French Holiday Part III

The third and final French summer holiday instalment! While I previously mentioned in my last post that we didn’t eat out much in the second week of our holiday, preferring to laze around our longere barbeucing anything and everything and stuffing our faces with French cheese and wine, we did go out for one ‘special’ evening meal. We had a mooch around nearby town La Chatre and clocked quite a few interesting looking eateries. In the end we plumped for one just tucked away down a cobbled side street from the main square, called Auberge A l’Escargot and were really glad we did so!

This was a proper French restaurant with starched linen tablecoth and napkins and a m’aitre d’!

First up we were treated to a dégustation of some sort of chilled fish mousse (I’m afraid my French wasn’t quite good enough to figure out exactly which fishy as the waiter rattled it off in quick fire French with a flourish!) with a little bite size parcel of goats cheese wrapped in filo pastry. The mousse was incredibly light and delicious and contrasted with the little crunch and then melt from the filo pastry and oozing goats cheese, yum!

Next up came our starters. I chose something called ‘Rouget Barbet’ which I think translates as red mullet. This was served cold with a mixed leaf and tomato salad, an intriguing olive oil cake, and two very cute little pots; one containing a lovely tangy and refreshing gazpacho, the other a selection of pickled vegetables. I really enjoyed all the different flavours and textures together, the whole thing felt really fresh and nourishing to eat.

Rob meanwhile got stuck into his pate a la maision which was served with both the usual toasts, and the less usual ginger cake (delicious!) as well red berry chutney and green salad.

Following a short break to enjoy our lovely local wine from a vineyard only a few miles down the road, we were presented with our mains. I plumped for the duck, one of my all time favourites. And it’s one of those meats which I find just never seems to be cooked as well in this country. So I had to take my opportunity! This lovely pink juicy magret de canard was crusted with sesame seeds and served with a perfectly sweet and moreish honey sauce, buttery herby new potatoes and some sort of puréed orange vegetable mousse (again, my French let me down here!), after much serious deliberation (slightly more tricky after half a bottle of wine) we decided it was most likely to be carrots, the fantastically sweet variety, rather than butternut squash or any other vegetable with the same hue.  However we were also both convinced it had some sort of nutty almost cheesy taste lurking at the back of the mouth…hhmm…. a touch of parmesan?! Or would that be too random?! Clearly we would fail the palate taste test on Masterchef! Still, my palate was more than capable of enjoying every little mouthful of this totally scrumptious dish. I didn’t want it to end. Some of the tastiest duck I’ve ever eaten (and I’ve eaten a fair bit!) I really enjoyed the honey sauce as something a little different from the more usual fruity pairing. Mmmm, more please?!

Rob’s steak was equally perfectly cooked and delicious, It was served with a polenta cake, chimichurri sauce and lots of glistening earthy mushrooms.

By the time it got around to dessert-ordering, I was preeeetttty stuffed, not having wanted to let any of the glorious food go to waste, I made sure I cleaned my plate each course! This meant I chose a dessert which I would normally have overlooked purely on the basis that I thought it would be the least filling (and of course I didn’t want to miss out!)

This was a millefeuille of chocolate wafers, strawberries and cream, served with a strawberry sorbet and strawberry sauce. While this was undeniably tasty, I have to say it didn’t quite live up to the standard set by the rest of the food up to this point. Perhaps my own fault for going ‘off-piste’ on my dessert choice!

Rob enjoyed a banana tarte tatin with caramel ice cream and a caramel sauce (I can’t get past classic apple tarte tatin, but this did make an interesting change!)

We rounded off the meal with a few little complimentary petit fours with our espresso. Itsy bitsy meringues with chocolate and some sort of cream and strawberry cups. I was beyond full, but managed to force down a taste of the little morsels (unfortunately before a picture was taken!) – they were only bite size, afterall!

All in all, a super French meal, which I would like to eat again! (especially the duck!!) I would highly recommed to anyone who was in the area!