A Fancy Dinner - with a twist

Christine and I decided to enjoy a vey nice, fancy dinner in Paris, thinking all the while of Lumiere from Disney's Beauty and the Beast: "After all this is France, and dinner here is never second best!"

We did a bit of research to find a restaurant that was romantic, delicious, and very well reviewed, eventually settling on a restaurant that serves purely French cuisine. Not only did the dinner turn out to be a fantastic evening, but also a bit entertaining as we broke a number of "rules" along the way - perhaps alienating the staff along the way.

We started off the evening by making a reservation. A simple task, one would think, but never the less, our very first mistake. Since we had arisen at 3-4 in the morning, we were a little ahead of the typical Parisian who seems to sleep in and get a late start to the day (I knew I was born in the wrong culture :) We tried to make our reservation for dinner at 6:00 in the evening, much to the shock and dismay of the Maitre D. Apparently the restaurant isn't even open that early and it's insulting to think that civilized people would eat dinner that early. We agreed on 7:30, a much more proper and fitting time to eat.

Upon arrival to the restaurant, spot on 7:30 and completely famished, we realized that we were the very first people to arrive. So we definitely stood out. After being seated a lovely table in very comfortable chairs, we made our second mistake. The waiter gave us an appertif menu to order some drinks to start, but being thirsty and used to traditional Canadian restaurants we asked for a couple of glasses of water to start - with ice. What ensued was a minute of Christine trying to say Glace (thinking Ice as Hovan loves very cold water) and the waiter saying Gas (thinking fizzy water). Finally breaching the cultural and linguistic barrier, it was agreed upon that we wanted water with Glacon (the proper term for ice). Much to the dismay of the very well attired, stiff waiter, he assumed the "barbarians" from North America (probably assuming we were American) just wanted free ice water as an apperitif. After getting our water we were finally in a happy postion to be able to order an appertif, cognac for Christine and Indian Tonic water for her teetotaler husband.

Now knowing and speaking french well enough, and knowing french to read fancy language about unique food dishes is a completely different story. We were able to understand what the essence of the dishes were, but not the finer details of the sauces, glazes, etc. We each ordered a 3 course meal. Christine received a tasty small dish of zucchini and other vegetables with a sharp cheese. It looked nice and tasted delicious. I received a lentil and bacon salad, and here is where portions started to become interesting. The waiter brought the lentil salad in a giant bowl, scooped some out and made a fancy design on my plate, looked good. Then he set down the bowl on the table and left. So here Christine had a nice petite salad, and Hovan had a serving bowl that could feed 4 people as an appetizer. It didn't help that they continued to deliver fresh bread with goose liver pate as soon as we finished off a previous batch. In the end between the two of us we hardly made a dent in the lentil salad.

The main course was a bit confusing as Christine ordered a duck dish only to have it turn out to be a fancy steak in a tasty glaze. My pork dish was served cold with an interesting cucumber sauce. Both were delicious, but neither was what we were expecting. The flavours of this restuarant were very good, but incredibly unique, I guess that's what we should expect from fancy French chefs. The main dishes came with these huge helpings of mashed potatoes, and I use the term potatoe lightly. The mashed potatoe was infused with butter, garlic, and a healthy portion of some cheese. The side dish was absolutely marvelous, but there was probably more cheese than potatoe and it was incredibly filling. Did I mention that it was a ridiculously large serving. In the end we couldn't even finish it all.

Meanwhile, as we are eating our meal, Christine keeps refilling her wine out of the wine bottle in the ice bucket, much to the dismay of the waiter. Apparently it is insultin his service skills that we don't think he is doing a good enough job paying attention that she is taking matters into her own hands. This did not endear us anymore to the staff at the restaurant.

Finally when we are finished with the main course we are ready for our 3rd course, dessert. We decided to leave some mashed potatoes on the plate so we had room. Apparently this is only slightly better than being sacriligous and now they think we are insulting the cooking. Looking around, everyone else is having no trouble eating all 3 courses, I thought Christine and I had healthy appetites.

For dessert we order some creme caramel and chocolate mousse. The waiter nods his acknowledgement that we have chosen correctly and brings us our dessert. He sets down the creme caramel in from of Christine, 3 dainty little dishes with fantastically unique flavours. In front of me he sets a plate, brings a huge bowl of chocolate mousse and scoops out a portion onto the plate. Perfect. He then proceeds to set down the bowl, one designed to feed 5-6 people and leaves the table. Are you kidding me. What is up with the serving sizes, one salad is small the other enourmas, one dessert is tiny, the other ridiculously large. Both desserts were fantastic and the chocolate mousse must have been made almost entirely of melted chocolate it was so dense. Apparently we weren't the only people to be chastised for not eating the 12 pounds of chocolate mousse as I heard the waiter giving the gears to others for wasting the dessert.

These portions were so big that I don't even think my brother in law Mark could eat everything on the table, and that man has an appetite you wouldn't believe.

On our way out, we decided to give them one more thing to think about. Christine had her credit card on the table and when he came by for the pin number and handed it to me, I passed it over to Christine. The look on his face was astounding, and even when I explained politely in French that it was the same card and bank account he was not mollified in the least.

In the end not only the food, but the experience have made that lovely meal memorable, and I am sure we will be joking about it for some time to come.

Cheers

Christine and Hovan