fresh_a

Nice to see more coverage of the 'neo bistro' scene, but Bittman's article is hardly cutting edge. Wonder who gave him those address?

I'll be in Croatia for about a week in a few days time...any suggestions? Will be around the Pula area...... any addresses/advice would be appreciated...

Well I was at the Experimental last friday around midnight and had a great time. Carina was en plein forme.

Any comments on Le Magnifique?

I went (report here), and had a great time. I think the fooding folks were having a little struggle dealing with the 1500 or so people that showed up, but it was a lot of fun. Highlights for me were the first , Christophe Pelé run stand with a small dish of marinated tendy beef cube, Bruno Doucet ran out of food, so we couldnt test him, the reworked Hagen Daaz ice creams were tasty, especially the vanilla/gélée of grapefruit one, and the Cyril Lignac beef brochette was a let down with tough meat. Oh yes, the most generous portion was from the chef of Jadis, braised veal tongue cooked Provincial style with spring vegetables. The DJ set in the middle of the Domaine was really cool, but I'm glad I didn't have to wait in line under the hot sun! Thanks Alex!

How about the rumours (Figaroscope, Optimum) on Marx taking over the Renoma on George V? In their window it says reopening June 3rd (I think...) but no mention of a change of style..........

The food is very mediocre, if not just downright bad in almost every brasserie I know. I don't mind predicatable food if well done. And one of the reasons is that most of the old-style French brasseries are owned by big corporate groups. I love the old style decos and ambience.

Love Coutancie. Alléno gave up wagyu for Coutancie years back.

They're all going downhill in my opinion. Could be the next trend if some enterprising chefs/businessmen wanted to do something about it. I've been to most of the big ones within the last year and it's extremely disappointing. The Balzar full of locals???? Wow. I guess something happened...

ok

I was told Fifteen

I heard Rostang sold Jarrasse.... Julot: given you wrote this in July 08 and only recently (2 weeks ago) folks like Rubin reviewed it, has anything changed between July and February?Still think it merits a visit? Thanks. ← I'm always up for a Rostang experience (save l'Absinthe), and BAC has been excellent for over 20 y. The difficulty is to keep up with whether Rostang's still in. He's not in the one on av. de Villiers anymore but the original one on rue Flaubert still works very well, methinks. btw, a recent visit at Jarrassse was awesome -- see my pics at http://picasaweb.google.com/ZeJulot/Jarrasse# ←

I was given a tip on this a week or two ago by a British internet guy I met at the bar of the Hotel Jules...he'd been a dozen times and loved it.

I think John's right- there's lots of other stuff going on. The street is just off of the Champs, which a lot of people want to avoid. The area isn't very interesting at all. The restaurant is very discreet and quiet. And the chef's wife passed away awhile back- she really was the soul of the restaurant...

On an unrelated note, had some insane Gillardeau no.2's yesterday at Trouville's Le Central

Anyone tried the live langoustines at Le Pichet? They're great.

It's not even the same chef as before, no?

Anyone out there got a great recipe for Kak-ik Guatamala turket soup?

I get enough of those on a daily basis, thank you very much...

Not so sure about La Cagouille...they're not what they used to be ....

What I meant was good products cooked simply I guess..

Doesn't mean much to me either, I frequent the rich and famous daily... I was just trying to describe the restaurant ambience, not name-drop..

It's expensive- but like a lot of places, you pay for the experience. The food is stuff you could do at home if you were a little apt and had top quality products. But it is a pretty amazing, time-warp bistro of the kind that don't really exist anymore, and eating next to Clinton or Spielberg has its cachet...

I know dinner there too. I've grown bored of it. There are too many other places now.

Had lunch a couple weeks ago. It's ok- big menu, but a little too touristy now, and too hustle bustle for my tastes.. so many more places now since they've opened...