rue Gambey intersects rue Oberkampf, with PSB’s first address on the corner, and the second address is a few tens of metres to the north. At first glance, it looks similar, with more main-floor table space, and apparently no downstairs seating. While the space is more attractive, there is less knee room at the counter, for some reason.
I had two glasses of wine (7€ each) at this meal, unusually: a Bandol rosé, and a Côtes-du-Roussillon. The table to our left had a bottle of Amalaya red. Argentinian wine in a French restaurant? Is that even legal?
This meal cost 10€ more, and for that, we got a more inventive set of dishes, better plating, and better lighting for the photos!
Scallops marinated in mandarin reduction, fennel, sesame, crumble with squid ink. They seemed really proud of the squid ink, but I couldn’t really taste it. One server was very insistent on quizzing us on what we thought was in each dish, and we managed to impress her a few times with correct guesses; another just recited the ingredients as he cleared away the dishes.
Céleri-rave (celery root), mushrooms, watermelon radish, red shiso, jamón de bellota, cockles, mushroom broth poured over the dish after serving.
Fresh fois gras de canard, seared, quince, beet, pistachio, vene cress.
Black Angus onglet (hangar steak), kale, butternut squash purée, chicken/red-wine jus, ssamjang. This one was rough on me, because I have braces on my teeth, with some poky wire ends that require wax to avoid tearing up my cheeks. Onglet is tasty but very chewy; I had to cut it as thin as I could and my jaws needed a nap by the end.
Brie emulsion, yuzu marmelade, crumble, roquette. A way better cheese course! (Also I must get hold of a large quantity of yuzu marmelade somehow.)
Red pepper sorbet, lime biscuit, mango, ghoa cress. I wouldn’t have expected red pepper sorbet to work as well as it did.
If you can only go to one? Go to the new address. But both are very much worth your while.
