Les Prés d’Eugénie Michel Guérard, Eugénie-les-Bains

Les Prés d’Eugénie Michel Guérard,
Type of Cuisine: Classic French (Haute cuisine)
Michelin Stars: 3
Event: Lunch on September 3rd, 2017 12:00
Addr: 334 Rue René Vielle, 40320 Eugénie-les-Bains, France
Phone: +33 5 58 05 06 07
Email: reservation@michelguerard.com
URL: https://lespresdeugenie.com/en/les-tables/michelin-starred-restaurant-michel-guerard/

 

They have the best MOFs working for them (Chef Olivier Brulard, in the case of Les Prés d’Eugénie – Chef  Brulard  spent some time at La Réserve de Beaulieu where he earned 2 michelin stars, after years alongside real culinary illuminaries and legendary Chefs such as Alain Chapel, Jacques Maximin, Gaston Lenotre)  and it shows in the very high level of classic French cooking technique on display.A destination, indeed. Still, at this level, if  I were them…I would “rewind the tape”  about the  service. That the younger staff did offer a flawless impression, whereas some of the older folks did not follow the bandwagon…well, that was Ok in the 1940s..perhaps….but right now, well ….you know….other 3 star Michelin French places  in France (Votre “niche” …)  are doing  better, on that front   (Pierre Gagnaire, L’Arpege, Le Louis XV, L’Ambroisie, L’Auberge du Vieux Puits, Ledoyen)….- Regardless, ..at the end of the count, I still loved LPE and would run back there, for the superb food, that friendly village, the world class French 3 star Michelin restaurant that LPE  truly is.

 

Service:  The younger employees (mostly present in the dining room) offered the sort of stellar service one has come to expect at this level, being as attentive and professional as it gets. By contrast, some of the older gentlemen (mainly present outside the dining room) could not handle a candle to their peers at, let us say, Pierre Gagnaire, L’Ambroisie, Le Doyen, Le Louis XV, L’Auberge du Vieux Puits, etc… : I felt, as if, the quality of their service was of the ymmv (your mileage may vary depending on who you are) type. 10/10 for the service of the younger staff. 6/10 for the service offered by some of the seniors… do not get me wrong, they were fine and professional, not mean at all, but they seemed more or less attentive depending on the customer they were dealing with. As an example, on my way out of the restaurant, I was asking a question to one of the older gentlemen, and he seemed more interested to talk to the couple who was behind me, as they looked more familiar (??) to him. Of course, that is normal  in general life, in your neighborhood, in a tavern, etc, lol, but NOT SO at a 3 star Michelin ….
Overall food rating (Category: French 3 star Michelin): 9/10 All in all, this was some excellent  cooking  by existing 3 star classic French Michelin star standards. Of course, Les Prés d’Eugénie is capable of an overall food rating of 10/10. There is NO doubt about that. But I have got to assess this specific meal, during which the Le Zéphyr de truffe ‘‘Surprise Exquise’’ was THE big “test” they had to pass as it requires lots of technique, precision, know-how, a great palate. I am afraid, they failed that test on my visit, as far as I am concerned (food assessment being obviously..subjective), of course.  Regardless, Les Prés d’Eugénie did pass plenty of other BIG tests,  as evidenced by the superlative pommes soufflées/gâteau Mollet du Marquis de Béchamel/amuse-bouches/pastries.
Overall dining experience :  See the section “My thoughts, days later” at the bottom of the current post.

Restaurant Les Prés d’Eugénie, located in a countryside’s spa resort in the  Landes, has 3 Michelin stars since the late 70s, one of the longest-running Michelin-starred restaurants in the world. It is the sole 3 star Michelin restaurant in  southwestern France, a historical gourmet destination where many great  Chefs of France have honed their skills (Gerald Passedat, Alain Ducasse, Michel Troisgros, to name a few).  Outside of France,  Chef Quique Da Costa of world famed 3 star Michelin Quique Da Costa in Denia (Spain) counts Les Prés d’Eugénie’s Mastermind Michel Guérard among the Chefs he drew his  inspiration  from (as he stated in this interview), and Chef Massimiliano Alajmo, the youngest Chef to have been awarded three Michelin stars, of 3 star Michelin Le Calandre in Sarmeola di Rubano, Padua, Italy (which I did visit, my review here) worked at Les Prés d’Eugénie at some point  in his career.

Michel Guérard, now 84 years old,  is one of the iconic Chefs of France, for his many achievements such as promoting Nouvelle cuisine in the 70s, with culinary heavyweights Roger Verge/Paul Bocuse/Alain Chapel/ Pierre Troisgros, which signified a break from Escoffier‘s classicism (the heavy sauces, etc), then, later on, his cuisine minceur.

The ‘Nouvelle cuisine’ (a lighter way of cooking, for i.e, refraining from using heavy sauces/marinades, reducing cooking time to preserve the natural flavors of the ingredients, etc), that we are talking about is, of course, not ‘nouvelle’ (new) anymore, but it is THE movement that led to the type of classic French cuisine that we know today. Way before the concept of ‘Nouvelle Cuisine’ became trendy in the 1970s, one Chef began his own revolution of French cooking: Chef Jean Delaveyne. Chef Delaveyne started to cook a lighter version of French food as early as in the late 50s. What Chef Delaveyne did not have, it is the sense of marketing that Chef Michel Guérard was gifted with. Chef Delaveyne’s revolutionary approach to cooking did inspire Michel Guérard, who, in his turn, did help popularizing the concept of ‘Nouvelle cuisine’.

Chef Guérard had another personal motivation in Nouvelle cuisine: according to him, Pastry Chefs were underestimated in those days, therefore he wanted to prove to the world of cooking that as a Pastry  Chef, he could play an important role in the evolution of cooking.

On the premises, they   have a very pretty old barn converted into a bistrot, La Ferme aux Grives,  that  I also tried (reviewed here). Chef Guérard’s mini-empire of restaurants includes La Bastide and Mère Poule & Cie. 

On the day of my visit, there were  several tasting menus, the A la carte menu, as well as some “special 40 years of Michelin stars” food items.

I did start the journey at their lounge bar, the Loulou‘s Lounge Bar, where I was served couple of amuse-bouches, which, on this lunch, were composed of:
-Caesar salad served with anchovies from Palamos (Spain), on toasted bread
-Shrimp “beignet” with verbena sauce
-a delicate pastry cone filled with a citrus flower mousse.

The Caesar salad was, as expected, not going to be your standard caesar salad but a creative take on it, delivered in the form of a mini “tartare” made of elements of a caesar salad mixed with first-rate anchovies (The anchovies from Palamos, which were served here, deserve their reputation as one of world’s best), atop a delicious piece of toasted bread. The kind of nibble that sounds simple, but which, once in mouth, do serve as a reminder that it is not …by chance…that some kitchen brigades managed to perform for decades at the highest level of classic French cooking (obviously, their case). 10/10

Shrimp “beignet” featured  shrimp of top quality, not one single sign of oil to be found, the batter delicately light, the fresh maritime flavour of the shrimp fragrant, the beignet was  served with a superlative verbena sauce. 8/10 for the shrimp beignet, 10/10 for that verbena sauce which brought incredible joy in mouth.

Then the pastry cone, filled with a citrus flower mousse of divine flavour, its impressive smooth texture stealing the show as well. 10/10

The amuse-bouches did really … amuse!

3 small breads are offered: olive, lemon and brioche. All, superb. The olives bread being the most popular during my visit. How do I know? Well, I asked.  Ferme Ponclet butter from the Finistere deserves praises, too. Perhaps one of the very best butters of this globe, boldly flavored but balanced,  with a fresh creamy finish that lingers gloriously on the palate.

Le Zéphyr de truffe ‘‘Surprise Exquise’’ / Vichyssoise is composed of an unsweetened  floating island infused with black truffle coulis disposed on a bed of white truffle cream and Vichyssoise, garnished with black truffles and a parmesan crisp. The dish came with a beautiful poetic description, the textural contrast between the slices of black truffle and the snowy white appearance of the floating island /white truffle cream/Vichyssoise so pretty to espy. One can imagine the incredible potential of such creation: imagine a dazzling airy floating island, the stunning fresh flavour of whipped egg whites. Imagine the fragrance of truffles. Imagine the taste sensation of a superlative Vichyssoise. A dish like this one is designed to blow you away. Done, as it should, it will. Alas, the flattering potential of my Zephyr experience was expressed only on paper. The Vichyssoise had way too much milk in it, more milk than vegetables, actually, which made it taste more of a cream of milk than of a proper Vichyssoise. I had better Vichyssoise at casual eateries, and was surprised that this one I was sampling at Les Prés d’Eugénie was underwhelming. The floating island? It paled in comparison to the world class example I had at Bistrot Casse-Noix in Paris: not as airy, not as tasty. Some say that there is just air in a floating island…well, there is more than that in a benchmark floating island, whether it is sweetened or not. There is the precise skills that allow for addictive fresh whipped egg whites flavour (which was missing in action, during this lunch at Les Prés d’Eugénie), there is timing. Vichyssoise, floating island, some important — as well as   exciting —  food items of classic French cuisine… this is where a kitchen of this caliber should  nail it! Even the white truffle cream was not satisfying enough to lift up the overall dish. The black truffle, you ask? Its fragrance was muted! Quoi d’autre? This was “unidimensional ” (essentially tasting of milk, and milk, and milk) flavor-wise, I am afraid. The parmesan crisp, the saving grace, but by then, I could not care anymore. 5/10

L’Oreiller moelleux de mousserons et de morilles au fumet de truffe – A  ravioli (the “oreiller” is for the ravioli- “oreiller” is French for “pillow”) wrapped around a filling of morels and fairly-ring mushrooms, bathed in a sauce made of mushrooms, truffle, with some asparagus atop. The sauce was packed with the enticing earthy aromas of the top quality mushrooms, the pasta cooked carefully to aldente doneness, the filling of morels timely cooked too (not mushy), tasting as delicious as a filling of meat. Even a fan of meat, like me, would opt for mushrooms in place of meat if fillings of mushroom could always taste this great. After the disappointing “Zéphyr de truffe”, the ‘Oreiller moelleux de mousserons’ came to the rescue and made this lunch great again. 8/10

Le demi-homard rôti, légèrement fumé à la cheminée, oignon confit au four – A half lobster (clawed blue lobster from Brittany) roasted in an open fire, some sweet onions (filled with a purée of peach and onions, gratinéed with parmesan cheese) accompanying the crustacean and its saffron butter sauce dressing . The saffron-flavoured butter sauce  is a nice idea, the saffron flavour not overwhelming as you would expect from top flight saffron. But having eaten my share of fully flavoured beautifully-meaty freshly caught spiny lobsters (I know, not of the same family of lobsters as the one of Brittany), during my tender childhood in the Indian Ocean, I wonder if it is fair to expect a fine dining restaurant to do better with its lobster? Can it better the dazzling freshly caught clawed lobster of the Maine (Trying to be fair here, and not being partial to spiny lobsters) or of Brittany, that we can enjoy at a lobster shack? Well, it cannot because fresh lobster is just great …away from any fine dining intervention. I had no choice but to take the lobster as it was part of my tasting menu.  They did put a lot of thoughts in this dish and this was certainly not a bad food item at all, but it was hard for me to fully enjoy such tiny  pieces of lobster flesh (they do not look tiny on that picture, but in real life, they were).  The peach/onion purée with gratinéed parmesan cheese  was as pleasant as you can imagine a purée of sweet onions and peach to be, and it would certainly compliment the sweet flesh of the  lobster but I would need a sizeable piece of lobster  to corroborate that …

Filet de Boeuf sur le bois et sous les feuilles, jus de viande et de raisin, pommes crémeuses à la truffe et pommes soufflées- Filet of beef (blonde d’Aquitaine breed), covered with leaves of plane trees then cooked (the meat cooked rare as /per my request) on wood fire. Those leaves do enhance the barbequey flavor of that meat. Wood fire cooking (which is the cooking method they did use to cook this filet of beef) is my preferred cooking method for red meats as its resulting delicate and enjoyable smoky flavor appeals to me. On the palate and to the smell, the smoky flavor was actually subtle, but as a result of using wood fire and cooking the meat under the leaves, I could appreciate the depth of the flavor of the meat. I was afraid that the addition of grapes would not work with the jus de viande, but the taste of the grapes  was barely noticeable, and fulfilled its mission of adding depth to the jus de viande. Flawless jus de viande, timely simmered, precisely reduced. This was not a dull piece of filet. 7/10

With the filet de boeuf, they served some pommes soufflées cooked to order, executed in a way that exemplary pommes soufflées do look, feel and taste like (spectacularly light, with an exquisite crisp and superlative fresh potato flavour. Bring back the poetic description, Chef! Roll the drums! I love when French classics are mastered this well. 10/10), as well as a very good purée of pommes de terres agria/truffles (8/10).

