Six hundred Michelin-starred restaurants in the 2016 French Michelin guide

Two of Paris's ritziest dining establishments joined the select list of three-Michelin-star restaurants in the 2016 Michelin Guide, the little red book that confers the highest gastronomic accolades.

The awards ceremony that took place at the Place Vendôme began with a minute of silence for three-star chef Benoît Violier, who was found dead on Sunday in his Swiss home of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot.

In bestowing the award, the guide's international director, Michael Ellis, said Ducasse's cuisine “offers an unprecedented marriage of flavours and shakes up the codes of haute gastronomy”. (MTI)