Small Restaurants in France

[robert brown]

Note: See "Vide Grenier" for preceeding, related post by Bux. I took the liberty of starting a new thread since we seem to have emptied the attic on emptying the attic.

Bux, I bet that's what happened with the Lascaux caves. Now I remember it was 1989 that we were in the Dordogne. And my last visit to Troigros was 1982; Jean Troisgros must have died later that year or the following. When did you start food touring in France? Even in 1985 there were great no-star or one-star small local restaurants seemingly everywhere. It seems to me that they are getting harder to find. A lot of them no longer offer any kind of choice and have one or two waiters or waitresses serving the entire room. Do you find that? I don't bop around France like I used to, but in Nice where I know just about any restaurant of significance, that's how it is. Provence is a bit better, however; but I remember superb meals 15-20 years ago in Burgundy, Savoie, Normandie, SW,etc. the level of which I find less often these days. Margaret or anyone else want to chime in?

(Edited by robert brown at 12:21 pm on Dec. 2, 2001)

[Margaret Pilgrim]

Robert, as you have noticed by now, I am not a big dog; we visit no-star and one-star restaurants almost exclusively.  Is the general state of this type of establishment in decline?  I think that Elizabeth David wrote to this topic half a century ago, and even Leibling suggested that a good many of his meals were more stellar in quantity than in quality.  That said, I think that, to the contrary, there are probably more good small restaurants now than in any recent memory.  The last two decades brought us a tremendous number of "young turk" chefs who left mentors in multi-starred kitchens to strike out on their own, and unlike previous generations, they have brought their cuisines to market at the middle price range.  Eric Frechon comes immediately to mind, and of course more recently the dynamic duo of Pascal Barbot and Christophe Rohat.

Are these fine, inexpensive restaurants easy to find?  Yes and no.  They are certainly harder to pin-point than three stars!  I find the yearly lists in popular food and travel magazines very disappointing, both behind the time and not as discerning as one would wish, continuing to tout familiar names we certainly would not return to or recommend. I read everything I can get my hands on, and have found that my best indicator continues to be the annual "big yellow" French edition of Guide France, Gault Millau, with its lengthly descriptions which I find far more informative than Michelin.  If you read between the lines, and choose restaurants that they rate from 15 through 16, even some 14s, you will very likely find a well conceived and prepared and often highly innovative meal in the 200FF-400FF range, before beverages.

[robert brown]

I should amend my above post a bit in that I forgot to write how barebones the wine lists have gotten in small restaurants in France. Upon further reflection on the topic, I am really addressing the general kind of restaurant that may still typify the region it's in, or another region in France. Lately I have been patronizing specialty restaurants which, where I hang out, would be seafood restaurants (fruit de mer, boullibaisse,etc.) a purely truffle restaurant in Nice opened by this guy Bruno, who does ventures with Ducasse; and even couscous places, of which there are a couple of good ones in the Alpes-Maritimes. I remember some of my most memorable meals even in touristy kinds of places like Chez Jacky in Belon or Les Vapeurs in Trouville. Sometimes you can go to an otherwise mediocre, even bad, restaurant that does one dish well: L'Autobus in Nice serves a terrific stockfish only on Fridays nights and only from October to April, or thereabouts. While it's getting harder, in my opinion, there's good stuff out there in France, but doing your homework is becoming increasingly crucial.

Margaret, you posted while I was writing. I like the G-M annual best of all, though as I wrote while you were away, it has lost some edge. (Where work the chefs you mention?) I think what we both say about assiduously picking your spots holds true. Maybe age has taken a toll on my palate and that I no longer shake the Gault-Millau from its binding, but I remember the chefs that came from Blanc, Troigros, Chapel,etc. opening much more ambitious restaurants in lots of places, and most of them were going back to where they grew up as opposed to the UK, USA, etc. All the more need to share info. I also agree with you on the magazine lists as well. Freebies may have something to do with it; nothing of the kind right here, of course. And yes, I do have to say that I have noticed more new-restaurant formation in France in the past year or two. I am sure your experience is more wide-ranging than mine these days.

(Too much Italian food, no doubt).