Le Gâteau Mollet du Marquis de Béchamel et la Glace Fondue à la Rhubarbe – The dessert I wanted to try at Les Prés d’Eugénie was the labor intensive and technically difficult (to compose) soufflé «Roulé-Boulé», but it was not available. I went with my second choice, the Gâteau Mollet du Marquis de Béchamel. This is a hybrid dessert (part soufflé, part crème renversée — the crème renversée barely cooked, essentially made with a hot water bath sweet bechamel) created by Pastry Chef Jérôme Chaucesse (when he used to work at Les Prés d’Eugénie as he does not work there anymore), served with a rhubarb ice cream and a raspberry coulis. The raspberry coulis responding really well to all the components of that cake, especially to the caramel sauce flavor. The soufflé part looks like a “soufflé failure”, but that was intentional. Consequently, you will not eat this cake with “your eyes”, but a palate that has long been familiar with classic French desserts will appreciate that every single component of Le Gâteau Mollet du Marquis de Béchamel was of the extraordinary sort: for sure, it is not rocket science to make a sweetened bechamel, a caramel sauce, a soufflé, etc, but what IS rocket science is to deliver benchmark versions of those, which is what the pastry team at Les Pres d’Eugenie did with their Gateau mollet. There was wit, a very high level of classic French pastry technique and, on the palate, an intensity of flavor to never forget. 10/10

Canelés surprises à l’armagnac/ tartelettes aux fraises (mini strawberry tarts) /madeleines, all freshly baked, as expected from a restaurant of this standing. I have heard about the superb work of the pastry team at Les Prés d’Eugénie, and I can tell you that it lived up to the hype, with exceptional sourcing and skills. A benchmark tartelette aux fraises (10/10), an equally perfected mini madeleine 10/10). The canelés (rum was replaced by armagnac)   were also great (8/10).

Pros: One great Classic French 3 star Michelin.
Cons: The Zephyr de truffe, on this lunch,  so close … yet so far

Bottom line: Chef Guerard, 84 years old, is, naturally, not cooking anymore. But what I like, in France, it is how serious those legends (Guerard, Bocuse) are about their legacy. They have the best MOFs working for them (Chef Olivier Brulard, in the case of Les Prés d’Eugénie – Chef  Brulard  spent some time at La Réserve de Beaulieu where he earned 2 michelin stars, after years alongside real culinary illuminaries and legendary Chefs such as Alain Chapel, Jacques Maximin, Gaston Lenotre)  and it shows in the very high level of classic French cooking technique on display.

My thoughts, days later: A high level dining experience, where you are interacting with friendly people. The ambience is relaxing. Food is great. Not too far, the cattle of blonde d’Aquitaine is grazing on emerald green grass. Stay in this village, Eugenie les Bains, for a day, walk in the countryside, rediscover the civilized manner of saying “hi” with a genuine smile to people you do not know (an aggression in most big cities,lol), smell corn (there are vast fields of corn to feed the cattle of Blonde d’Aquitaine) the way it used to smell and feel before the big industries have decided that chemical elements are necessary for their growth. And If you are a foodie, there are couple of eateries in the village. They have small hotels of far superior quality than most of the so-called budget hotels of our big cities,  and I did spot a farm in the village, with some serious foie gras. A destination, indeed.

Le Coucou, New York (April 2017)

The cooking at Le Coucou (Addr: 138 Lafayette St, New York; Phone +1 212-271-4252) has been making headlines around New York  since the  opening of the restaurant in June 2016, with rave reviews  from New York’s major sources of information on their local restaurants: Time Out New York, New York Times, Zagat, Forbes, The Infatuation, Grubstreet, Village Voice and the Wall Street Journal. The Chef , Daniel Rose from Chicago, was an apprentice at Bruneau, when the restaurant was bestowed with 3 Michelin stars (Bruneau  has a sole Michelin star nowadays)  and trained under the supervision of 3 star Michelin Chef   Yannick Alleno (Yannick now owns a duo of 3 star Michelin restaurants in France,  Alléno Paris au Pavillon Ledoyen as well as Le 1947 in Courchevel) . Daniel, who  also owns successful restaurants Spring and Chez la vieille in Paris, is offering Classic French cooking at Le Coucou.

I made it difficult for Le Coucou. I went there on a Monday, generally a quiet evening, when the best cooks of a kitchen brigade tend to stay at home. I decided not to take their most popular dishes (pike quenelles, tout le lapin, bourride). I brought the Missus, a hard-to-please diner. And the star Chef, Daniel Rose was not present. When the meal started, I was certain that I was going to corner the bird (as per the logo of the restaurant, Coucou is ..obviously…a bird) and accuse it of not living up to its hype. I was wrong. Le Coucou fought back, and the bird went on cruising at exceptional altitudes.  This  is, right now, a destination restaurant in New York serving some of the very best French fares outside of France. And it happens to have an interior that is very easy on the eyes.

 

I wanted to visit Le Coucou since a  long time, but it is a very popular restaurant and snatching a seat for dinner, here,  can be a bit tricky (they start taking reservations at midnight, 28 days prior to the day you want to book). For pictures of the interior, click here.  Everything else that you need to know about the restaurant is concisely described in this Zagat’s post, therefore I will focus on the food I was sampling.

Here are the food items we did order:

Oysters from Washington DC /seaweed butter – fresh maritime flavor. This, although pleasant, its sourcing great, its execution without reproach…was not going to help me understanding the hype about Le Coucou. 6/10

Endives/ham – Endives salad, with dried Iberico ham, served with a grapefruit vinaigrette. A superlative vinaigrette with fresh acidity and vibrant flavor of the sort that many restaurants have long forgotten about. That vinaigrette, as well as the rest of the condiments will be showered with praises, deservedly so, but the overall salad, although enjoyable, was not going to leave any lasting impression. Upon finishing this dish, all I had in mind, is the picture of Le coucou, that small unimpressive bird…though, do not get me wrong: the endives and oysters were made by a competent kitchen brigade, I am not denying that. But in light of the hype, I was expecting more. 6/10

I chose the veal tongue / golden ossetra caviar / creme fraiche – a thick slab of veal tongue, firm in consistency, with, of course, some room for proper chew. This is how a certain generation of French used to prefer their veal tongue. A feeling of a bistrot of la ´France rurale’. I appreciate that Daniel brought such memories back. 8/10 for the quality veal tongue, 10/10 for the dazzling (and pertinent, to this dish) homemade creme fraiche (it is rare for a creme fraiche at a top French table, in North America, ​to be packed with such exciting lactic freshness).

The Missus did opt for the Lobster salad, lettuce – on the side a dazzling lobster sauce mixed with egg yolk. 10/10 for that sauce. Perfectly well grilled small piece of tasty quality lobster. 7/10 for the lobster. Hard to tell when you look at the picture above, but there was a big lettuce, next to a tiny piece of lobster ..and that did not sit well with me (quite a weird sight, I found). May as well call it “lettuce salad” …. “avec un soupcon de queue de homard” ….

Lamb rack (carré d’agneau), egg plants, tomatoes stuffed with “choulder and chard” – faultless cooking with requested medium-rare doneness achieved successfully, quality lamb from Colorado, first-rate lamb jus sauce (mixed with red wine). 8/10 for the lamb, 10/10 for that exciting lamb jus. Clearly, this saucier is crazy … ;)

Prime filet of beef/bone marrow jus/oxtail potatoes – served with a dazzling sauce bordelaise (10/10), the filet mignon of superb quality (8/10),

Braised oxtail / potatoes boasting superlative textures and flavor. This would NOT be out of place at  a serious classic French 3 star Michelin table (10/10).

Cheeses (Aretheusa Blue, O’bannon Goat, Overjarige gouda, Hooligan, Red Hawk) of good quality, from several parts of the US as well as abroad, all served with a first rate sauce of plum/ porto. When sauces are done this well, all I can say is that “you are a first-rate french restaurant”!

Wine service and selection is of prime mention, here.

For desserts, we had:

Riz au lait (rice pudding) — My idea of the perfect riz au lait is the one that Bistrot Le Casse -Noix did serve me, years ago, in Paris. When it comes to the rice pudding, I do not like too many extra ingredients. At le Coucou, Le riz au lait comes with extra ingredients: chartreuse, pistachio. This rice pudding was still enjoyable with one flavor profile that some French of a certain generation will remember, only it is revisited and was well made (6/10)

Roasted pineapple is a simple dessert, consequently there is no shortage of decent roasted pineapples at good restaurants. What’s rare, though, are roasted pineapples that stand out. For some reason, the equation roasted pineapple=quality pineapple+dazzling flavors is an equation that is not taken as seriously as it should by many kitchen brigades. Mind you, who is going to blame a Chef, in the west, for not losing a sleep over some tropical fruits? Le Coucou is one rare restaurant, in the west, that does not underestimate that aspect, as the pineapple that they did use seemed to have been carefully hand picked at its optimal stage of ripeness. The roasted pineapple was served  with a yellow chartreuse sorbet and a touch of olive oil. This roasted pineapple was packed with memorable fruity aromas, a benchmark of its kind (10/10)

We also had a technically flawless  chiboust (impossibly light and delicate), with well judged meringue to pastry cream ratio. 9/10

As well as a coconut financier  with exciting fresh coconut flavor. The coconuts are from the Caribbean and are grated for their  financier. The sourcing of the coconut was not an afterthought, the technique of high level (9/10).  The talented Pastry Chef Daniel Skurnick, who worked previously for some of this globe’s best restaurants (The River Café, Jean-Georges)  is their current Pastry Chef.

Pros: First-rate updated French sauces. A meal as well as an overall dining experience with many highlights!
Cons: Coucou mon coucou, for my pineapple juice, may I suggest that you use that same outstanding pineapple you did use to make the ananas roti? Also:  c’mon folks…..that lobster / lettuce menu item…I mean…c’mon, that is more “coucou” the unimpressive bird than a “crowned eagle” …Lol.

The hospitality standards are up there with what the grand tables of this planet have to offer, minus the heavy decorum that can be found in some houses. The restaurant has a tiny but prettily decorated bar at the entrance. On the wall of that bar (you cannot sit there, btw), a painting that will remind you of Provence. It is the kind of bars you see in movies. The rest of the decor is lavishly styled, with chandeliers, candles on every table, large glass windows, vaulted ceiling, a modern open kitchen.

Overall food rating: 9/10 (Categ: Fine dining, Top tier French restaurant outside of France, Top tier restaurant in New York) –  Hey, mon Coucou, I have no clue if your sauces are always as dazzling as on the evening of my visit, but with sauces of this caliber… , I am flying, too!!!

Bottom line: I made it difficult for Le Coucou. I went there on a Monday, generally a quiet evening, when the best cooks of a kitchen brigade tend to stay at home. I decided not to take their most popular dishes (pike quenelles, tout le lapin, bourride). I brought the Missus, a hard-to-please diner. And the star Chef, Daniel Rose was not present. When the meal started, I was certain that I was going to corner the bird and accuse it of not living up to its hype. The oysters and anchovies were fine, but given the hype, they did not deliver the emotions we came for, therefore I was determined to “pluck the feathers” of the bird. But Le coucou fought back, and the bird went on cruising at exceptional altitudes. By the time the beef filet and carré d’agneau (rack of lamb) arrived at our table, the bird was out of reach, really high in the skies. Then the desserts were served, and I received a note, falling from the sky “coucou, I am not… I am actually a crowned eagle, ca te va? ” Crowned eagle, you are, buddy! Can’t agree more. Ca me va! Hype is always too much, generally impossible to live up to, but Le Coucou deserves its reputation. It is, right now, a destination restaurant serving some of the very best French fares outside of France. And it happens to have an interior that is very easy on the eyes. I loved Le Coucou!

