New Paso Robles restaurant serves up French cuisine in a ‘fancy-casual’ setting
A new downtown Paso Robles restaurant is serving up farm-to-table French cuisine in a “fancy-casual” setting.
On Nov. 1, Courtney and Julien Asseo opened Les Petites Canailles at 1215 Spring St., a space that was previously home to Spring Seafood Bar and Grill.
Julien Asseo’s family hails from southwest France, his wife said. They moved to the Central Coast in the 1990s to found L’Aventure Winery on the west side of Paso Robles.
As a teenager, Asseo left California to attend culinary school near Bordeaux, France. He met his future wife when they were both working at a restaurant in Los Angeles — he as a pastry chef, she as a server.
According to Courtney Asseo, the couple then lived in Las Vegas for a decade, where Julien Asseo honed his skills at fine-dining restaurants Joël Robuchon and Restaurant Guy Savoy at Caesars Palace.
But the Asseos wanted to raise their children, Margaux and Maddox, in Paso Robles, where they frequently visited Julien’s family, Courtney Asseo said. So they began to plan their westward move.
“We’ve always said someday we wanted to open up our own restaurant,” Asseo said.
Paso Robles restaurant ‘feels like home’
The Asseos made an offer on the Spring Street building in December 2018 and moved to the area in March.
Courtney Asseo said her husband and his parents did much of the location scouting work, as she was then pregnant with the couple’s second child and unable to fly.
But she quickly fell in love with the new space and its potential.
“I just knew instantly it was our place,” said Asseo, who helped design the interior of Les Petites Canailles. She said she wants customers to feel like they’re the couple’s personal guests.
The name of the restaurant, which means “the little rascals” in French, refers to Courtney and Julien Asseo’s children, she said. Photos of the family line one of the hallways.
The seasonal menu features French-inspired food with a fresh twist.
“(Julien) really wanted to get away from that super-fine dining, white tablecloth cuisine,” Courtney Asseo said.
Entrees include steak frites, beef cheek bourguignon, bouillabaisse and burgers. Large-format dishes are also available for family-style dining, including rotisserie chicken, veal shank and fish.
Asseo said the steak tartare, which is offered as an appetizer, is a personal favorite.
“It melts in your mouth,” she said. “It’s so good.”
Asseo said she wants customers at at Les Petites Canailles to feel like they’re the Asseos’ personal guests.
“We really just wanted to create a place that felt like home,” Courtney Asseo said.