(Edited by robert brown at 6:03 pm on Dec. 2, 2001)

[Bux]

There are several expanations to your inability to find really fine and exciting little restaurants, besides the obvious one that they see you coming and hide. I've had the same observation and made the same complaint. When I do, I'm usally asked if the fault doesn't lie in my expectations and if it's merely a matter of my becoming jaded over the years. That's got to be true to some extent, but it's been obvious that food in France, and restaurants in France have declined considerably in the past three or four decades. Lest I sound like an old curmudgeon (is that redundant?) I will note that I think haute cuisine is better than it's ever been in my experience in France and that I still get a rush out of good old fashioned country food that competes with the one I get from the best restaurants.

Food and restaurants are not what they once were. Check out Mort Rosenblum's A Goose In Toulouse for the figures (I think that's where I saw them). A generation or two ago, France was an agricultural country with most of its citizens living on farms and engaged in the production of farm stuff. Today, it's the other way around. The TGV killed the snails and frog's legs have to be imported. If snails and frog's legs are no longer any more indigenous than pizza and soy sauce, where is French food? Let those Frenchman condemn McDonald's all they want. The chain is succeeding not on the business of tourists in Paris, but on the French kid's and parent's business all across the country. Haute cuisine chef's, on the other hand, are quick to note that their restaurants survive on business from abroad. Elsewhere on this site, I've already spoken of a young chef from Bordeaux who went to cooking school in France and came to NY to do a stage at Daniel. I met him in St. Jean de Luz in his restaurant. He said his work with Boulud and Francois Payard as well as the ingredients he worked with in the kitchen at Daniel were his inspiration to achieve better than what was offered by the typical restaurant in this town. This brings me around to note that although restaurants here have improved immensely and those in France have lowered their standards, the two have not crossed and food at many levels in France is seeing a revival. At this point we've got to move faster to catch up. Catchup, right I do see more of that in France than ever before. ;)

[robert brown]

The three of us are writing over each other after the thread has laid dormant all afternoon! I'm heading down to Dim Sum Go Go for more broiled shrimps. (Bux, my wife said the shrimp are most reminiscent of Spain).

But I plan on replying when I get back.

[Bux]

We are writing over each other as I'm replying and missing posts, but WAIT--they were out of the live shrimp this afternoon. I was assured they were wonderful. You're probalby gone. Did they get fresh ones for dinner? Probably not on a Sunday.

[Bux]

One thing to consider is change--the only constant. Even when things are not getting better or worse, they are getting different.

[Margaret Pilgrim]

REALLY off topic, but I would love to see what each/any of us chooses in our own neighborhoods when the question becomes, "What's to eat when there's nothing to eat!".  We will find something from the pantry this evening, but went wandering around looking for lunch.  We settled on Vietnamese rolls: barbequed pork, fine noodles, bean sprouts, cilantro encased in soft rice wrappers, served with fish sauce.  2 orders at Ū.50 for 2 piece order, take out.  They always take good care of me since I am the usually the only foreigner in the dining room and I scare them to death. :)

[Bux]

Someone is going to snatch this thread and move it to General, if we do't get back on topic.

I have to admit we can have one of the barest refrigerators in town. We try to keep some tuna and sardines for emergencies. We even have a few cans of paté from Brittany--there I'm back on topic. ;)  This afternoon we were the first eGullet members to learn that DimSum GoGo was out of live shrimp. After our meal of dim sum, we shopped in Chinatown and picked up some bags of frozen dumplings to steam and boil for those days when there's nothing to eat. Of course I'm always game to walk to Chinatown and hate take out. My wife prefers to order in. The dumplings are a great compromise.

By the way,  the French Hénaff canned paté is several cuts above spam and, I'm told, favored by Bretons for stocking their gallies.

[robert brown]

Margaret, you mean there's a Dim Sum a Go Go in SF? My neighborhood (86 & Lex) has the worst restaurants in the city. Sounds like you got a situation of "vide frigo".

Bux,  I'm not trying to following you around. I'm sorry to report that there were live shrimps tonight. Funny, the owner told me she ran out of them at lunch. When I asked her how she got some on a Sunday, she said, "This is Chinatown". Have you had the shrimps yet? Tonight's were the best of the three times I have had them.

I will have to wait until tomorrow to continue my contribution to the state of small, unrated, everyday,etc. restaurants in France.

[Wilfrid]

Quote: from Margaret Pilgrim on 5:43 pm on Dec. 2, 2001

... even Leibling suggested that a good many of his meals were more stellar in quantity than in quality.  

