Le Brun -- Restaurant Review

95 Rue Saint Honoré, 75001
Metro line #1 Louvre-Rivoli
Tel: 09 54 00 10 47
For hours of operation and entertainment information check their website
https://le-brun.fr/

Rating Standards: 5-Stars = Extraordinary; 4-Stars = Excellent; 3-Stars = Average; 2-Stars = Fair; 1-Star = Poor

€ = Inexpensive: 30€ and under; €€ = Moderate: 31€-49€; €€€ = Expensive: €50 -75; €€€€ = Very Expensive: more than €76 (prices based on minimum 2-courses)

1-Bell = Pleasantly quiet (less than 65 decibels); 2-Bells = Can talk easily (65-70); 3-Bells = Talking normally gets difficult (70-80); 4-Bells = Can talk only in raised voices (75-90); BOMB = Too noisy for normal conversation (90+)

3.5 - Star......................................................€€......................................................... 3 - Bell

Note: noise level will be high when band is playing. So if you want a quiet romantic dinner, this is not the place for you. 

This restaurant is somewhat located in a tourist area on "Rue Saint Honoré", but tonight I would say it was about 1/4 tourist and the rest French.  The restaurant is deceiving because it's quite large, it extends to the back, and downstairs there are more tables.

As we entered it was very warm and inviting. There was a bar and it looked like they stocked up pretty well. And unbeknownst to us there would later be a duo performing, one on a sax and clarinet, and another on the piano. It made dining so much more enjoyable since the kind of music that they were playing was "crooner" type of music.

If you make reservations ask for a table in the main dining room, so you can see the actual performers. If you are downstairs, although cozy, there are no windows, so the ambience is a little different.

We perused the menu and it looked really interesting. They gave us an English menu, but I asked for a French menu, because oftentimes the translation from French to English make no sense.  So for example in English it said "larded prawns" which actually meant prawns cooked in bacon.

Also note a little trivia. You see the little house emblem at bottom right hand page, that means everything is made on premises or "home made" (Fait Maison). As I mentioned in earlier blogs, many restaurants buy pre-made food from "costcos" for chefs (e.g., Metro) and claim it as their own So, the new laws are getting stricter this days. It lets you know if it's just being heated up or they actually cooked it on premises, I think this is a very good law.


ENTRÉE

Octopus carpaccio.  I have to say we were not very fond of this entrée. It was too confusing. We all agreed, separately the items would've been lovely, but together, you want scream out and tell the chef, "less is more". The mango gave the octopus an almost fluorescent yellow color. Not sure why the pomegranate seeds were added. Sometimes simple is more. The combination of textures, flavors was very confusing. It's like asking, "what the hell do you wanna be when you get older?' So, not a hit.






PLAT

Pork. The pork was confit'd, it was delicious. So moist and not at all dry. The fatty portion of the pork was melt in your mouth delicious. Although the rosemary was added I think as a garnish, I actually broke it up and used it to further flavor the pork. Overall, this was a simple confit'd pork and it was delicious. So, this dish was a hit.







Since I did not take pictures of the other main dishes I will not review then, but I did taste Jack's risotto and it was delicious.

We opted not to have dessert, but continue drinking and listing to this fabulous duo who crooned away.

WINE.  CHÂTEAU HAUT SELVE ROUGE 2015.  A Graves red wine with tassting notes of black fruits and peonies. Jack and the rest of the gang loved it. I drank a rosé from Provence.

















SUMMARY

I thought the ambience and the setting was quite lovely. The service was very good. They didn't rush because they knew that there would be entertainment for us later, and they didn't disappoint with this wonderful duo "crooners" who made our dinner special. Now onto the food.

Entrée of octopus, although not bad, was way too confusing for us. Did it want to be a simple entrée or was it fighting to be a fruit salad. Personally, I thought they should have gotten rid of the pomegranate, the texture against the octopus was not pleasant. It's not a horrible dish, but just poorly composed.

Plat. We had the pork, and I have to say the confi'd pork was excellent, tender and succulent, and the pieces of skin just melt in your mouth. So, this was a hit for me.

Although, I didn't like the entrée, overall it's a restaurant worth going back. I rated it higher because of the service, entertainment and the excellent plat.

We had 4-entrées, 4-plats, a bottle of wine, 3-glasses or rosé for 4 people and our bill came to 193€or 48.25€ a person. Very reasonable, considering you're also being entertained.

Au Bascou -- Restaurant Review

38 Rue Réaumur, 75003
Tél. : (+33) 1 42 72 69 25 
Metro: Arts et métiers. Lines 3, 11Check Website for operating hours
Website: http://www.au-bascou.fr/

Rating Standards: 5-Stars = Extraordinary; 4-Stars = Excellent; 3-Stars = Average; 2-Stars = Fair; 1-Star = Poor

€ = Inexpensive: 30€ and under; €€ = Moderate: 31€-49€; €€€ = Expensive: €50 -75; €€€€ = Very Expensive: more than €76 (prices based on minimum 2-courses)

1-Bell = Pleasantly quiet (less than 65 decibels); 2-Bells = Can talk easily (65-70); 3-Bells = Talking normally gets difficult (70-80); 4-Bells = Can talk only in raised voices (75-90); BOMB = Too noisy for normal conversation (90+)

3.25 - Star......................................................€€......................................................... 2 - Bell

I'm back. After a month long hiatus for most Parisians, looks like Paris is back to normal. How can most people tell? First of all, more people on the streets, stores and restaurants are reopening,  and it's almost impossible to find a seat on the metro, but that's city living.