What I think weeks later: Daniel Rose is a TRUE / REAL Chef. You know you are dealing with a REAL Chef when his absence is not felt at all. That is because GREAT Chefs will never leave a kitchen in the hands of poorly trained cooks. I have no clue where Daniel was, on that evening, but if he happened to be at a bar, in the carribbean, sipping a pina colada while I was dining at his restaurant..I swear, I would take a plane, right away, fly to his hideaway and thank him…which, if you are familiar with this blog, is not my normal reaction in such circumstance. Lol. But that is the thing: Daniel is a GREAT Chef! Michelin, please continue to stay away…Le Coucou is a bird that is great, the way it is right now, free from the ridiculous rules that have killed so many talents. Please, please …  DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT, dear Michelin! Go elsewhere. Lol  UPDATE: In NOVEMBER 2018,  Michelin did award a star to le Coucou, which I hope is not going to be the beginning of the end for this restaurant – sometimes,  some restaurants do not have a star because they are way more inspired, creative and superior than those having the stars…then they gain their stars and are stuck in a formula…Good luck dear Coucou!

 

 

 

L’Ambroisie, Paris – A gift from the above!

 

 

 

 

 

 

L’Ambroisie, Paris

Event: Lunch at restaurant L’Ambroisie, Paris
When: Friday March 25th 2011 12:30
Michelin stars: 3
Addr: 9, pl des Vosges Paris, France (4e arrondissement)
URL: https://www.ambroisie-paris.com/
Phone: Phone: 01-42-78-51-45
Type of cuisine: Classic french

Overall Food rating : 10/10 Superlative flavours, benchmark textures.
Service: 10/10 As “perfected” as their food and overall dining experience.
Overall Dining experience: 10/10 Everything, on this lunch, was of superior 3 star Michelin standards
Food rating: Exceptional (10), Excellent (9), Very good (8), Good (7)

 

To quote the late il Maestro Gualtiero Marchesi, one of my top favourite Chefs around the world: ”’A melody is composed only of the necessary notes’. L’Ambroisie, on this lunch was profoundly melodious. Our lives are defined by moments. This was a moment. A moment of two hours and a half , transcendent and memorable. For those in the know, it would not be hard to understand anyone who would argue that this is, right now, the best French 3 star Michelin in the globe. Of this meal, I can certainly submit that even though perfection is a relative word,  “perfected” is how I would qualify this meal I had under their roof. Perfected in a way that is rare, even at such high level of dining, I meant.

 

I will, for this review on L’Ambroisie, seize the opportunity to elaborate a bit on my expectations, experiences and views on French cuisine in general, 3* Michelin Fine dining  and the Michelin guide in particular. I hope this will be useful to the  readers  of the current report.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As a long time  admirer of French fine dining, I have naturally sacrificed a big portion of my hard earned money in what France offers on the upper scale of its restaurant scene.  L’Ambroisie, along with Ledoyen, are the only Parisian 3* Michelin ventures that I had not  visited yet as of today (Ledoyen was finally visited yesterday). You’ll find more about my experiences with France’s haute cuisine in the next sections of this review, but for now I’ll start with the motivation that lead to  my consideration of  the Michelin red book: for years, I have carefully followed all type of restaurant reviews. ALL! … only to end up with SOME supposedly serious food columnists (I wrote “some” since NOT ALL  of them are concerned by  my reservations)  raving  over  restaurants where impressive pre-sold magic are  never found in the plates but  rather  in the   media buzz  itself (I do not mind buzz. It is necessary as a business /marketing tool, but back your buzz by matching  reality)! When you end up with supposedly serious professionals who themselves recognize that they are well known to those they are reviewing, you know it is about time to put an end to the circus. That reliability I was dearly seeking, I knew  I had  to  find it elsewhere!  That is how I started to trust Michelin. Not that it is a perfect system (there will never be a perfect system anyways), but at least it does what has to be done: anonymous reviews (instead of the friendly reviews of some) and a rigorous work of evaluating  excellence in food and dining experience. Michelin may have its detractors (who doesn’t?) , but I prefer discretion and serious work over annoying quest for celebritism through restaurant reviewing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Michelin being initially from France, I also tend to value its appreciations on … France’s restaurants. To some extent, its evaluations of French restaurants in general, whether they are in France or outside of France. I do not expect Michelin to be the specialist of non  French restaurants. But that’s just my personal expectations of  Bibendum’s works.

 

Many of the 3* Michelin France’s haute  dining —- that I partook in — have delivered some  moments of culinary amazement  (Michel Bras, when he was regularly behind  his stoves, that was   a true defining experience of 3* dining excellence in my opinion. Thought the same about  Michel Guérard, Olivier Roellinger, Gerard Besson,  Georges Blanc when they are / were  at  their very best). Chef Bernard Loiseau (had couple of meals cooked by him in 1992, 1993, 1997) , who unfortunately took his own life, will always be remembered too as one giant who has never failed to serve me what still rank, years later, among the best moments of all my Michelin starred meals (for those who went recently dining at his restaurant, please send me an email with details of  your own experience. I am curious to learn about the cooking of their current Chef, Monsieur Patrick Bertron).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Of course, I did also experience few  other  3* events that did not seduce, of which I could easily identify the major problems: usually it was either a hasty interest in modernizing the cuisine or a lack of clear culinary identity (this often  happens when the kitchen switches in between the hands of too many cooks or a Chef whose brigade is weak / lacking in leadership).

How do I choose a 3 Michelin star restaurant?

Most people I know won’t bother with careful long research on restaurants when it comes to  dining out. They  basically rely on opinions of who they think is enoughly reliable, even though this is clearly not a matter of reliability but of personal preferences as in  the preeminent and realistic long formula “”food enjoyment = personal expectations + knowing what you like Vs what you do not + what your palate has bookmarked as previous references + misc personal encounters during your diner + the ability of remaining humble enough to avoid unnecessary pretention +  how informed you were about the place you are dining at + what you have been eating before you head there + your state of mind + how open minded you are…and I’ll stop here, Lol! “””.  I can’t blame them (there are certainly other interests that deserve much attention), but my choice for a dinner goes through an absurdly (yeah, I’ve got to admit this…although I will always maintain such diligence) extended process: I read ALL, absolutely ALL possible comments, inform myself a lot about the Chef’s philosophy/creations/ background/achievements + the type of restaurant, its history, its style. I do the same, whenever it is possible, with the authors whose opinions  I read: enquiring about the style of dining he or she usually favors is one (among others)  essential piece of intelligence.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This dinner at L’Ambroisie is the result of a two years long  study on an impressive list of 3* Michelin tables around the world. Two years is time consuming, but I do not go to restaurants just for the sake of piling numbers (The  number of restaurants you visit says nothing about the quality of the dining experience you accumulate). I go to a restaurant for the adding value I presume the restaurant can bring to my personal dining experience.  Back to L’Ambroisie, it is interesting to note that  I could have picked restaurants on which there seems to exist more favourable conscensus. In Paris, if you do not want to miss the boat on the upper 3* Michelin starred dining echelon, just pick Guy Savoy, L’arpège or Alain Ducasse at Plaza Athénée. They are great: their food is consistently good and they treat you like you are a king. Exactly what we all should expect from an   expensive and haute  dining experience. But what attracts me to a restaurant is a combination of very precise factors: (1) food that has a chance to set some kind of new reference to my personal gustatory repertoire,  (2) food of a Chef mostly praised for that little touch that sets the truly talented cooks apart. And in the case of L’Ambroisie, there is also this reason: he –Bernard Pacaud – is one of the last chefs from the nouvelle cuisine movement. There is nothing ‘’nouvelle’’ anymore with that culinary movement , but this is one type of cuisine that suited well with my palate. Before Chefs like Pacaud  retires (He is 64 yrs old ), I’d suggest anyone interested in French fine dining to try at least once in their life the cuisine of those  last pioneers of the nouvelle cuisine.

I  was lucky enough to fullfill this aim to sample the food of some of them:  Michel Guérard (I sampled his food in 2005 and 2006 at Les prés d’Eugénie in Aquitaine. I hope it is still as great as it used to be since I never went back since ), Bocuse’s Auberge du Pont de Collonges in Lyon (2006,2007,2008 All three meals were admittedly not among the best I ate, but they all featured some dishes with character that  still rank high among those I keep referring back to whenever I indulge in French haute dining), Alain Senderens whose food I tasted in 2004 and 2009, and of course the other Chefs that I mentioned previously.

 

The meal began ..NOT with their  usual expected  serving of classic French cheese based savory choux pastry from Burgundy (gougeres), BUT with

 

 

 

 

 

 

Langoustine, ananas, velouté de crustacés – The langoustine , in season  and  as fresh as it gets (which you have come to expect at this level of dining). It is rare that you will see me praising seafood at a high end restaurant as I grew up with the spectacular seafood of the Indian Ocean   right in front of my door, therefore  a fine dining restaurant, miles away from any sea or ocean, with its inflated cost …is hardly going to seduce me with its seafood offerings. I rarely order seafood at a high end restaurant as I know that it  cannot match the seafood of my childhood both on the front of the quality  as well as the price (this was an amuse-bouche , therefore not ordered from the menu ). It does not help that I have always found  langoustine not as worthy of my attention as lobsters .  Langoustines are members of the lobster family, but they are tinier than lobsters and (for my taste), not as flavourful (langoustine is …less flesh to put in your mouth, anyways,  therefore less to ..savour, obviously). Alas,  lobsters are no longer “trendy” at high end restaurants, langoustines are. That said,  I can only trade in facts: although  the precise cooking of that langoustine (perfectly firm and meaty, moist as it should)  is to be expected, L’Ambroisie managed to make the point that I was eating at a 3 star Michelin restaurant by never allowing that offering to leave a “mundane” impression:  a little  ‘brunoise‘ of carefully handpicked prime  pineapple (mixed with dices of green, red peppers) as well as a superlative velouté (exciting crustacean flavours) were benchmark examples of what they should feel, taste and look like even by the very high standards of this level of dining.  10/10

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chaud froid d’oeuf mollet au cresson , asperges vertes, caviar oscietre gold– The oeuf mollet (poached egg – the egg is  successfully half cooked as it should)  was covered with a layer of watercress sauce (I enjoyed  the interesting kick brought by the sourness of the watercress to the egg)  and served along asparagus (they have mastered the doneness of the vegetable pretty well) and caviar (typical oscietra thin flavor, a rich quality salty fish roe   as I expect at  such heavy  price). A dish that has been perfected to deliver memorable deliciousness. 10/10

 

On the side, I was served with their:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oeuf en coque: Many  high end French restaurants have their version of  the “boiled egg” appetizer. Since it is  seemingly easy to do (a boiled egg, right?), they tend to overwork it with ridiculous flavour combinations. Chef Pacaud’s “Oeuf en coque” managed to be a sublime take on the “Oeuf en coque” by relying on spectacular sourcing (it is rare that you will find an egg of such spectacular quality even at the best 3 star Michelin restaurants) and an unusually  “gifted palate” — so to speak — (even, by the highest standards of fine dining that this restaurant is competing…you will rarely get to the conclusion that “wow…whoever has cooked my food has an exceptional palate”. That does not happen as often  as  you may think…). It may sound surreal to be impressed by some boiled egg, but few, even at this level of dining,  are capable of  an exciting “Oeuf en coque” (you had  all the essence of an Oeuf en coque, boosted  with the simplicity of fresh chives, nothing else, but delivered with an emphasis on bold, fresh  delicious and memorable flavours) 10/10

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sea bass and artichoke atop a caviar (Ocietra gold from Iran) white butter sauce –  Sea bass has always been one of my favorite fish (especially the Chilean sea bass, with pan roasting being my #1 cooking method for fish). The seabass was nicely cooked (perfect moist interior) and tasted great (it is amazing how this ugly fish can taste good ;p).  The butter sauce had great textural quality, balance between its ingredients (shallots, white wine), and  enough acidity (coming from the sauce’s white wine) to control its richness . The mild flavor of the artichokes (sliced artichoke hearts) paired  well with the sauce and the quality of the sturgeon’s processed salted roe was at its finest. Overall, a dish that is technically without reproach  (you can see that each step of the preparation of that fish was well-timed) and more importantly delicious. 8/10.

