Jeanty at Jacks, Bistro Jeanty

[lizziee]

Phillipe Jeanty was the chef at Domaine Chandon in its hey-day. It was fine dining - a leisurely lengthy tasting menu with first class wines. Philip decided to do his own thing and opened Bistro Jeanty - a casual, typical French bistro in Yountville - right down the street from the French Laundry. Every time we go to Napa Valley we always have a meal there and it is always good - a perfect balance after eating at The French Laundry.

He has now opened a restaurant in San Francisco called Jeanty at Jacks in a space that housed a once famous San Francisco restaurant institution known as Jacks since 1864.

It is essentially the same type of restaurant as his bistro in Yountville.

Below is not the full menu, but a sampling of some of his best dishes:

Duck "foie Blond" Pate

Pieds de Cochons persilles (pigs feet and haricot verts salad)

Terrine de Lapin (rabbit pate with celery root apple salad)

Petit sale (cured pork belly. Lentil ragout with 1/8" cubes of foie gras)

Foie Gras Torchon with Brioche and Sauterne Jelly

Lamb Tongue and Potato Salad

Phillipe's Smoked Salmon Carpaccio style

Escargots

Quenelles de Brochet (Pike dumplings with lobster sauce)

At one time or another, we have eaten all of the above and they match any very very good bistro in Paris. Especially remarkable is the Petit Sale, the Lamb Tongue and the Rabbit Pate.

Entrees

Steak Tartare (the real thing)

Coq au Vin

Mussels, steamed in pinot Noir with Bay Leaves

Monkfish and Clams in a saffron Broth

Steak Frites (ribeye with fries served in a paper cone with béarnaise)

Daub de Boeuf

Cassoulet

From the above we have had the Mussels, the Cassoulet and the Steak. Particularly the steak also brings back memories of France. Softly in the background is a CD playing plaintive songs in French. Of course there is cheese: goat cheese with honey, Fourme d'Ambert, epoisse de Bourgogne.

I have not eaten their desserts but they also are traditional French fare: chocolate mousse, apple tarte tatin, creme caramel, rice pudding, lemon meringue tart. I can't comment on the quality as I have never ordered one.

All in all both Bistro Jeanty and Jeanty at Jacks is a perfect spot for us, particularly for Sunday lunch.

[melkor]

Strangely this post seems to be the only one in the CA forum dedicated to Bistro Jeanty. Since we just returned from dinner there I suppose this is as reasonable a place to post about it as any.

We started our meal with fried smelt which were incredible - just a tiny fresh fish rolled in semolina and deep fried, better than the best french fry. The other app was duck and goat cheese rillettes, which were good but paled in comparison to the smelt.

For entrees we went with daube du boeuf and braised lamb shank - I preferred the beef, MsMelkor preferred the lamb. Both were quite good and on a cold winter night it's hard to go wrong with a good braised dish.

Dessert was surprisingly good, rice pudding that was quite creamy while keeping the individual rice grains intact and a bread pudding made from toasted cubed of bread, giving it a nice texture contrast.

This was one of the best meals we've had at any of the Jeanty restaurants - I'm far more excited about going back than I was previously.

[Underhill]

Strangely this post seems to be the only one in the CA forum dedicated to Bistro Jeanty.  Since we just returned from dinner there I suppose this is as reasonable a place to post about it as any.

We started our meal with fried smelt which were incredible - just a tiny fresh fish rolled in semolina and deep fried, better than the best french fry.  The other app was duck and goat cheese rillettes, which were good but paled in comparison to the smelt.

For entrees we went with daube du boeuf and braised lamb shank - I preferred the beef, MsMelkor preferred the lamb.  Both were quite good and on a cold winter night it's hard to go wrong with a good braised dish.

Dessert was surprisingly good, rice pudding that was quite creamy while keeping the individual rice grains intact and a bread pudding made from toasted cubed of bread, giving it a nice texture contrast.

This was one of the best meals we've had at any of the Jeanty restaurants - I'm far more excited about going back than I was previously.

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[Underhill]

We dined at Bistro Jeanty last Thursday night for my husband's birthday. Having eaten there two years ago and loved the food we were disappoined to find that the quality wasn't the same--it is because Jeanty has other houses to run now? Escargots were off the menu, unfortunately, and the tomato soup in its puff-pastry tocque wasn't an adequate replacement. My dabue de boeuf was so fatty that I couldn't eat, and the tarte tatin was applesauce rather than apple slices and so sweet that I could only eat a small amount of it. We were saddened to find that our favorite restaurant in the Napa Valley is not what it was.

Our trip was saved by lunch at the CIA in St. Helena the following day.

[TexasGal]

I was just at Bistro Jeanty (for the second time) on March 18th and had a wonderful meal. Granted, I love tomatoe soup and this is one of the best I have had. We also had a terrific salad with beets and feta cheese. The beef stew was so tender and delicious that I really want the recipe. The smoked trout appetizer tasted more cured then smoked and was good but not amazing so I probably won't order that again.

There were four of us at dinner and we all appeared quite happy with our food. I live in LA so it may not be for another year (too many great food places in Northern California) but it is definitely on my list of places to try again.

I have also been to Jeanty at Jack's in town and remember having a particularly wonderful mushroom risotto but my SF friend said it was not as good when she went back a different time.

[Catherine Nash]

I have been a frequent visitor to Bistro Jeanty (and, for a while, Jeanty at Jack's) over the last two years since discovering it on a weekend visit to Napa. It's the perfect spot for a long lunch - you can always get a spot and it's open all day.

Favorite dishes that haven't yet been mentioned are the oft-presented special of pappardelle with rabbit, thickly chopped onions and rugged hunks of carrots in a barely-there cream sauce. If it's on the menu, get it. It was my inaugural bite of rabbit but I've had it several times since, each with the same degree of pleasure. The sweetbreads are wonderful, too, ethereal and fragrant and just too damn good for this feeble writer's words.

I don't much like Jeanty at Jack's - it has none of the atmosphere of the Bistro, nor any of its own. The food is good so it's a shame.