Portraits of Belleville: Jono, Claire, and Lilia (Kiwizine)

Our favorite restaurant in Paris is not one you'll find in the Michelin guide, on Chowhound, or in any food magazine (at least, not yet). It's a tiny place just around the corner called Kiwizine, and technically it's a non-profit "association" with two goals: bring people together around food and drink, and provide the chef, Jonathan Bevan, a chance to experiment in the kitchen. Jono hails from New Zealand (thus the punny restaurant name - say it with a French accent and it sounds like "cuisine"), his wife Claire is French, and their almost-1-year-old daughter, Lilia, is just unbearably cute.

We mostly see Jono, Claire, and Lilia on the weekends, since Kiwizine is only open Fridays and Saturdays. Hopefully someday it'll be open all week, because there's nothing we like more than stopping in with Panda on our way home from the park to make a reservation, to talk about food, or just to say hi.