 

DESSERT:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tarte fine sablée  au cacao amer, glace à la vanille bourbon – A chocolate” pie”, that is – to the contrary of what some online reviews have pointed out – not raw at all,  its topping  made of a powdery cocoa layer, its filling consisting of chocolate ganache and sabayon . The pie was  served with a side of vanilla ice cream (which, as expected at this level, was not going to be of  the run-of-the-mill sort. High grade fresh vanilla being used, the lactic fragrance coming straight  from … a dairyman’s dream). Pacaud uses a dark rich chocolate from celebrated Master chocolatier  Christian Constant. All in all, the pie showcased  a great deal of  technical skills  (the super delicate consistency of that pie)  and  reaffirmed  the recurrent  strong focus —that was met all along this entire repast — on making food tasting genuinely  delicious  (the filling of chocolate ganache + sabayon is a great idea, indeed, as it added  enticing layers of flavours) . 10/10

 

SERVICE: As “perfected” as their food and the overall dining experience. Madame Pacaud welcomes all her patrons, but even though  many wives of Chefs do the same, at restaurants, what sets her apart is her exceptional ability to talk to you with a genuine warmth and expression of care you will rarely experience with her competition. What is impressive, based on what I could observe, during this lunch,  is that she is able to do that with the same intensity whether you are a regular (a table nearby had regular diners) or someone she never saw before (me). Seems like the saying ‘‘just be yourself” works wonders in her case.  Not always an easy thing to get right, even by the high standards of hospitality expected at  high end restaurants, but she nails it. There was also Mr Pascal, the Maître d’Hôtel on this lunch, a classy gentleman and experienced  professional who is easily among the very best at what he does. For sure, that is what one needs to expect at this dining level, but even  by those lofty standards, he stands out from the pack.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DECOR:
If like me, you are fond of baroque style , then L’Ambroisie interior will appeal. I noticed the Aubusson tapestries that I kept hearing about when informing myself on L’Ambroisie (http://www.finehomecrafts.com/aubusson-tapestries.htm), the marble floors, paintings.  It is not  as grandiose as I had once anticipated, but extremely charming.

PROS:  I think that Bernard Pacaud’s  cooking (he was cooking on this lunch) is the finest haute French food that has ever blown away my taste buds since Joel Robuchon and Frédy Girardet have  retired. To my taste, this  overall dining experience on Friday March 25th at L’Ambroisie is exactly what reaches out to my own definition of the pinnacle of a 3 star Michelin dinner.

CONS: Nothing that  comes to mind.

CONCLUSION:  My definition of ‘’great food’’ turns around a  combination of   80% from  the natural talent of the Chef (the personal touch of an exceptionally skilled artisan, whatever magic his personal impulsive genius can generate, the s-o-u-l of the Chef!!)  + 20%  that will come from the quality of the ingredients. Basta! The rest (whatever philosophy, vision is great for both the Chef himself on a personal level and/or his marketing team) is theoretical.

There is an important distinction between talent and personal touch:

a Chef can be technically skilled (mastering various cooking methods, cooking at the correct temperature, with the right ingredient combinations, etc) but his food lacking in terms of soul (ever wonder why out of a team of highly talented chefs, cooking the exact same dish, with the exact same ingredients, there is always one or two who still manage to elevate the dish  to some kind of gustatory reference?). Passion? It should already be part of the personality of a great Chef  or else he has no business being a chef. Great ingredients? Absolutely, but in the hands of a non talented chef, they worth nothing.

Going there, I was looking for great cuisine that is taking no risks nor trying to be trendsetting (“dated” in not part of my vocabulary. Good or bad food are), but that is delectable and heartwarming. Going there, I was expecting Bernard Pacaud, a Chef widly praised  for his exceptional talent, to make a good impression on me. Fortunately, I got all of  of that at this restaurant.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The overall  may boast an impressive price tag, which most (opinions over the web + among those close to me who are regulars of Paris haute dining  ) have agreed on, but the most important was delivered:  food that  was superbly D-E-L-I-C-I-O-U-S!  Many Michelin 3-star dinings have pleased me, but I can count with the fingers of my hands the few remarkable moments  when food was as savourish as on this one lunch.  Now that I’ve visited all current Parisian 3 Michelin star establishments –Le Doyen and L’Ambroisie being the only two that I had not visited up to this day (luckily, there are not that many and no newer Parisian 3 star have emerged lately), I can confidently state that L’Ambroisie is — at this moment —- my personal choice for #1 best Parisian three Michelin star (for the record, L’Arpège used to be my personal #1 for a long time, in Paris) .

L’Ambroisie reaches out to my dining expectations and philosophy:  I am not one interested in whatever theatrical or conceptual aspect of food. It is food and its main duty has to be fulfilled: it has to storm my palate for its superior savourishness.  They did it with the highest mastery one might expect at this level of cooking, shining with equal excellence on both the savories and the desserts. But L’Ambroisie went way beyond that:  this type of  decor, the service (elegant, serious and focused) , the way the sommelier did his work  (grace and efficiency),  absolutely everything went in line with what I expect from the best 3-star michelin   ventures.

 

 

 

 

 

If you came to me with such a statement as “””this is currently the best classic Haute french michelin 3 star in operation in the world”’,   I’d reply that  ”’I concur with you””!  This one specific lunch was simply divine. The price? No..No..No..I won’t reveal it simply because as human beings, we tend to overwhelm excellence by material value. Which is not an issue when the experience is average (in which case, I see the $$$ in BOLD!! Rfaol!), but when it is exceptional — as it was with this one specific lunch at L’Ambroisie — I will never let numbers overshadow exceptional dining occurence!

 

 

 

 

 

 

There was,  on this lunch, a feel of remarkable  grace and  profound commitment  for   ultimate delicious  food   that will mark my souvenirs for a long time.

Wishing  you this  same amazement!

 

WHAT I THINK MONTHS LATER:  Bernard Pacaud was behind the stoves on that lunch, and I regret to have discovered him so late at a stage where he is close to retirement.  Well, at least I had this priviledge because this is what I consider as a priviledge:  skills so exceptional that they pertain to my top 5 all time favourite Chefs of the globe, alongside Joel Robuchon, Jacques Maximin, Constant,  Girardet,  Besson.  Again, I never tried this place when Bernard Pacaud is not behind the wheels, so I can talk only for this one instance.

L’Ambroisie, Paris

 

 

 

 

 

 

L’Ambroisie, Paris

Event: Lunch at restaurant L’Ambroisie, Paris
When: Friday March 25th 2011 12:30
Michelin stars: 3
Addr: 9, pl des Vosges Paris, France (4e arrondissement)
URL: https://www.ambroisie-paris.com/
Phone: Phone: 01-42-78-51-45
Type of cuisine: Classic french

Overall Food rating : 10/10  Superlative flavours, benchmark textures.
Service: 10/10 As “perfected” as their food and overall dining experience.
Overall Dining experience: 10/10 Everything, on this lunch, was of superior 3 star Michelin standards
Food rating: Exceptional (10), Excellent (9), Very good (8), Good (7)

 

To quote the late  il Maestro Gualtiero Marchesi, one of my top favourite Chefs around the world: ”’A melody is composed only of the necessary notes’. L’Ambroisie, on this lunch was profoundly melodious. Our lives are defined by moments. This was a moment. A moment of two hours and a half , transcendent and memorable. For those in the know, it would not be hard to understand anyone who would argue that this is, right now, the best French 3 star Michelin in the globe. Of this meal, I can certainly submit that even though perfection is a relative word,  “perfected” is how I would qualify this meal I had under their roof. Perfected in a way that is rare, even at such high level of dining, I meant.

 

I will, for this review on L’Ambroisie, seize the opportunity to elaborate a bit on my expectations, experiences and views on French cuisine in general, 3* Michelin Fine dining  and the Michelin guide in particular. I hope this will be useful to the  readers  of the current report.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As a long time  admirer of French fine dining, I have naturally sacrificed a big portion of my hard earned money in what France offers on the upper scale of its restaurant scene.  L’Ambroisie, along with Ledoyen, are the only Parisian 3* Michelin ventures that I had not  visited yet as of today (Ledoyen was finally visited yesterday). You’ll find more about my experiences with France’s haute cuisine in the next sections of this review, but for now I’ll start with the motivation that lead to  my consideration of  the Michelin red book: for years, I have carefully followed all type of restaurant reviews. ALL! … only to end up with SOME supposedly serious food columnists (I wrote “some” since NOT ALL  of them are concerned by  my reservations)  raving  over  restaurants where impressive pre-sold magic are  never found in the plates but  rather  in the   media buzz  itself (I do not mind buzz. It is necessary as a business /marketing tool, but back your buzz by matching  reality)! When you end up with supposedly serious professionals who themselves recognize that they are well known to those they are reviewing, you know it is about time to put an end to the circus. That reliability I was dearly seeking, I knew  I had  to  find it elsewhere!  That is how I started to trust Michelin. Not that it is a perfect system (there will never be a perfect system anyways), but at least it does what has to be done: anonymous reviews (instead of the friendly reviews of some) and a rigorous work of evaluating  excellence in food and dining experience. Michelin may have its detractors (who doesn’t?) , but I prefer discretion and serious work over annoying quest for celebritism through restaurant reviewing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Michelin being initially from France, I also tend to value its appreciations on … France’s restaurants. To some extent, its evaluations of French restaurants in general, whether they are in France or outside of France. I do not expect Michelin to be the specialist of non  French restaurants. But that’s just my personal expectations of  Bibendum’s works.

 

Many of the 3* Michelin France’s haute  dining —- that I partook in — have delivered some  moments of culinary amazement  (Michel Bras, when he was regularly behind  his stoves, that was   a true defining experience of 3* dining excellence in my opinion. Thought the same about  Michel Guérard, Olivier Roellinger, Gerard Besson,  Georges Blanc when they are / were  at  their very best). Chef Bernard Loiseau (had couple of meals cooked by him in 1992, 1993, 1997) , who unfortunately took his own life, will always be remembered too as one giant who has never failed to serve me what still rank, years later, among the best moments of all my Michelin starred meals (for those who went recently dining at his restaurant, please send me an email with details of  your own experience. I am curious to learn about the cooking of their current Chef, Monsieur Patrick Bertron).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Of course, I did also experience few  other  3* events that did not seduce, of which I could easily identify the major problems: usually it was either a hasty interest in modernizing the cuisine or a lack of clear culinary identity (this oftently happens when the kitchen switches in between the hands of too many cooks or a Chef whose brigade is weak / lacking in leadership).

How do I choose a 3 Michelin star restaurant?

Most people I know won’t bother with careful long research on restaurants when it comes to  dining out. They  basically rely on opinions of who they think is enoughly reliable, even though this is clearly not a matter of reliability but of personal preferences as in  the preeminent and realistic long formula “”food enjoyment = personal expectations + knowing what you like Vs what you do not + what your palate has bookmarked as previous references + misc personal encounters during your diner + the ability of remaining humble enough to avoid unnecessary pretention +  how informed you were about the place you are dining at + what you have been eating before you head there + your state of mind + how open minded you are…and I’ll stop here, Lol! “””.  I can’t blame them (there are certainly other interests that deserve much attention), but my choice for a dinner goes through an absurdly (yeah, I’ve got to admit this…although I will always maintain such diligence) extended process: I read ALL, absolutely ALL possible comments, inform myself a lot about the Chef’s philosophy/creations/ background/achievements + the type of restaurant, its history, its style. I do the same, whenever it is possible, with the authors whose opinions  I read: enquiring about the style of dining he or she usually favors is one (among others)  essential piece of intelligence.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This dinner at L’Ambroisie is the result of a two years long  study on an impressive list of 3* Michelin tables around the world. Two years is time consuming, but I do not go to restaurants just for the sake of piling numbers (The  number of restaurants you visit says nothing about the quality of the dining experience you accumulate). I go to a restaurant for the adding value I presume the restaurant can bring to my personal dining experience.  Back to L’Ambroisie, it is interesting to note that  I could have picked restaurants on which there seems to exist more favourable conscensus. In Paris, if you do not want to miss the boat on the upper 3* Michelin starred dining echelon, just pick Guy Savoy, L’arpège or Alain Ducasse at Plaza Athénée. They are great: their food is consistently good and they treat you like you are a king. Exactly what we all should expect from an   expensive and haute  dining experience. But what attracts me to a restaurant is a combination of very precise factors: (1) food that has a chance to set some kind of new reference to my personal gustatory repertoire,  (2) food of a Chef mostly praised for that little touch that sets the truly talented cooks apart. And in the case of L’Ambroisie, there is also this reason: he –Bernard Pacaud – is one of the last chefs from the nouvelle cuisine movement. There is nothing ‘’nouvelle’’ anymore with that culinary movement , but this is one type of cuisine that suited well with my palate. Before Chefs like Pacaud  retires (He is 64 yrs old ), I’d suggest anyone interested in French fine dining to try at least once in their life the cuisine of those  last pioneers of the nouvelle cuisine.