Being a Liebling lover, may I weigh in belatedly with a clarification?  I expect you are thinking of Liebling's reflections in "Between Meals", where he asserts that dining in France after the Second World War was in decline when compared with the meals he had eaten there in the 1930s.  He certainly seemed to think his early years in France provided stellar eating.

I do wonder how reliable such memories are?  I enjoyed wonderful meals (at least I thought so) in France in the late 1970s/early 1980s.  Recently I have often found myself thinking that little restaurants in Paris and elsewhere are not what they were.  Sure, things change.  But perhaps we shouldn't overlook the possibility that we change too.  It's quite possible that something which thrilled my expectant 18 year old palate would make no impact on my old, jaded tastebuds today.  My standards have been inexorably raised by experience, and I just don't think I can make an obective comparison between a meal I ate ten years ago and one I eat today.

Sorry to hear about these bare larders and empty refrigerators.  I usually have something lurking in the confit jar for a rainy day.

[Margaret Pilgrim]

The flourishing small restaurants to which I refer are indeed different from the ones you, Robert, Bux and Wilfred remember with such fondness.  They are the work of young restless chefs who have left important kitchens to strike out on their own.  Eric Frechon left Crillon under Christian Constant to start his eponymous restaurant in Paris' 19e, which he ran for roughly a half dozen years before being tapped to head the kitchen at Le Bristol a year or so ago.  Pascal Barbot and Christophe Rohat left Passard's Arpege in order to start now wildly successful Astrance, Paris' 16e, just over a year ago.  What these and others of this movement have in common is the desire to serve highly creative and inventive menus at unbelievably low prices.  This they accomplish by using the highest quality of the less expensive ingredients, and charging supplements for foie gras, etc.  There are now dozens of these neo-bistros  in and outside of Paris, and the best of them are amazingly good.  And interestingly, many have extensive wine lists that may or may not be priced like the food.

OT: No, Robert, we don't have a Dim Sum a Go Go in SF.  We live a half dozen blocks from a major Asian restaurant street that tempts us with several nationalities' snack foods: dim sum, Vietnamese rolls and sandwiches, ricetables, Korean hot pot, sushi.  Good excuses for shrugging your shoulders when spouses come in asking for the carte!

[Bux]

Having put forth the idea that change is the only constant, I should also add that the more things change, the more they remain the same. It's all relative.

I'd heard about La Regalade for some time before we made it there and now I hear it may be declining, but our dinner there a few years ago, reminded me very much of my initial exposure to France and French food circa 1959-60. It was so reminiscent of the restaurants in which I first ate, that in spite of the fact that the chef was from the southwest and the wine list leaned heavily in that direction, I felt compelled to order a Beaujolais--the first wine I recall ordering by name in Paris. I also recall the name of the restaurant that had barrels of wines in the basement and offered a variety of appellations by the carafe. I was a student, not able to afford wine with a label and always ordered en carafe. Liebling wrote affectionately of that restaurant and his description was not far from what I remember from my early visits. By the eighties, the bearnaise was heavily floured to keep from breaking and it was a shallow reminder of it's glory although it was always an inexpensive restaurant and catered to students and artists.

[robert brown]

Margaret, I was only kidding about there being a Dim Sum a GoGo in your neighb. You sound lucky, though, having the Asians near by.

Bux, I can barely vouch for dining in France 30-40 years ago. In 1962 -63 I had eaten at La Tour d'Argent, La Perouse, and a few other places only in Paris. Being just a kid, I had no idea what was going on. My parents actually ate the food of Fernand Point and Raymond Oliver. However, I think you are meaning to say that if you ate in small restaurants in Paris and the provinces in the 1960s and'70s the food;i.e. produce would be better. I can vouch for small restaurants from the mid-70s on when we started renting houses some summers in the Savoie and around Annecy. I just remember monster produce, great variety, and respectable wine lists. I think this persisted until 1990. Do you remember the Gault-Millau guide and magazine hammering away at "rapport prix-qualite" all through the early 1990s and beyond? It still persists today as Margaret sort of says. Now Wilfrid may have a valid point as well. I would like to see research on how palates fade with age. Also, as I (and probably all of us) lose the ability to experience life's stimuli with the acuity or profundity we used to, maybe it does take more to excite our palates. However, there is no denying that the small French restaurant has cut back on choice, wine, and personnel, and it has to come out of our enjoyment. I'm willing to gave Margaret the benefit of the doubt. One or two of the kind of restaurants she mentions has opened in the Provence-Cote d'Azur area, but maybe they are not as interesting as L'Astrance. I feel like kind of the lone wolf doing my gastronomic travel in Northern Italy and have fallen out of the French loop except for the South. I don't think, however, that my general perceptions have suffered as a result.

