My husband and I spent 5 days in Paris, and mostly ate very well, with only one really bad experience.
Here are the places we dined at:
Hectar
From my blog post:
The atmosphere was nice, and it was filled with presumably happy customers. We couldn’t understand why it reminded me of last year’s experience at Le Mazenay (see last year’s Paris posts).
The quail starters that Stanley and Ana had were adequate, but not in any way special. We’ve had much better, including the ones Stanley prepares himself. I had soupe au pistou, which was just ordinary bland vegetable soup.
For main courses, Stanley had cassoulet, which was absolutely awful, a bowl of undercooked beans with tough meats. Cassoulet should be cooked for many hours, even days, for the beans and meat to soften and the flavors to meld. It’s not a difficult dish to make. This one was not at all what it should have been. Stanley makes a much better version himself. Ana and I had a special of colvert, which is a wild duck. I’ve had excellent versions of it in other restaurants, particularly Le Radis Beurre, but this one was poorly executed, with a skin so tough it had to be cut off and put aside. The meat wasn’t bad but just uninteresting.
For dessert, they had figs topped with whipped cream, which weren’t bad, but again nothing imaginative. I had “chocolate mousse”, which I put in quotes because it was not a mousse at all, more like a bowl of chocolate sauce.
Only the wine was satisfying and well-priced.
For the 3 of us, the bill was 211 euros.
Le Servan
For several restaurants o n this trip I chose places with Asian-influenced dishes, and this one was an excellent choice. Pig’s ear salad was great, veal tartare very flavorful, pork dish perfectly medium-rare and delicious, raviole scrumptious. Desserts of a berry parfait and a clafouti were perfect endings. Nice wine and very reasonable, the total was 141 euros.
Le Radis Beurre
This has been a favorite of ours for many years, the one we always go back to. The cooking is updated traditional, and features organ meats and game in season, always creatively done. We love the atmosphere too, and the lovely staff.
I had the appetizer I always order there, the pigs feet, and Stanley had head cheese. His main course was sweetbreads, and mine was colvert, same as I had last year. It was way better than the one I had at Hectar the previous Friday. We shared a dessert of rice pudding, and a bottle of a really great Vacqueyras. The bill was 136 euros.
Jeanne Aimee
I had decided on this back when the menu was 3 courses, as we are not big fans of tasting menus. The new tasting menu looked very interesting though, so we stuck with it and it did not disappoint.
The chef is French but uses many Japanese ingredients, making for some very interesting flavors and textures.
Unfortunately I didn’t get a printed menu and the descriptions of the dishes were complicated. There was a menu on the website, which only varied slightly from what we had, but it’s not showing up now. It only shows the lunch menu, but maybe they will correct that.
Beware of the sommelier pushing wine pairings, as they are expensive and what I saw him pouring at neighboring tables was nothing special. We ordered a bottle of a light red that went well with everything, for 49 euros.
The bill was about 230 euros. This is exceptional value for the money.
Brigade du Tigre
A wonderful place for a casual lunch of Asian-fusion small-plates.
We ordered 4 plates and 2 sides, starting with a raviole of chicken, crawfish and rice and duck tartare, then fried chicken and noodles with meat and seafood, with sides of rice and kimchi. The food was very interesting and tasty. With a bottle of rose, the bill was 91 euros.
Le Sergent Recruteur
We had lunch here last year and were very impressed. This time the menu was almost exactly the same. We both began with foie gras, which was excellent, and a generous portion. Stanley had chicken and I had grouper, both very good but not exceptional (I should have chosen the saddle of lamb that I had there last year). We shared a chocolate dessert. With an excellent bottle of 2013 Cahors (62 euros) , the total was 247 euros. A little pricey, but I would recommend it for the quality of the food.
This wraps it up. There is a lot more about our trip on my blog:
