Fouquet, Louis Émile (1872–1905), a Parisian restaurateur, was one of the early French advocates of the American school of mixed drinks. Born in Paris to parents who owned the Grande Épicerie Rivoli, a fine grocery, at twenty-three years old he opened the Criterion bar and buffet in front of the Saint-Lazare station, where American and English travelers arrived to Paris. The year after, in 1896, he published Bariana, the second French cocktail book, and in 1899 he opened the Criterion-Fouquet’s Bar on the Champs-Élysées. After his premature death of typhoid fever, his friend Leopold Mourier, a famed restaurateur, became the tutor of Fouquet’s two sons and built Fouquet’s Bar into one of the most famous and fashionable in Paris.
“Fouquet.” Journal officiel de l’alimentation, July 15, 1916, 17.
Fouquet, Louis. Bariana. Paris: 1896.
“Nouvelle création.” Le temps, September 24, 1898, 3.
“Une bonne nouvelle.” Le journal, October 15, 1896, 1.
By: Fernando Castellon