[Margaret Pilgrim]

More than fading taste organs, I wonder if diminishing appreciation isn't at least partially a function of a jaded palatte or the demand for an element of surprise. I know that I have been enchanted by a meal at a restaurant, returned, reordered the same dishes that had given me such joy, only to find that, yes, that is what I ate before, and yes, it is pretty good.  

I read something the other night that startled me with its truth.  I also have the feeling that it is something that Bux has been trying to tell me for a long time.  Supposedly it is an old saw, however I had never heard it before: "Expectation is the mother of resentment."  

[Bux]

Robert, when we spent three months in France in 1964, we assumed that even a listing in the MIchelin guide meant we couldn't afford it. Soon enough we learned that the guide was pretty reliable down to the least expensive restaurant, but the stars were not even in our dreams. In the late sixties we ventured to Laperouse, La Pyramid and La Cote d'Or, but after Point and Alenandre had passed away.

[Patrice]

While in France we also enjoyed some very good small restaurant .  In paris we had a faboulous meal at Le Café des Délices. The owner who is also the chef had worked for Vigato at the Apicius and he also owned a one starred restaurant outside Paris. His Café is a small restaurant that is always fully booked.  He served very creative food for a resonable price: Foie gras creme brûlée as an appetizer and for desser, a pear milk-shake with spiced figs and rice krispies. In Bordeaux we also really enjoyed our meal at Gravelier. This small restaurant is owned by Toigros daugther. The decor is very original, you can also see the chef in the cuisine by a big glass in front of the bar.

[chefette]

Patrice--how was the pear milk shake with spiced figs served and presented?  in a glass?  were the rice crispies caramelized?

[Bux]

Patrice, the Michelin lists Gravelier in Bordeaux, but can you give us a location for Le Café des Délices in Paris?

Margaret, I think jaded palate is a major factor. The discovery of French provincial or bourgeois cooking is far different than its repetition, but I'd also say that with the ability to understand the food comes a greater appreciation. The staples of French country cooking don't wear as thin as quickly as the inventions. Think of the the foods you've enjoyed in SF for years and how much you can still crave a good whatever it is you may crave.

Three star restaurant offer the greatest potential for disappointment.

(Edited by Bux at 8:04 pm on Dec. 3, 2001)

[Bux]

Margaret: I find the yearly lists in popular food and travel magazines very disappointing, both behind the time and not as discerning as one would wish, continuing to tout familiar names we certainly would not return to or recommend.

I spoke to someone who had written one of those lists in a glossy food magazine published this past year. She rather regretted the article. Many of the restaurants were not happy for the new trade which pushed out the regular customers. Moreover many of these new one shot diners, were much more trouble to serve and a whole slew of them was quite disruptive. Of course many of these tourists avidly look forward to eating as the French do until they learn how and what the French eat, then all of a sudden after hunting down the hidden bistro or cafe, they're faced with uncertain choices and often less than pleased. The dilemma here in eGullet is that we may send the wrong people to the right restaurants.

[Bux]

Robert: Do you remember the Gault-Millau guide and magazine hammering away at "rapport prix-qualite" all through the early 1990s and beyond?

Le Vieux Pont in Belcastel (Aveyron). We first went there because GM touted the restaurant as the best "rapport prix-qualite" in all of France, the year before they finished their little 7 room hotel. How could a cheapskate such as myself pass up the best food deal in France.

[robert brown]

Bux, you really are a veteran! You should know that when I ate at those two three-star restaurants in 1962-63, they were splurges during a year off from college, and that any other decent meals were when my folks came over, or friends of the family took me out. (Chez Albert on Ave. du Maine was a place my folks liked and where we all went. Does it ring a bell?) Between then and 1974, I went dormant as far as eating in France was concerned. At heart I'm a nouvelle cuisiner. It was an amazing period (1968-1990) of implied collegiality, but really, I think, also implied efforts or competition of each chef trying to outdo the others, all to the benefit of folks like us who ate the food and drank the wine. I think it even spilled down to the lower echelons in a kind of "rising tide lifts all boats" phenomenon.

