Brooklyn’s Biggest Little Oyster Bar

Designed as an homage to the classic French and New Orleans–style absinthe bars of the early 20th century, Maison Premiere is an aphrodisiac repository (think: oysters, mood lighting, martinis crafted tableside). We wanted to open a place that had it all: narrative, history, soul, and incredible booze.” Now, more than a decade later, Boissy is treading new territory with a book that’s just as comprehensive: The Maison Premiere Almanac , coauthored by Zizka, along with novelist and food journalist Jordan Mackay and Maison’s longtime managing partner and executive bar director, William Elliott.

Obviously, I consulted Krystof, who was my closest friend and creative counterpart in the city, and I called my mom a thousand times, and the consensus was basically, “What’s the worst that could happen?” So I briefed Marquet I was in—with one caveat: I wanted full creative control, as president. Lo and behold, two years later, we were doing $2 million in yearly takings—up from the weekly $5,000 Le Barricou had been doing before that. By 2009, the place was so successful, we decided we wanted to open a new place of our own.

Krystof found the white box that would become Maison Premiere, around the corner on Bedford, and we set to work—without knowing exactly what we wanted to build. He worked with the kitchen staff to revamp the menu, and he went to work on our oyster program.

Overall, it took about two years to make Le Barricou into a thriving, successful restaurant with 55 employees—and by that point, we all felt like we were ready to build a place up from scratch. That explained, obviously, as a restaurant, if you’re not growing, you’re dying—so we knew we couldn’t just build a successful old-school menu and leave it at that.

So, in the interest of keeping things fresh and exciting, we kicked off adding our own variations on the classics to the menu. We’d rather add three really good new drinks to the menu than 15 mediocre ones, just for the sake of novelty. Over the years, we’d had a publisher or two reach out to us about our interest in making a book.

Obviously, we were so flattered every time, but I think we all wondered if we were ready—if Maison felt complete enough to be book-worthy. Right before COVID-19 struck, we took a meeting with this writer, Jordan Mackay, and he really offloaded us on the idea.

Everything felt difficult and chaotic, but at the same time, I think we all felt like we wanted to be in control of the narrative again. In our words, some will say, “Oh, it’s a New Orleans place.” And some will say, “Oh, no, it’s a Brooklyn hipster place.” And some will say, “It’s an oyster place,” or, “It’s a French bistro,” or “It’s an absinthe spot.” So when we decided to work on the book, it was the first time we felt like we could explain who we were.

To be honest, it was so much more challenging than I ever imagined—and I think we all felt that way. And somehow, for the sake of the book, we were supposed to be this unified, creative force.

At one point, we were like, “How do we write a book about Maison while Maison is closed—and may never reopen?” But eventually, deep into the process, once we started flowing, we could see the material piling up. We spent lots of time foraging for ramps, preparation steaks, and drinking wine, and he would just interview me for hours—we talked about everything under the sun, and he recorded. And after those sessions, we all knew he’d tapped into something—that we could trust him to tell our story better than we ever could.