I  was lucky enough to fullfill this aim to sample the food of some of them:  Michel Guérard (I sampled his food in 2005 and 2006 at Les prés d’Eugénie in Aquitaine. I hope it is still as great as it used to be since I never went back since ), Bocuse’s Auberge du Pont de Collonges in Lyon (2006,2007,2008 All three meals were admittedly not among the best I ate, but they all featured some dishes with character that  still rank high among those I keep referring back to whenever I indulge in French haute dining), Alain Senderens whose food I tasted in 2004 and 2009, and of course the other Chefs that I mentioned previously.

 

The meal began ..NOT with their  usual expected  serving of classic French cheese based savory choux pastry from Burgundy (gougeres), BUT with

 

 

 

 

 

 

Langoustine, ananas, velouté de crustacés – The langoustine , in season  and  as fresh as it gets (which you have come to expect at this level of dining). It is rare that you will see me praising seafood at a high end restaurant as I grew up with the spectacular seafood of the Indian Ocean   right in front of my door, therefore  a fine dining restaurant, miles away from any sea or ocean, with its inflated cost …is hardly going to seduce me with its seafood offerings. I rarely order seafood at a high end restaurant as I know that it  cannot match the seafood of my childhood both on the front of the quality  as well as the price (this was an amuse-bouche , therefore not ordered from the menu ). It does not help that I have always found  langoustine not as worthy of my attention as lobsters .  Langoustines are members of the lobster family, but they are tinier than lobsters and (for my taste), not as flavourful (langoustine is …less flesh to put in your mouth, anyways,  therefore less to ..savour, obviously). Alas,  lobsters are no longer “trendy” at high end restaurants, langoustines are. That said,  I can only trade in facts: although  the precise cooking of that langoustine (perfectly firm and meaty, moist as it should)  is to be expected, L’Ambroisie managed to make the point that I was eating at a 3 star Michelin restaurant by never allowing that offering to leave a “mundane” impression:  a little  ‘brunoise‘ of carefully handpicked prime  pineapple (mixed with dices of green, red peppers) as well as a superlative velouté (exciting crustacean flavours) were benchmark examples of what they should feel, taste and look like even by the very high standards of this level of dining.  10/10

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chaud froid d’oeuf mollet au cresson , asperges vertes, caviar oscietre gold– The oeuf mollet (poached egg – the egg is  successfully half cooked as it should)  was covered with a layer of watercress sauce (I enjoyed  the interesting kick brought by the sourness of the watercress to the egg)  and served along asparagus (they have mastered the doneness of the vegetable pretty well) and caviar (typical oscietra thin flavor, a rich quality salty fish roe   as I expect at  such heavy  price). A dish that has been perfected to deliver memorable deliciousness. 10/10

 

On the side, I was served with their:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oeuf en coque: Many  high end French restaurants have their version of  the “boiled egg” appetizer. Since it is  seemingly easy to do (a boiled egg, right?), they tend to overwork it with ridiculous flavour combinations. Chef Pacaud’s “Oeuf en coque” managed to be a sublime take on the “Oeuf en coque” by relying on spectacular sourcing (it is rare that you will find an egg of such spectacular quality even at the best 3 star Michelin restaurants) and an unusually  “gifted palate” — so to speak — (even, by the highest standards of fine dining that this restaurant is competing…you will rarely get to the conclusion that “wow…whoever has cooked my food has an exceptional palate”. That does not happen as often  as  you may think…). It may sound surreal to be impressed by some boiled egg, but few, even at this level of dining,  are capable of  an exciting “Oeuf en coque” (you had  all the essence of an Oeuf en coque, boosted  with the simplicity of fresh chives, nothing else, but delivered with an emphasis on bold, fresh  delicious and memorable flavours) 10/10

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sea bass and artichoke atop a caviar (Ocietra gold from Iran) white butter sauce –  Sea bass has always been one of my favorite fish (especially the Chilean sea bass, with pan roasting being my #1 cooking method for fish). The seabass was nicely cooked (perfect moist interior) and tasted great (it is amazing how this ugly fish can taste good ;p).  The butter sauce had great textural quality, balance between its ingredients (shallots, white wine), and  enough acidity (coming from the sauce’s white wine) to control its richness . The mild flavor of the artichokes (sliced artichoke hearts) paired  well with the sauce and the quality of the sturgeon’s processed salted roe was at its finest. Overall, a dish that is technically without reproach  (you can see that each step of the preparation of that fish was well-timed) and more importantly delicious. 8/10.

 

DESSERT:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tarte fine sablée  au cacao amer, glace à la vanille bourbon – A chocolate” pie”, that is – to the contrary of what some online reviews have pointed out – not raw at all,  its topping  made of a powdery cocoa layer, its filling consisting of chocolate ganache and sabayon . The pie was  served with a side of vanilla ice cream (which, as expected at this level, was not going to be of  the run-of-the-mill sort. High grade fresh vanilla being used, the lactic fragrance coming straight  from … a dairyman’s dream). Pacaud uses a dark rich chocolate from celebrated Master chocolatier  Christian Constant. All in all, the pie showcased  a great deal of  technical skills  (the super delicate consistency of that pie)  and  reaffirmed  the recurrent  strong focus —that was met all along this entire repast — on making food tasting genuinely  delicious  (the filling of chocolate ganache + sabayon is a great idea, indeed, as it added  enticing layers of flavours) . 10/10

 

SERVICE: As “perfected” as their food and the overall dining experience. Madame Pacaud welcomes all her patrons, but even though  many wives of Chefs do the same, at restaurants, what sets her apart is her exceptional ability to talk to you with a genuine warmth and expression of care you will rarely experience with her competition. What is impressive, based on what I could observe, during this lunch,  is that she is able to do that with the same intensity whether you are a regular (a table nearby had regular diners) or someone she never saw before (me). Seems like the saying ‘‘just be yourself” works wonders in her case.  Not always an easy thing to get right, even by the high standards of hospitality expected at  high end restaurants, but she nails it. There was also Mr Pascal, the Maître d’Hôtel on this lunch, a classy gentleman and experienced  professional who is easily among the very best at what he does. For sure, that is what one needs to expect at this dining level, but even  by those lofty standards, he stands out from the pack.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DECOR:
If like me, you are fond of baroque style , then L’Ambroisie interior will appeal. I noticed the Aubusson tapestries that I kept hearing about when informing myself on L’Ambroisie (http://www.finehomecrafts.com/aubusson-tapestries.htm), the marble floors, paintings.  It is not  as grandiose as I had once anticipated, but extremely charming.

PROS:  I think that Bernard Pacaud’s  cooking (he was cooking on this lunch) is the finest haute French food that has ever blown away my taste buds since Joel Robuchon and Frédy Girardet have  retired. To my taste, this  overall dining experience on Friday March 25th at L’Ambroisie is exactly what reaches out to my own definition of the pinnacle of a 3 star Michelin dinner.

CONS: Nothing that  comes to mind.

CONCLUSION:  My definition of ‘’great food’’ turns around a  combination of   80% from  the natural talent of the Chef (the personal touch of an exceptionally skilled artisan, whatever magic his personal impulsive genius can generate, the s-o-u-l of the Chef!!)  + 20%  that will come from the quality of the ingredients. Basta! The rest (whatever philosophy, vision is great for both the Chef himself on a personal level and/or his marketing team) is theoretical.

There is an important distinction between talent and personal touch:

a Chef can be technically skilled (mastering various cooking methods, cooking at the correct temperature, with the right ingredient combinations, etc) but his food lacking in terms of soul (ever wonder why out of a team of highly talented chefs, cooking the exact same dish, with the exact same ingredients, there is always one or two who still manage to elevate the dish  to some kind of gustatory reference?). Passion? It should already be part of the personality of a great Chef  or else he has no business being a chef. Great ingredients? Absolutely, but in the hands of a non talented chef, they worth nothing.

Going there, I was looking for great cuisine that is taking no risks nor trying to be trendsetting (“dated” in not part of my vocabulary. Good or bad food are), but that is delectable and heartwarming. Going there, I was expecting Bernard Pacaud, a Chef widly praised  for his exceptional talent, to make a good impression on me. Fortunately, I got all of  of that at this restaurant.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The overall  may boast an impressive price tag, which most (opinions over the web + among those close to me who are regulars of Paris haute dining  ) have agreed on, but the most important was delivered:  food that  was superbly D-E-L-I-C-I-O-U-S!  Many Michelin 3-star dinings have pleased me, but I can count with the fingers of my hands the few remarkable moments  when food was as savourish as on this one lunch.  Now that I’ve visited all current Parisian 3 Michelin star establishments –Le Doyen and L’Ambroisie being the only two that I had not visited up to this day (luckily, there are not that many and no newer Parisian 3 star have emerged lately), I can confidently state that L’Ambroisie is — at this moment —- my personal choice for #1 best Parisian three Michelin star (for the record, L’Arpège used to be my personal #1 for a long time, in Paris) .

L’Ambroisie reaches out to my dining expectations and philosophy:  I am not one interested in whatever theatrical or conceptual aspect of food. It is food and its main duty has to be fulfilled: it has to storm my palate for its superior savourishness.  They did it with the highest mastery one might expect at this level of cooking, shining with equal excellence on both the savories and the desserts. But L’Ambroisie went way beyond that:  this type of  decor, the service (elegant, serious and focused) , the way the sommelier did his work  (grace and efficiency),  absolutely everything went in line with what I expect from the best 3-star michelin   ventures.

 

 

 

 

 

If you came to me with such a statement as “””this is currently the best classic Haute french michelin 3 star in operation in the world”’,   I’d reply that  ”’I concur with you””!  This one specific lunch was simply divine. The price? No..No..No..I won’t reveal it simply because as human beings, we tend to overwhelm excellence by material value. Which is not an issue when the experience is average (in which case, I see the $$$ in BOLD!! Rfaol!), but when it is exceptional — as it was with this one specific lunch at L’Ambroisie — I will never let numbers overshadow exceptional dining occurence!

 

 

 

 

 

 

There was,  on this lunch, a feel of remarkable  grace and  profound commitment  for   ultimate delicious  food   that will mark my souvenirs for a long time.

Wishing  you this  same amazement!

 

WHAT I THINK MONTHS LATER:  Bernard Pacaud was behind the stoves on that lunch, and I regret to have discovered him so late at a stage where he is close to retirement.  Well, at least I had this priviledge because this is what I consider as a priviledge:  skills so exceptional that they pertain to my top 5 all time favourite Chefs of the globe, alongside Joel Robuchon, Jacques Maximin, Constant,  Girardet,  Besson.  Again, I never tried this place when Bernard Pacaud is not behind the wheels, so I can talk only for this one instance.

L’Ambroisie, Paris – A gift from the above!

 

 

 

 

 

 

L’Ambroisie, Paris

Event: Lunch at restaurant L’Ambroisie, Paris
When: Friday March 25th 2011 12:30
Michelin stars: 3
Addr: 9, pl des Vosges Paris, France (4e arrondissement)
URL: https://www.ambroisie-paris.com/
Phone: Phone: 01-42-78-51-45
Type of cuisine: Classic french

Overall Food rating : 10/10 Superlative flavours, benchmark textures.
Service: 10/10 As “perfected” as their food and overall dining experience.
Overall Dining experience: 10/10 Everything, on this lunch, was of superior 3 star Michelin standards
Food rating: Exceptional (10), Excellent (9), Very good (8), Good (7)

 

To quote the late il Maestro Gualtiero Marchesi, one of my top favourite Chefs around the world: ”’A melody is composed only of the necessary notes’. L’Ambroisie, on this lunch was profoundly melodious. Our lives are defined by moments. This was a moment. A moment of two hours and a half , transcendent and memorable. For those in the know, it would not be hard to understand anyone who would argue that this is, right now, the best French 3 star Michelin in the globe. Of this meal, I can certainly submit that even though perfection is a relative word,  “perfected” is how I would qualify this meal I had under their roof. Perfected in a way that is rare, even at such high level of dining, I meant.