P.S. I just saw your post above. How was the place in the Aveyron? You sure get into "La France Profonde".

(Edited by robert brown at 12:44 am on Dec. 4, 2001)

[Bux]

La France Profonde is a bit like the Twilight Zone. It tends to sneak up on you like a ghost rather than existing as a destination. Maybe I don't see it coming because I still expect to exist ony in the black and white of old films and photographs. One day we were staying with friends and went to the butcher in Pezenas. I think we bought a chicken to make coq au vin and some boudin noir. It was not much like shopping in the states. First the butcher's wife behind the counter needed to know what we were doing with the chicken. Then she held up some pork belly and said we needed this for lardons. "How much did we want?" One might have expected the customers behind us to get antsy as we carried on in our halting French, but no, they all had suggestions as to how we should prepare our chicken and when it came to boudin noir, everyone had an opinion on how to best prepare and serve them. Forty years of travel in France, always looking for La France Profonde and here I was with truly nothing to see, but I felt like a guy who had seen a leprachaun or unicorn.

Le Vieux Pont was good enough to warrant a return visit a couple of years later and I'd like to return again soon. It's run by two sisters. One is the chef, the other takes care of the front of the house. The food is simple. I've used the same adjective to describe Ducasse's food and Bach's music. I understand the chef is self taught and a devotee of Michel Bras. The advantage of our first visit was that it was off season and there were few tourists. The camping site almost adjacent to the restaurant was closed. The disadvantage was that the hotel was not finished. The bed in a simple  place in the adjacent town sagged. The new hotel met my exact standards. It was clean, bright, interestingly designed and minimally decorated. A simple two story stone box was gutted and inside the old shell the architect used a curved wall and a few angled walls to create spaces of some interest without hitting guests over the head with his cleverness. The camping site is small enough so that even in midsummer it's more pastoral and less trailer park. The food is still at least half the draw.

Our daughter has had a much earlier start on haute cuisine than we did. If I thought there was reason to apologize for eating at three star restaurants in one's teens, I would not have taken her to those places. It was just not what my parents did, nor what I expected to do when I first traveled in France. Indeed, my daughter spent a term in Paris and eventually went to cooking school there. She ate very well when we visited and when her uncle visited.  

We did not travel from about 1972-1985 and thus only read about much of the beginnings of nouvelle cuisine. We dismissed most of it partially out of natural inclination and perhaps some buried resentment of not traveling. We cooked at home in a very old fashioned French style. Much of the early nouvelle cuisine seemed odd and forced. By the time we started to travel again, a contemporary and more interesting cuisine with fewer faults had bcome well instituted and it became obvious to us how tired much of the old cuisine had become.

[Patrice]

Le Café des Délices is in the 6e on rue d'Assas. The owner and chef is Gilles Choukroun. Before going to Paris he was in Chartres at La Truie qui File.  For lunch, you can have a main course and a glass of wine for 89F.  In the evening it's 250F for the appetizer, the main course and desserts.  Speeking of dessert his pear milkshake was incredible: served in a kind of asian bowl, it was served like a thick soup with pieces of spiced dried figs in it.  It was then covered with rice krispies. We also had for dessert a citrus. salad with rose gelée, pistachios, cinnamon

[robert brown]

Bux, I took it on myself to jump from the "Scarcity" thread to here since I am curious to know if you can remember the bouilliabaisse restaurant you went to in Marseilles. Some years ago we went to one Eli Zabar likes the most. It begins with a "B" I think and not on the port. But I don't have my Michelin handy. It would be fun to try and nail down one day the best half dozen or so bouilliabaisse restaurants along the coast. I guess Tetou in Golfe-Juan would get the most mentions. But a year and a half ago the foodie friend we took there trashed it because of what he perceived was the lack of quality of the fish and the purely decorative function of the tiny crabs. Irrespective of that, I believe I read that a liberal use of rascasse is a marker of a serious bouilliabaisse.

(Edited by robert brown at 12:33 pm on Dec. 27, 2001)