Lucien Robert, the namesake of former landmark Boston restaurant Maison Robert, the city’s center of sophisticated dining and power lunches for three decades, died Feb. 20. He was 87.
Maison Robert (1972–2004) was widely considered one of the nation’s best restaurants and created a stir in Boston’s culinary, social and political circles. Among its famous guests were the Kennedys, former Boston Mayor Kevin H. White, who ate lunch at Maison Robert almost every day, and Julia Child.
Maison Robert achieved pop culture fame when it was featured in a Folger’s coffee television commercial in the 1980s.
Friends, colleagues and family remembered Robert as the quiet, dignified Frenchman who helped bring sophisticated dining to Boston and inspired a culinary renaissance in the city that continues to evolve today.
“Before (Lucien) opened Maison Robert, Boston was all beans, potatoes and cod,” said Steve DiFillippo, the chef-owner of Boston-based Davio’s Northern Italian Steakhouse.
“I came to America because of him; I became a chef because of him,” said Robert’s nephew, Jacky Robert, who cooked for the elder Robert for many years, and who today runs Petit Robert Bistros throughout the city.
“Maison Robert was the place to be in Boston,” said chef and restaurateur Lydia Shire, who credits Robert for changing her life when he hired her in the early 1970s. “It was the standard by which other restaurants were measured. Everyone wanted to eat there.”
Robert would shop for whole lambs at local markets and deliver the entire carcasses to the restaurant in his tiny Citroen, remembered Shire.
Born in Normandy, Robert moved to the United States in the 1950s, first to Wisconsin where he met his American wife, Ann, and then to Boston. The Roberts lived for more than 40 years in a West Newton home that “reminded him of the family farmhouse in Normandy,” said his nephew.
His famous restaurant was located in Boston’s Old City Hall, the stately School Street manse in Downtown Crossing built during the Civil War. The fine dining restaurant was upstairs; the more casual bistro on the street level. The downstairs eatery was called Ben’s Cafe, a tribute to Founding Father and ambassador to France Benjamin Franklin, who attended Boston Latin School when it was located there on School Street.
“My uncle was a patriot, a patriot of France and a patriot of America,” said Jacky Robert. “He loved this country.”