So as soon as we returned, our friend J invited us out to lunch. Surprisingly, this restaurant was open on Monday, the first day of "La Rentrée".  As we got closer to the restaurant, I realized I had been there before. And, after entering, I immediately recognized it, since the interior had not changed, even though there has been a management change as well as a new chef de cuisine.

We perused the menu, they had a suggestion du jour as well as their regular menu on a chalk board. At first glance it looked well balanced and a nice selection.


ENTRÉE

Terrine de Campagne. (Country terrine). As a general rule, I really don't care for terrines, unless they're done really well. For the most part, for me anyway, it just tastes like compressed meat and/or fowl with some fat. But I have to say, I really enjoyed this terrine. It was well balanced with pieces of pistachios for texture. There were nice smooth and chunky elements, and the accompanying salad with the citrus cut some of the fat, so this was very good.

Pimentos del Piquillos Farci, Roquette (Stuffed red peppers with rocket). Simply and beautifully presented. The red peppers were skinned and very tender. It was stuffed with a sweet mash, and the accompanying salad, was a nice accompaniment, but honestly, I don't know why they called it a rocket salad, since I didn't see any arugula in the salad. Guess they must've run out and substituted it. A good, well composed starter.










PLATS

Caille Rôti, Mousseline. (Roasted quail and a mash).  Both Jack and I had this dish. Because I ordered a la carte, I had a larger portion whereas Jack had a smaller portion. I have to say I really liked this dish. I thought the meat was perfectly cooked and tender. The mash was a bit sweet for me, so I'm guessing he added sweet potatoes. Our friend J said he would've preferred the skin crispy versus a more braised version, I would agree that texturally it would've brought it to the next level. But overall, I thought it was a very tasty good dish. Reminded me of "Filipino chicken adobo" where the skin is not crispy.

Axoa de veau façon espelette Poterne vapeur. (Veal cooked in a clay pot). Axoa is a Basque dish which is typically mashed meat seasoned with espelette (Basque red pepper). I really enjoyed the sauce that it came in. However, I doubt it was veal, unless it was really old veal, because the meat seemed very stringy and rather than mashed meat, which is characteristic of "Aaxoa" the meat was in big chunks. The flavors were spot on, but the texture of the meat and chunks was questionable.


DESSERTS

Cheese. Ardi gasa, confiture a la cerise noire. (Basque sheep Cheese with black cherries confiture). One of my all time favorite cheese is sheep cheese. Probably because it's aged and has a nice salt component to it, and oftentimes crystallized. This was perfect cheese, full of flavor and the sweetness of the cherries added to it.

Sweet desserts: 

Tourtiere pomme et pruneau glace a la vanille. (Apple and prune tart with vanilla ice cream).  Jack ordered this dish and said it was a very good dessert, the crust was flaky and the filling had the right about of balance between the prunes and apples without being overly sweet.

Creme tendre au chocolat, espuma safran (Chocolate with foam of safran). At first I was trying to figure out what this dessert was. Was it a panna cotta, was it just whipped  cream. Then I discovered that "espuma" means foam in Spanish. So basically it was a foam of saffran, but it must've been a very mild application because I didn't really taste it, and chocolate pieces. I personally did not like the foam because I think of foam as an accompanied, but not as a main component of a dessert, but the chocolate pieces were fine.


WINES

We ordered a white and a red from the same vineyard.

WHITE. Ilori Les Jonquilles Irouleguy. Known for it's citrus notes, floral and fruitiness. I loved it.

RED. Brana Vigeron Ohitza 2016 Irougleguy. Known for its intense, small red fruits, spices. As for the palate, it has nice structure, creamy, chalky, and very balanced. The finish is aromatic and long.




SUMMARY

Not much has changed physically about the restaurant, from what I remembered the last time, granted from a different Chef, it still is a good restaurant. I thought the food was above average. The service was impeccable, but it also wasn't busy. It's in a great easy location in the "Le Marais".  With Basque food, I always think of the cuisine as being very hearty with influences from Spain and France. I personally enjoy it, since there's nothing pretentious about it. It's good wholesome food and depends a lot on the freshness of the products with a heavy emphasis on tomatoes and espelette.

The price ratio excellent, so overall I would go back. For 1-formule (included starter, plat, dessert), 1-entrée a la carte, 2-plats a la carte, 1-dessert a la carte, 2-bottles of wine and 1 coffee our bill came to 161€ or roughly 54€ per person, but also keep in mind 67€ of it was for the 2-bottles of wine, otherwise the price point would have been much, much lower.