Bonjour nos amis!

This week we’re reviewing L’Ardoise, a neighborhood French bistro that we have been meaning to try for some time.  Hopefully the words “French bistro” don’t have you running for the hills (or the electronic equivalent…).  A bistro is just a small restaurant that serves simple, traditional food – supposedly at a modest price.  But we’ve seen “bistros” serving $50 steak frites where the word “bistro” is really humble-bragging – and where the prices belie a restaurateur’s grander ambitions and cost structure.  So let’s see if L’Ardoise is a real bistro or a wolf in rack of lamb’s clothing.

We had Saturday night reservations, and the little restaurant was full but not too crowded.  There was a VERY tight squeeze to get to the back of the restaurant – it’s a long, narrow space, covered in dark wood and French touches.

Our waiter had a French accent, and the vibe was very French.

Let’s have a look at the menu:

This is a very nice, small menu, a bit oddly ordered – note the cheese plate is listed WAY at the bottom when it probably should be at the top with the appetizers.  But on retrospect this made a bit of sense – in Europe, the cheese course is usually at the end of the meal, not at the beginning (which works better if you think about it – why have something so rich to whet your appetite for the entrée?).  Prices are all over the place, ranging from $17 for risotto to $42 for rack of lamb.  42 bucks is a little steep for a bistro, but there were some more reasonably priced options to choose from.

We ordered the following:

• Charcuterie plate with homemade pates
• Seafood and shellfish Cassolette, Lobster Reduction Sauce
• Bistro Coq au Vin in a Red Wine Sauce with Mashed Potatoes, Bacon, Pearl Onion

We also had some sparkling water.  We are now going to rave about the sparking water.  Yes, we are. This is what it looked like:

Perhaps we’ve been drinking La Croix, Sodastream and Trader Joe’s sparkling water too long, but this Badoit water seemed to us like the most delicious sparkling water we’ve ever had.  The bubbles were very tiny and just tickled the palate on the way down, rather than those waters that explode on your tongue.  We may even buy some of this for home… well, it’s a bit pricy for just WATER, but we’ll think about it.  Apparently, this is the main rival of Perrier in France – no contest, in our opinion.

The charcuterie plate was served very simply, with a delightful variety of olives and a rich, sweet onion jam.  There were also caper berries.  Stay away from the caper berries (unless you happen to like them, in which case we say – please eat them all so we don’t have to!).  The pates were pretty good – the one with rosemary on the left was the best.  They were indeed house made, and so a little bit chunky, but thankfully mild flavored.  The other charcuterie items were fine but nothing special.

BREAD.  So here is the bread basket.

It was filled TWICE during our meal, before it ever got empty and before we had to ask.  I call that STELLAR bread service.  And I adore French bread, so this delighted me.  My low carb diet was not quite as amused.

Here are the entrees – first, the Coq au Vin:

I believe I have never seen Coq au Vin served with spinach on top.  Not sure it added much, but it looked like half their entrees are served with mashed potatoes and spinach.  They gave me two chicken thighs, as you’ll see.  The sauce was velvety and just the right amount of rich fattiness and salt.  Personally, I like to throw in a splash of red wine later in the cooking to give the dish some acidity and brighten the color, and I wished they’d done the same here.  But there were lots of perfectly cooked mushrooms (really, that’s a hard feat), but maybe a couple pearl onions that had cooked down to almost mush.  And the tender chicken easily slid off the bone when merely prodded by my knife.

My Darling ordered a very rich seafood stew.

“Cassolette” apparently means a small casserole, but I was corrected by the waiter when I asked whether it was like a cassoulet – totally different dish, although similar word root.  Oops.  The cassolette had fish (sea bass, supposedly), shrimp and mussels.  The mussels were cooked perfectly – still tender, not rubbery.  The fish would have fallen off the bone if bone was present (it wasn’t).  The shrimp were slightly overcooked to our taste, but not tough.  The sauce was creamy and buttery (this is French cuisine – cream and butter are both used without restraint) but could have had more seafood flavor.

Desserts are written on a slate (une ardoise, bien sûr) in the restaurant – they offered a chocolate fondant cake, crème brulée, an apple tarte tatin, and a floating island.  We went with the island, and here it is:

I must admit – I was expecting something more like oeufs en neige so was surprised to see it looked like they had partially baked the meringue.  This made it a little chewy on the outside – almost like the crust to a white bread – although the inside meringue was still soft.  Reasonably nice sauce and very good strawberries.

For wine, we drank a half bottle of Chateauneuf-du-Pape – this little guy:

Highly recommend – a lovely balance of fruit and the restraint that is the hallmark of French wines.  Very food-friendly with the rich dishes that we had.

L’Ardoise really charmed us, despite the occasional missteps and quirks.  I suspect that they have a small kitchen and so are limited in what they can do.  The service was efficient and smooth – and of course the bread service was the bomb.  They’ve nailed the atmosphere – it feels like walking into a warm, dark French home, far away from the foggy San Francisco streets.  We wouldn’t say it’s worth crossing a bridge to go here, but as a neighborhood spot, we think every neighborhood should have one.