noir's Alsatian context gives it a wine-pairing advantage that kitchens in other regions cannot replicate without importing the bottles. See our full Kilstett restaurants guide for additional options in the area.
Au Cheval Noir is located at 1 Rue du sous Lt Maussire, 67840 Kilstett, France. The price range is €€. The venue has a Michelin Plate for 2024 and 2025 and a Google rating of 4.6 from 535 reviews. Booking difficulty is Easy. Hours, phone, and website are not confirmed in our current data , verify directly before travelling. Dress code is not formally stated, but a Michelin-recognised traditional French dining room at €€ in a village setting typically expects neat, occasion-appropriate attire rather than formal dress.
For accommodation and further planning, see our guides to hotels in Kilstett, bars in Kilstett, wineries in Kilstett, and experiences in Kilstett.
Quick reference: Traditional cuisine, €€, Michelin Plate 2024–2025, 4.6 Google (535 reviews), Easy to book, Kilstett (Bas-Rhin, Alsace).
| Venue | Price | Booking Difficulty | Value |
|---|---|---|---|
| Au Cheval Noir | €€ | Easy | — |
| Plénitude | €€€€ | Unknown | — |
| Pierre Gagnaire | €€€€ | Unknown | — |
| Alléno Paris au Pavillon Ledoyen | €€€€ | Unknown | — |
| Kei | €€€€ | Unknown | — |
| Le Cinq - Four Seasons Hôtel George V | €€€€ | Unknown | — |
What to weigh when choosing between Au Cheval Noir and alternatives.
It suits solo diners reasonably well for a traditional French village restaurant at the €€ price point. The relaxed, local setting typical of Alsace brasseries tends to be less pressured than a formal city dining room, making it easier to eat alone without feeling out of place. That said, without confirmed counter or bar seating in the venue data, call ahead to check seating arrangements for one.
Menu format and pricing details are not confirmed in available data, so a direct verdict on a tasting menu is not possible here. What is confirmed: the €€ price range positions Au Cheval Noir as an accessible option, and the back-to-back Michelin Plates for 2024 and 2025 signal consistent kitchen quality. If a tasting format is available, at this price tier in Alsace it would likely represent solid value compared to Strasbourg's city-centre equivalents.
Group capacity details are not in the venue record. For a village restaurant of this type in Alsace, private dining or large-table bookings are common, but availability varies. check the venue's official channels at their Kilstett address to confirm group minimums and room options before planning an event around it.
Specific menu items are not listed in the venue data, so recommending individual dishes would be speculation. The cuisine type is Traditional Cuisine, which in Alsace typically means regional French cooking. The Michelin Plate recognition for two consecutive years suggests the kitchen is executing its core menu reliably, so ordering signature or seasonal specials is a sound approach.
Kilstett is a small village with limited dining options at this level. The practical comparison is Strasbourg, roughly 15 kilometres north, where a broader range of Michelin-recognised restaurants operates. For a similar village-scale traditional French experience in the Bas-Rhin, Alsace has a number of Michelin Plate and Bib Gourmand addresses worth cross-checking against your date and group size.
Yes, with caveats. The Michelin Plate for 2024 and 2025 gives it credible quality signalling, and the €€ price range means a special occasion here costs considerably less than a comparable evening in Strasbourg's top tables. The village setting in Kilstett is low-key rather than grand, so if atmosphere and prestige matter as much as food quality, factor that in. For a food-first celebration on a sensible budget, it is a reasonable choice.
At the €€ price range with two consecutive Michelin Plates, it clears the value bar comfortably. You are getting Michelin-recognised traditional cuisine at mid-range pricing, which is the core value case for a restaurant like this. The main trade-off is location: Kilstett requires a deliberate trip rather than a casual drop-in, so factor in travel from Strasbourg when weighing the full cost of the evening.
Keep this venue in your Pearl passport, rate it after you visit, and track it alongside every other place you collect.