 

I will, for this review on L’Ambroisie, seize the opportunity to elaborate a bit on my expectations, experiences and views on French cuisine in general, 3* Michelin Fine dining  and the Michelin guide in particular. I hope this will be useful to the  readers  of the current report.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As a long time  admirer of French fine dining, I have naturally sacrificed a big portion of my hard earned money in what France offers on the upper scale of its restaurant scene.  L’Ambroisie, along with Ledoyen, are the only Parisian 3* Michelin ventures that I had not  visited yet as of today (Ledoyen was finally visited yesterday). You’ll find more about my experiences with France’s haute cuisine in the next sections of this review, but for now I’ll start with the motivation that lead to  my consideration of  the Michelin red book: for years, I have carefully followed all type of restaurant reviews. ALL! … only to end up with SOME supposedly serious food columnists (I wrote “some” since NOT ALL  of them are concerned by  my reservations)  raving  over  restaurants where impressive pre-sold magic are  never found in the plates but  rather  in the   media buzz  itself (I do not mind buzz. It is necessary as a business /marketing tool, but back your buzz by matching  reality)! When you end up with supposedly serious professionals who themselves recognize that they are well known to those they are reviewing, you know it is about time to put an end to the circus. That reliability I was dearly seeking, I knew  I had  to  find it elsewhere!  That is how I started to trust Michelin. Not that it is a perfect system (there will never be a perfect system anyways), but at least it does what has to be done: anonymous reviews (instead of the friendly reviews of some) and a rigorous work of evaluating  excellence in food and dining experience. Michelin may have its detractors (who doesn’t?) , but I prefer discretion and serious work over annoying quest for celebritism through restaurant reviewing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Michelin being initially from France, I also tend to value its appreciations on … France’s restaurants. To some extent, its evaluations of French restaurants in general, whether they are in France or outside of France. I do not expect Michelin to be the specialist of non  French restaurants. But that’s just my personal expectations of  Bibendum’s works.

 

Many of the 3* Michelin France’s haute  dining —- that I partook in — have delivered some  moments of culinary amazement  (Michel Bras, when he was regularly behind  his stoves, that was   a true defining experience of 3* dining excellence in my opinion. Thought the same about  Michel Guérard, Olivier Roellinger, Gerard Besson,  Georges Blanc when they are / were  at  their very best). Chef Bernard Loiseau (had couple of meals cooked by him in 1992, 1993, 1997) , who unfortunately took his own life, will always be remembered too as one giant who has never failed to serve me what still rank, years later, among the best moments of all my Michelin starred meals (for those who went recently dining at his restaurant, please send me an email with details of  your own experience. I am curious to learn about the cooking of their current Chef, Monsieur Patrick Bertron).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Of course, I did also experience few  other  3* events that did not seduce, of which I could easily identify the major problems: usually it was either a hasty interest in modernizing the cuisine or a lack of clear culinary identity (this oftently happens when the kitchen switches in between the hands of too many cooks or a Chef whose brigade is weak / lacking in leadership).

How do I choose a 3 Michelin star restaurant?

Most people I know won’t bother with careful long research on restaurants when it comes to  dining out. They  basically rely on opinions of who they think is enoughly reliable, even though this is clearly not a matter of reliability but of personal preferences as in  the preeminent and realistic long formula “”food enjoyment = personal expectations + knowing what you like Vs what you do not + what your palate has bookmarked as previous references + misc personal encounters during your diner + the ability of remaining humble enough to avoid unnecessary pretention +  how informed you were about the place you are dining at + what you have been eating before you head there + your state of mind + how open minded you are…and I’ll stop here, Lol! “””.  I can’t blame them (there are certainly other interests that deserve much attention), but my choice for a dinner goes through an absurdly (yeah, I’ve got to admit this…although I will always maintain such diligence) extended process: I read ALL, absolutely ALL possible comments, inform myself a lot about the Chef’s philosophy/creations/ background/achievements + the type of restaurant, its history, its style. I do the same, whenever it is possible, with the authors whose opinions  I read: enquiring about the style of dining he or she usually favors is one (among others)  essential piece of intelligence.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This dinner at L’Ambroisie is the result of a two years long  study on an impressive list of 3* Michelin tables around the world. Two years is time consuming, but I do not go to restaurants just for the sake of piling numbers (The  number of restaurants you visit says nothing about the quality of the dining experience you accumulate). I go to a restaurant for the adding value I presume the restaurant can bring to my personal dining experience.  Back to L’Ambroisie, it is interesting to note that  I could have picked restaurants on which there seems to exist more favourable conscensus. In Paris, if you do not want to miss the boat on the upper 3* Michelin starred dining echelon, just pick Guy Savoy, L’arpège or Alain Ducasse at Plaza Athénée. They are great: their food is consistently good and they treat you like you are a king. Exactly what we all should expect from an   expensive and haute  dining experience. But what attracts me to a restaurant is a combination of very precise factors: (1) food that has a chance to set some kind of new reference to my personal gustatory repertoire,  (2) food of a Chef mostly praised for that little touch that sets the truly talented cooks apart. And in the case of L’Ambroisie, there is also this reason: he –Bernard Pacaud – is one of the last chefs from the nouvelle cuisine movement. There is nothing ‘’nouvelle’’ anymore with that culinary movement , but this is one type of cuisine that suited well with my palate. Before Chefs like Pacaud  retires (He is 64 yrs old ), I’d suggest anyone interested in French fine dining to try at least once in their life the cuisine of those  last pioneers of the nouvelle cuisine.

I  was lucky enough to fullfill this aim to sample the food of some of them:  Michel Guérard (I sampled his food in 2005 and 2006 at Les prés d’Eugénie in Aquitaine. I hope it is still as great as it used to be since I never went back since ), Bocuse’s Auberge du Pont de Collonges in Lyon (2006,2007,2008 All three meals were admittedly not among the best I ate, but they all featured some dishes with character that  still rank high among those I keep referring back to whenever I indulge in French haute dining), Alain Senderens whose food I tasted in 2004 and 2009, and of course the other Chefs that I mentioned previously.

 

The meal began ..NOT with their  usual expected  serving of classic French cheese based savory choux pastry from Burgundy (gougeres), BUT with

 

 

 

 

 

 

Langoustine, ananas, velouté de crustacés – The langoustine , in season  and  as fresh as it gets (which you have come to expect at this level of dining). It is rare that you will see me praising seafood at a high end restaurant as I grew up with the spectacular seafood of the Indian Ocean   right in front of my door, therefore  a fine dining restaurant, miles away from any sea or ocean, with its inflated cost …is hardly going to seduce me with its seafood offerings. I rarely order seafood at a high end restaurant as I know that it  cannot match the seafood of my childhood both on the front of the quality  as well as the price (this was an amuse-bouche , therefore not ordered from the menu ). It does not help that I have always found  langoustine not as worthy of my attention as lobsters .  Langoustines are members of the lobster family, but they are tinier than lobsters and (for my taste), not as flavourful (langoustine is …less flesh to put in your mouth, anyways,  therefore less to ..savour, obviously). Alas,  lobsters are no longer “trendy” at high end restaurants, langoustines are. That said,  I can only trade in facts: although  the precise cooking of that langoustine (perfectly firm and meaty, moist as it should)  is to be expected, L’Ambroisie managed to make the point that I was eating at a 3 star Michelin restaurant by never allowing that offering to leave a “mundane” impression:  a little  ‘brunoise‘ of carefully handpicked prime  pineapple (mixed with dices of green, red peppers) as well as a superlative velouté (exciting crustacean flavours) were benchmark examples of what they should feel, taste and look like even by the very high standards of this level of dining.  10/10

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chaud froid d’oeuf mollet au cresson , asperges vertes, caviar oscietre gold– The oeuf mollet (poached egg – the egg is  successfully half cooked as it should)  was covered with a layer of watercress sauce (I enjoyed  the interesting kick brought by the sourness of the watercress to the egg)  and served along asparagus (they have mastered the doneness of the vegetable pretty well) and caviar (typical oscietra thin flavor, a rich quality salty fish roe   as I expect at  such heavy  price). A dish that has been perfected to deliver memorable deliciousness. 10/10

 

On the side, I was served with their:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oeuf en coque: Many  high end French restaurants have their version of  the “boiled egg” appetizer. Since it is  seemingly easy to do (a boiled egg, right?), they tend to overwork it with ridiculous flavour combinations. Chef Pacaud’s “Oeuf en coque” managed to be a sublime take on the “Oeuf en coque” by relying on spectacular sourcing (it is rare that you will find an egg of such spectacular quality even at the best 3 star Michelin restaurants) and an unusually  “gifted palate” — so to speak — (even, by the highest standards of fine dining that this restaurant is competing…you will rarely get to the conclusion that “wow…whoever has cooked my food has an exceptional palate”. That does not happen as often  as  you may think…). It may sound surreal to be impressed by some boiled egg, but few, even at this level of dining,  are capable of  an exciting “Oeuf en coque” (you had  all the essence of an Oeuf en coque, boosted  with the simplicity of fresh chives, nothing else, but delivered with an emphasis on bold, fresh  delicious and memorable flavours) 10/10

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sea bass and artichoke atop a caviar (Ocietra gold from Iran) white butter sauce –  Sea bass has always been one of my favorite fish (especially the Chilean sea bass, with pan roasting being my #1 cooking method for fish). The seabass was nicely cooked (perfect moist interior) and tasted great (it is amazing how this ugly fish can taste good ;p).  The butter sauce had great textural quality, balance between its ingredients (shallots, white wine), and  enough acidity (coming from the sauce’s white wine) to control its richness . The mild flavor of the artichokes (sliced artichoke hearts) paired  well with the sauce and the quality of the sturgeon’s processed salted roe was at its finest. Overall, a dish that is technically without reproach  (you can see that each step of the preparation of that fish was well-timed) and more importantly delicious. 8/10.

 

DESSERT:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tarte fine sablée  au cacao amer, glace à la vanille bourbon – A chocolate” pie”, that is – to the contrary of what some online reviews have pointed out – not raw at all,  its topping  made of a powdery cocoa layer, its filling consisting of chocolate ganache and sabayon . The pie was  served with a side of vanilla ice cream (which, as expected at this level, was not going to be of  the run-of-the-mill sort. High grade fresh vanilla being used, the lactic fragrance coming straight  from … a dairyman’s dream). Pacaud uses a dark rich chocolate from celebrated Master chocolatier  Christian Constant. All in all, the pie showcased  a great deal of  technical skills  (the super delicate consistency of that pie)  and  reaffirmed  the recurrent  strong focus —that was met all along this entire repast — on making food tasting genuinely  delicious  (the filling of chocolate ganache + sabayon is a great idea, indeed, as it added  enticing layers of flavours) . 10/10

 

SERVICE: As “perfected” as their food and the overall dining experience. Madame Pacaud welcomes all her patrons, but even though many wives of Chefs do the same, at restaurants, what sets her apart is her exceptional ability to talk to you with a genuine warmth and expression of care you will rarely experience with her competition. What is impressive, based on what I could observe, during this lunch,  is that she is able to do that with the same intensity whether you are a regular (a table nearby had regular diners) or someone she never saw before (me). Seems like the saying ‘‘just be yourself” works wonders in her case.  Not always an easy thing to get right, even by the high standards of hospitality expected at  high end restaurants, but she nails it. There was also Mr Pascal, the Maître d’Hôtel on this lunch, a classy gentleman and experienced  professional who is easily among the very best at what he does. For sure, that is what one needs to expect at this dining level, but even  by those lofty standards, he stands out from the pack.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DECOR:
If like me, you are fond of baroque style , then L’Ambroisie interior will appeal. I noticed the Aubusson tapestries that I kept hearing about when informing myself on L’Ambroisie (http://www.finehomecrafts.com/aubusson-tapestries.htm), the marble floors, paintings.  It is not  as grandiose as I had once anticipated, but extremely charming.

PROS:  I think that Bernard Pacaud’s  cooking (he was cooking on this lunch) is the finest haute French food that has ever blown away my taste buds since Joel Robuchon and Frédy Girardet have  retired. To my taste, this  overall dining experience on Friday March 25th at L’Ambroisie is exactly what reaches out to my own definition of the pinnacle of a 3 star Michelin dinner.

CONS: Nothing that  comes to mind.

CONCLUSION:  My definition of ‘’great food’’ turns around a  combination of   80% from  the natural talent of the Chef (the personal touch of an exceptionally skilled artisan, whatever magic his personal impulsive genius can generate, the s-o-u-l of the Chef!!)  + 20%  that will come from the quality of the ingredients. Basta! The rest (whatever philosophy, vision is great for both the Chef himself on a personal level and/or his marketing team) is theoretical.

There is an important distinction between talent and personal touch:

a Chef can be technically skilled (mastering various cooking methods, cooking at the correct temperature, with the right ingredient combinations, etc) but his food lacking in terms of soul (ever wonder why out of a team of highly talented chefs, cooking the exact same dish, with the exact same ingredients, there is always one or two who still manage to elevate the dish  to some kind of gustatory reference?). Passion? It should already be part of the personality of a great Chef  or else he has no business being a chef. Great ingredients? Absolutely, but in the hands of a non talented chef, they worth nothing.

Going there, I was looking for great cuisine that is taking no risks nor trying to be trendsetting (“dated” in not part of my vocabulary. Good or bad food are), but that is delectable and heartwarming. Going there, I was expecting Bernard Pacaud, a Chef widly praised  for his exceptional talent, to make a good impression on me. Fortunately, I got all of  of that at this restaurant.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The overall  may boast an impressive price tag, which most (opinions over the web + among those close to me who are regulars of Paris haute dining  ) have agreed on, but the most important was delivered:  food that  was superbly D-E-L-I-C-I-O-U-S!  Many Michelin 3-star dinings have pleased me, but I can count with the fingers of my hands the few remarkable moments  when food was as savourish as on this one lunch.  Now that I’ve visited all current Parisian 3 Michelin star establishments –Le Doyen and L’Ambroisie being the only two that I had not visited up to this day (luckily, there are not that many and no newer Parisian 3 star have emerged lately), I can confidently state that L’Ambroisie is — at this moment —- my personal choice for #1 best Parisian three Michelin star (for the record, L’Arpège used to be my personal #1 for a long time, in Paris) .

L’Ambroisie reaches out to my dining expectations and philosophy:  I am not one interested in whatever theatrical or conceptual aspect of food. It is food and its main duty has to be fulfilled: it has to storm my palate for its superior savourishness.  They did it with the highest mastery one might expect at this level of cooking, shining with equal excellence on both the savories and the desserts. But L’Ambroisie went way beyond that:  this type of  decor, the service (elegant, serious and focused) , the way the sommelier did his work  (grace and efficiency),  absolutely everything went in line with what I expect from the best 3-star michelin   ventures.

 

 

 

 

 

If you came to me with such a statement as “””this is currently the best classic Haute french michelin 3 star in operation in the world”’,   I’d reply that  ”’I concur with you””!  This one specific lunch was simply divine. The price? No..No..No..I won’t reveal it simply because as human beings, we tend to overwhelm excellence by material value. Which is not an issue when the experience is average (in which case, I see the $$$ in BOLD!! Rfaol!), but when it is exceptional — as it was with this one specific lunch at L’Ambroisie — I will never let numbers overshadow exceptional dining occurence!

 

 

 

 

 

 

There was,  on this lunch, a feel of remarkable  grace and  profound commitment  for   ultimate delicious  food   that will mark my souvenirs for a long time.

Wishing  you this  same amazement!

 

WHAT I THINK MONTHS LATER:  Bernard Pacaud was behind the stoves on that lunch, and I regret to have discovered him so late at a stage where he is close to retirement.  Well, at least I had this priviledge because this is what I consider as a priviledge:  skills so exceptional that they pertain to my top 5 all time favourite Chefs of the globe, alongside Joel Robuchon, Jacques Maximin, Constant,  Girardet,  Besson.  Again, I never tried this place when Bernard Pacaud is not behind the wheels, so I can talk only for this one instance.

Restaurant L’eau à la bouche, Sainte-Adele: Take Two

Click here for a recap of  my picks of all Montreal’s top fine dining & best Montreal’s bistrots.
Also: My  3 and 2 Star Michelin restaurant review web site

Dinner at L’Eau à La Bouche, Sat Febr 27th 2010, 18:00PM
3003 Boulevard Sainte-Adèle
Sainte-Adèle  (Québec)
Phone: 450 229 2991
URL: http://www.leaualabouche.com/
Particularity: A Relais & Chateaux restaurant
Type of dining: Upscale market cuisine / French Fine dining

 

THIS RESTAURANT IS PERMANENTLY CLOSED –  THIS REVIEW IS KEPT ONLINE FOR HISTORICAL DOCUMENTATION

 

 

 Second visit at Restaurant L’eau à la bouche, Sainte-Adele in the Laurentides (in between Montreal and Tremblant). As most already know, this is the restaurant of star chef Anne Desjardins and one of the very few  Relais & Chateaux tables of Eastern Canada/Quebec. L’Eau à la Bouche is one of QC’s very top best fine dining tables along with Hotel Saint-James XO Le Restaurant, Toque! / Nuances in Montréal, Initiale in Quebec City, Quintessence in Tremblant. Last time we dined there, that was on February 13th 2009 (ref: click here for my review of that dinner) and that tasting menu we had back then was simply stunning. We were excited to see if this magic would perpertuate and went this time again with their tasting menu.

Kicked off with an Ok Rhum coco/blood orange/grapefruit:
 Rhum coco/blood orange/grapefruit: Ok, satisfying cocktail (7/10). A second cocktail of gin/tonic (10/10) was more memorable.

Next came a mise en bouche of:

 Wild mushroom/chives/creme fraiche potage: evenly seasoned, not too creamy not too light, enjoyably slightly peppery with the chives adding a nice touch to the earthiness of the whole potage. Welcoming refreshing touch from the crème fraiche. Good. 8/10

Followed by:
 Smoked trout from Sainte-Agathe crème fraiche, horseradish, wakamé, roasted sesame seeds – The cold smoked fish’s flesh sported an ideal pink texture. The trout was oozing with it’s enjoyable natural strong flavour. The sweet, smoky flavor of the fish was delightfully enhanced by the mix of the creme fraiche and horseradish that provided an excellent kick to the smoked trout (although common — horseradish/creme fraiche acompanying smoked fish is common affair— this was more importantlyl very tasty). 10/10 for the match Smoked Trout/Horseradish/Creme Fraiche.
Wakame: Crunchy, fresh  and tasty. Drizzling it with the sesame seeds was a great touch and turned out to be a convincing great work of taste. On it’s own, it was excellent, but not a convincing accompaniment to the smoky trout.
Precision of the cooking: 5/5 (The trout ont it’s own was nicely smoked)
Tastyness: 5/5  for the taste of the trout, same for each other element on their own
Complexity: Medium
Overall Value: 4/5
Pairing wine: Sauvignon Blanc 2008, Reserva Selection Limitée , Montes – Vallée de Leyda, Chile
It is a wine unknown to me, which is exactly what I seek for since I love discovering wines. And it turned out as a welcoming surprise to my tastebuds: nice medium-bodied mineral wine, aromatic with a nose of grass and enjoyably fruity aromas too (my tastebuds sensed aromas of litchi and cantaloup). I love this white wine: it’s aromatic, intense. To my tastebuds, this balanced so well with the smoky aspect of the trout. Great wine pairing.

 Fresh duck foie gras from “la Canardière” “au torchon”, celery, honey caramel  – To be honest, although “au torchon” preparations keep most part of the taste/flavors of the foie, I am more a fan of pan-seared foie (especially the ones concocted by Toque!, Bistro Cocagne and APDC. I have always said that Laprise-Loiseau-Picard have among the best techniques of pan-seared foie gras concoctions. L’Eau à la Bouche’s pan-seared foie on my 1st dinner there in Febr 2009 was also a blast, sharing actually the position of best pan-seared I ever had on a fine dining table — here & abroad’s included — with the item #3 of the last dinner at Toque!). It just blows my tastebuds way more than the “au torchon” version. To make matter worst, I really had average experiences in Mtl & surroundings with most preparations of the “au torchon” version (even at upscale restaurants, with only the one I had last summer at M Sur Masson being a highlight  (it was tiny in portion, but oh so intense and of high quality) along with the one at Toque!, too.
As to this one, the pate consistency was ideal: beautifully velvety, not too firm, not mushy  and enjoyably meaty, like I expect my au torchon foie gras to be. The La Canardière foie gras is a truly top quality foie produced in QC’s region of L’Estrie.
Tastyness: Excellent freshness + superior quality of the foie  reflected in this lovable tasty au torchon foie gras in it’s simplest splendour. The honey caramel was delicious and complemented so well the foie.
Overall Value: for the top quality foie gras, this is definitely of nice value. As for the accompaniment, I’d skip only the celery (not to be seen as a reproach here: the celery –you can see it at the bottom of the picture— adds actually a cute textural visual balance to the overall dish, was good and fresh on it’s own but not quite complementing the foie, to my tastebuds opinion) but the honey caramel was simply divine!
My only suggestion: put more complexity into the 3 pieces of toasts, for ie offer 1 honey-flavored baked toast, another one could be spice bread..etc. 8/10

–See how they cook one stands to me as the best pan-seared foie I ever tasted on any upscale fine dining table, here and abroad included.

Pairing wine: Gaillac Doux 2006, Grain de Folie Douce, Causses Marines – although I know so well this wine (one favourite of mine), I do also appreciate seeing it served on a restaurant table. It’s a great wine full of intensity, dense, with  aromatic nose of   prune, honey, currant, and an enjoyable long finish. Solid value. As for the pairing, it tuned out, in mouth, as  nice match to the foie (Undoubtly even better with some pan-seared foie gras).

Served in a tajine:

 Roasted squab, risotto, wild and cultivated mushrooms, cooking jus, tonka bean and mint –

 Roasted squab – There are some few meats that are victims of severe judgements from my tastebuds  like Squabs and Quails, courtesy — perhaps— to the fact that I seldomly get to eat them and many cooks managed to somehow serve it either bland or try to my table. The rewarding aspect of this stands in the fact that whenever  it impresses me, the squab or quail had to be an exceptional exercice of cooking mastery and tastebud wonder (well, to my tastebuds of course!).
This simple preparation of theirs perfectly accented the natural flavors of the fowl, the pigeon’s meat had the ideal texture, slight smoky-ness and tasty meaty juicy-ness. Delicious tender squab taht kept it’s gamey taste intact. The squab was roasted to perfection. 10/10 for the roasted squab.
I feel a bit uncomfortable when judging risottos: I have been perfectionning this at home for years, at least once a month, so needless to stress that in such circumstances you are afraid to be harsh on judging others risottos. Fortunately, I can be completely detached from that aspect and fully focus on someone else’s risotto as my tastebuds sense it. This  risotto was delicious and delicate on it’s own, not mushy but at ideal al-dente consistency, sporting a nice texture, ideal creaminess, delicious taste and enhanced by a subtle enjoyable citrus aroma. 8.5/10 for this risotto. The risotto I had last year at Restaurant Primo & Secondo in Montreal  is still KING, but the Desjardins are doing a really good job at this, too.
The mushrooms brought the right level of earthiness to balance with the earthy-tone of the squab meat.
Complexity: Honestly, High. Think about how time-consuming and fussy a risotto can be. I know, this is a big league restaurant and surely a simple affair for them, but it is still not as simple as 1,2,3 + it takes a considerable level of focus, patience and skills to make a delicious risotto. This was definitely not our so called easy easy home made risottos. Add to this, the master cooking behind that flawless roasted pigeon + the righful balance of flavors in there.8/10
 Pairing wine: Niagara Escarpment VQA 2006, Gamay, Malivoire Wine. Being profoundly attached to  France’s terroir wines, I mistakenly left canadian wine sleeping a bit under my radars, and this was a nice reminder to look also this side of the world since some solid nice wines have made their way for a while, now. Unfortunately, this very specific 2006 Malivoire made of Gamay grapes was disappointing to my tastebud: it lacked body (way too light-bodied for me) and character. Slight nose of rosemary, tannic, just not as delicate and aromatic as I wished.

 Wild Boar,  roasted contre-filet, braised shoulder, rutabaga and butternut squash, cranberry and green pepper corn sauce – The best Boar dish I ever had since a long time was the braised Boar I devoured at LCCP on Nov 13th 2009 (It’s the Braised Boar / See course #4 of that dinner): that was pure cooking genius and a stunning concerto of decadent flavors/textures/tastes. Since then, I had my share of satisfying, but not memorable, boar dishes at many restaurants this side of the border. So I was looking forward to taste  L’Eau à la Bouche’s take on the Boar: the meat came in two ways: roasted (tender and flavorful) + braised (even more enjoyable to my tastebuds since it was packed with deeper flavors and tasted great. In both versions, the meat was nicely tenderized, and they manage to skillfully avoid the easy dry-ness this meat can easily indulge into. Nice work too on keeping the natural gamey taste of the meat.  8/10
Pairing wine: Palacio de Ibor Reserva Valdepeñas 2004.  It’s a wine from the Spaniard’s region of Castilla de la Mancha. Appelation Valdepenas. This affordable tempranillo (made from a small portion of Cabernet Sauvignon, too) wine (off side note: if you are seeking for nice value wines, this one is a great value red wine for the $$$, btw ) is packed with a nice tannic presence, has low acidity, a nice structure and remarquable enjoyably fruity (cherry) notes + aromas of coffee. Nice complexity. Liked it, especially with the Boar meat ( found it to pair nicely with this meat).

 “Heirloom” beet salad, creamy goat cheese, ham salt, roasted nuts  – The quality of the beet is remarquable here. Nicely boiled, the various types of beets tasted great and the work of textures at display on this dish is appealing to the eyes. The creamy goat cheese was tasty. Roasted nuts adding an enjoyable nutty touch to the overall. A simple dish, with a homey feel.
Pairing wine: Arbois 2005, Béthanie, Fruitière Vinicole d’Arbois. It’s a France’s region of Jura (Sub region of Arbois) Chardonnay that I know very well. Very affordable rich fruity wine, with fine minerality, citrus aromas. Paired naturally well with the beets salad dish.

Before I conclude with the dessert, try this  highly recommendable 1986 Château-Chalon Yellow wine if you get a chance:

The dessert:

 Mango and litchi, coconut “macaron”, mango jelly  – I have a huge weak spot for tropical fruits. Mango and litchis are among those I like the most. Last year, L’eau à la bouche won my heart with an amazing…roasted pineapple marvel (hi..hi..I told you: those tropical fruits drive me nuts! Rfaol!). This time, it sounded as interesting too with such thing like mango jelly and coconut macaron and I was looking for my tastebuds to interpret this all: although enjoyably flavorful , the macaron (6/10) was too dry and too crunchy. In the middle, a sorbet of litchi (delicious, rich and memorable 10/10) and on the far right a mango brunoise (6/10 Just ok).

SO, Voilà! My last year’s tasting menu at L’Eau à la Bouche (ranked #1ex aequo personal top dinner at all Mtl and surroundings restaurants of my 2009-2010 exercise) was more on the ‘upscale fine-dining’ range whereas this year’s (ranked #15  personal top dinner at all Mtl and surroundings restaurants of my 2009-2010 exercise)  pertains to the ‘upscale bistro-esque’ repertoire. Either way, L’Eau à la Bouche can deliver some of the top finest dining experiences of this province (on this dinner, most patrons at neighboring tables who picked some of the à la carte menu items had experienced the full potential of the huge fine dining talent of this table, so do not rely solely on the bistro-esque trend of my latest tasting menu).

IMPECCABLE WORLD CLASS SERVICE, AWESOME SOMMELIER
What a charming wait staff: sociable, extremely accomodating and professional. Exactly what I do expect from a Relais & Chateaux (Remarquable High standard of customer service). And charming they are: At some point, our sommelier of the evening, Valerie (who does, by the way, an awesome work at patiently describing and elaborating on each wine), learned from my part that I was charmed one year earlier by the poetic presentation of wines made by Mr Pierre, who has been one star of the restaurant for almost 22 years. She made sure that Mr Pierre appeared at my table towards the end of the dinner. Awesome charming touch!

CHARMING COUNTRYSIDE INTERIOR DINNING ROOM
As you already know from the Febr 13th 2009 report, the interior decor is simple, small, with low ceilings and above all, in perfect harmony with the basics of French countryside interiors  that it naturally has to relate to. Although simple looking, it has a charming elegance to it. Let’s go through a little visual tour of it all:

As soon we got in, we faceda small little bar where a welcoming staff (smiley, sociable) welcomed us:

As I wrote earlier on, the dining room has a cute countryside interior type of decor:

 

 

 

 

 

PROS: This is indeed in the top 3 finest tables of Quebec Province. All the top tables supposedly as great or greater than this one have failed to prove me otherwise. I am not talking about value for my bucks here, but the ‘gourmet’ aspect in itself. So, the 1st meal (Febr 13th 2009) there was simply stunning. We had at our neighbouring table a couple who was familiar with this globe’s finest tables and they agreed that that meal (they were having the same tasting menu we have chosen) was of top 2 star Michelin standard even right at the heart of Michelin stardom: France. But…

CONS: But…the 2nd meal was inferior to the 1st (and this has nothing to do with the fact that the 1st occurence is always more ‘magical’). Talking about the 2nd meal, I do expect such top level dining venture to not miss a simple macaron. It is a forgivable slip given what they have proven on the 1st meal, but this should not happen. And when  you opt for something slighlty less ‘gourmet’ and more ‘bistro’ ( as it was the case with the tasting menu on the 2nd meal), I become less of a fan. Lastly, The ‘smoke trout’ and the ‘foie gras au torchon’ dishes would have benefited from a more elaborate  ‘gourmet’ concept/construction (they were too straightforwardly conceived for this level of dining). What justifies an outstanding gourmet level of dining is its complexity, done superbly well. I did not get such depth of successful complexity on this 2nd meal ..which I should expect at at such high $$$!

Cuisine et Dependance, Montreal

 

Event: Dinner at Cuisine et Dependance
Friday Oct 16th, 2009 5:30PM
Type of restaurant: Mix of Modern and Classic Bistro fare
4902 St.Laurent Blvd, Montreal, QC
http://www.cuisineetdependance.ca/
514-842-1500

 

THIS RESTAURANT IS NOW CLOSED – THIS REVIEW IS KEPT ONLINE FOR  HISTORICAL DOCUMENTATION

 

 

 This is one restaurant which sudden growing interest for (see page 9 of the Chatboard) had caught me by total surprise. Well, I know that their chef was a star back to the days of his old restaurant at St Augustin (I even  highly regarded him as one of Quebec’s best chefs based on the amazing job he did overthere), but when I heard he moved to Mtl and was doing bistro, I never manifested any particular interest since I prefer bistro-centric star chefs (M sur Masson’s Filiatreault, Michael Ross from Old Brunoise, Loiseau from Bistro Cocagne, etc) behind a .. bistro kitchen!

But I owe you a lot from your old time loyalty (already 10 years of following me all around!), so I said “Why not?”, specially for a bistro that has barely been reviewed by the next door foodies that most of us are (there are reviews on C&D by newspapers/magazine’s  food journalists, couple of comments here and there on the web, but apart one article that was once published on montrealfoodie.com — I think the article was retrieved since I do not see it anymore / pls correct me if I am wrong here — I haven’t yet read any next door foodie’s fully detailed review about this restaurant). To that regard, it was kind of interesting to break the ice. So, after the luxurious dinner of last Friday at XO, I was searching for a counter-balance: something more bistro-esque, this time! My heart said “Go to Mas Cuisine!!” (it’s about time I give Ross’s Brunoise successor a try…I can’t believe I’ve never been to this one!!), but another part of me whispered “Don’t forget the girls and boys who have been asking you to try C&D for them”. I went for the latest this Friday evening (Mas, I am coming at you soon!! believe me!).

Decor is minimalist (no heavy distracting decorations) and yet of stylish modern bistro type with an omnipresence of warm colors (green, brown, wall bricks painted in white) and darker ones (black, darker floor, dark roof). Very pretty decor, very airy (even when it is busy, you do not get that uncomfy feel of beeing jam packed)

and welcoming glass windows offering a perfect penetration of natural light:

They have both a fixe menu available everyday (basically, some menu items that were so popular that they decided to make available on a daily basis such as some delicatessen, ray wings, their very popular veal cheeks):

AND also a variable menu that changes daily (written on  paperboards):

The paperboard menus are very accessible and omnipresent, so you wont have to worry about beeing able to read the menu or not (anyway, the waiter re-explains the entire menu at the table).

I started by chosing a wine. As usual, I always go for a wine that I am not familiar with.
I went with the 2007 Corsican Fiumeseccu (Domaine d’Alzipratu)  red wine. This wine really gets better upon decantation. Some wines gets worst after they are decanted, but this was is the total opposite: at first, it sports a strange confusing acidic deep taste barely detectable berries, liquorice and peppery touch (really not that pleasant on the first 5 minutes, well at least not to my tastebuds)…then, it evolved gradually (10,15 minutes after it was decanted) into a  a nice wine suddently characterized by a pleasant light fruity and subtly spiced enjoyable good wine:

I picked a first appetizer of crab, called “Crabe tourteau”:
 This starter consisted of crab meat, nicely concocted in a light taragon-flavored delicious cream of mayo, sandwiched between two very tasty buttery slightly-toasted slices of “dodu du fromentier”‘s bread: the crab meat was amazingly fresh (as if it came right from the sea), tender, nicely seasoned, flavorful and very tasty. It was served along fresh mesclun baby leaves that were ideally crunchy on top of complementing perfectly well the crab meat. Refreshing and Delicious!
PS: Do not search far for what “Crabe Tourteau” is. “Crabe Tourteau” is just another naming for the big majority of some common crab species. It’s just “cuter/more inspired/etymologically richer” to put it as “Crab Tourteau” 10/10

I then picked a second  appetizer called “Tartelette de Boudin”:
 The blood sausage tart was surrounded by nice fresh green salad (amazingly light and tasty vinaigrette, Yeah..I could do that salad  at home, but hey this was very nice nevertheless), topped by tasty crunchy slices of fresh green apples (apple as a salad could be a wow. That is the case here!), a chunk of rich greasy bacon lardon (I could live without it..but it was irreproachably tasty). The two pieces of blood sausages were nicely concocted, had an awesome inside smoothness and was perfectly flavored. They were sitting on a flat savourish slightly enjoyable sweet biscuit topped by an intense rich and all flavorful onion fondue. I liked the precision both in terms of mouthfeel and cooking of that fondue: It was more of a jam of chopped pieces of onions, cooked to perfection with flawless  well balanced tastes and flavors. It’s when simple things are done so well that you measure the grandeur of a chef, and this is a perfect example of just that -> straightforward onion jam-alike fondue that’s very tasty. Not one flavor was outperforming here! The biscuit was light, had a heavenly enjoyable subtle buttery taste and was litteraly melting mouth crispy!A lot of great work here on this appetizer: various layers of tastes that paired so well between one another. 8/10

Then the braised veal cheeks:
 The braised veal cheeks were sitting on top of a nice rich creamy delicious potato purée. The cheeks were undeniably very tender and packed with remarkable flavors. Nicely cooked and delectable mouthfeel on top of being perfectly well seasoned. Not too salty, not too greasy, not lacking at all in terms of flavors. In the plate, there was a nice piece of beet (nicely crunchy,  lightly sweet) with carrots. I am not a big fan of veal cheeks, but since this is one of their signature dishes, I had to try it and this was definitely lovely. 7.5/10

Concluded with a vanilla pot de crème:
 The pot de crème was flawless on all accounts: light, rich  and delicious in taste. Topped by a nice little touch of little slices of nuts. 8/10

I also ended with a nice warm brazilian coffee:

Service:
I really liked the non formal, relax service provided by my waiter, Yves Larose. This gentleman is what I would qualify as an open minded intellectual with lots of outlooks on practically anything. Interesting person to talk to. And really passionate about what he does: he takes proud detailing each product and reminding how pure and natural they stand (I trust him: the freshness of the ingredients here are undeniable! As fresh as if there was a market and a fishermen’s village right in front of the restaurant!).

Jean-Paul Giroux is one of the few Chefs around the globe that I hold in high esteem. If I had to spend the rest of my life on a desert Island with just 3,5 Chefs to feed me, he would be among those very few. Because he has a great palate (not all Chefs do, believe me!), because he knows how to deliver the most important: delicious food. Because he knows how to deliver them: the simple way possible, but with remarkable palatable impact. Where some do  skip  many essential steps and are busy discovering the next trends of the moment, I remain convinced that great food needs no complex interventions but simplicity expressed with tremendous personal culinaric skills.

Bottom line: this is exactly what I am looking for when I go to a restaurant -> food that is profoundly delicious, executed with inspiration and talent by a Chef entirely dedicated to the ultimate purpose of dining: leaving pleasurable imprints on his customers palates.