L’Écu de France (Reprise) - Form Follows Function

A well-kept secret, assuredly, but now the secret is out - yours truly & Co. have returned twice to L’Écu de France, the 'atmosphere, atmosphere' venue along the Marne that I reviewed back in June '08. If you've read that review, you already know that I was somewhat conflicted, essentially concluding with the impression that the restaurant was aloof and over-priced. Now that I am a full two years older, wiser, and much more mature, I am willing to admit that I stand corrected - I have no reason to conclude aloofness any longer, I confidently can supplant 'over-priced' with 'pricey', and you no longer have to take a copy of War & Peace to bide your time between courses (and even then, I would instead recommend Larsson's Millennium trilogy, now that I am more than halfway through book 3 and well on my way to finishing before the end of the current decade).

All kidding aside ('a dyslexic man walks into a bra . . .'), no I mean it, all kidding aside, this time I intend to make a long story (my first Ecu review) short (this second review). And in short, the chef is doing a great job conjuring up some interesting and imaginative dishes. Even cooler, the chef requests that specific, specially designed plates are ordered for serving those creations, from an independent (and secret except for those, ahem, who know) createur francais, as a means of further embellishing and enhancing the already artistic presentation of the food. Form follows function.

Now, I hope you are sitting down, because this time I took photos!

Here's the Asiatic-leaning mise-en-bouche:



First course - Co. opted for the Millefeuille de Foie gras de Canard et magret fumé,
pain d’épice à la saubressade, jus au caramel (18€) and I selected Filet de Daurade Royale, consommé froid d’algue et Thon séché marinade de légumes au thé vert (15€):




Co. was very pleased with the delicately layered foie gras, although we found little evidence of pain d’épice à la saubressade, unless it was the sprinkly stuff you see on the plate. My dish hit the mark conceptually, but this was definitely not my cup of tea, green or not.

Moving on to the main dishes, here we go, two big hits. Co. was knocked out (in a good way) by her lamb dish, Canon d’Agneau du Limousin en cappuccino d’arabica,
farandole de poires en compotée et confite au Bourgogne (19 €), the plate comprised of two bowled spaces, one for the lamb, the other for the pear, and the great gesture here was the cappuccino sauce - lamb cooked in coffee?, you've got to be kidding, but like I said, a knockout. My dish was up there as well, the Magret de Canard du Pays d’Auge caramélisé au Pondichéry risotto « Arborio » à la betterave, émulsion de réglisse (21€) - a hint of nostalgia with the return to the beet, last year's big thing, and the combo was Technicolor - the beet red and the duck pink bleeding over the risotto, enveloped by the purple plate.





Desserts also were near-perfect on the satisfaction scale. Co. went with the lemon inspired Macaron au Fenouil et citron vert glacé, litchis à la fleur de menthe (15€), whereas I couldn't deny an after dinner cigar, the chocolate variety, Cigare « Partagas » en After Eight,émulsion d’orange sanguine, turbiné au moment (19€), which looks kind of well, phallic, but the chocolate, mint, orange melange with little squares of lime jello was epic.





Not to be denied, my espresso came with a small plate of tasty patisseries, not that they were needed by this point. But if its free, I'll take it. Before I forget, all this grub was washed down with a Givry « Clos Salomon » 2005 (M. du Gardin), a tasty red for 35€.

Total for the evening - two 3-course meals, wine, and one cafe came to 149€. Just a reminder - L'Ecu has a strange concept - you can order the plates in 1/2 portion or full. Once again, we opted for the less expensive 1/2 portion and could not fathom eating anything more by the end of the meal, certainly not twice as much.

Service was diligent and attentive, with a couple of minor glitches subtly evident in the background, and for an end of August Friday night, the large room was well populated. It's off the beaten path and you'll need a car to get there, but the next time you go visit the Marne, check out L'Ecu. Interesting place.

L’ÉCU DE FRANCE
31 Rue Champigny
94430 Chennevieres-sur-Marne
tel: 01 45 76 00 03
Website (with directions): http://www.ecudefrance.com/

L’Écu de France – Atmosphere! Atmosphere!

That time of the year again, with Co. in the driver’s seat having organized my birthday dinner to points unknown. Mercifully, I wasn’t required to wear a blindfold, but until I saw the Marne river, I had no idea we were headed to L’Écu de France, a veritable French institution in Chennevières sur Marne, the town bordering Champigny, another place you’ve probably never heard of. As we pulled up to the door of L’Écu, an old hunting lodge dating back to 1850--the restaurant itself established in 1920 by the Brousse family-- I had the impression we were pulling up to, well, an old hunting lodge. Replete with pastoral charm and rustic authenticity, we rued the fact that the terrace overlooking the Marne was not yet open for the summer.

Actually, we didn’t really pull up to the restaurant’s door at all, because all patrons are directed to a free parking lot just across the street, managed as it was by an old haggard gentleman sitting under a beach umbrella listening to French talk radio (poor guy). I kind of joked about how comforting it was to see this lame excuse for a security guard keeping tabs on our vehicle during our dinner, as he nodded off to the monotonous AM radio show. In this idyllic setting by la Marne, it seemed highly unlikely that bad things could possibly befall our Peugeot. Little did I know that later that evening, about 60 cars were burned during unrest in the Marne region, not exactly in the neighborhood, but humbling nonetheless, even if the total was only a slight bump up from the usual number of weekend car burnings in the greater Paris metropolitan area.

Getting to the business at hand, after an uneventful welcome, we were guided to our table, unfortunately on the side of the room away from the windows overlooking the river. The meal started off on a high note, with an extremely tasty amuse bouche consisting of a small square of carrot mouse with vinegrette. This gave us ample time to peruse the at-first confusing menu. You can check out a previous version of the current menu at the restaurant's website. Essentially, the left hand page of the menu, titled ‘La carte en portion de degustation’ consists of smaller-plate versions of the same items found on the much pricier right hand page, titled ‘La carte’. By selecting entrees from the left and main plates from the right, you can keep the price down; otherwise, count on spending well over 200€, including a bottle of wine. The left/right approach served us well, especially after treating ourselves to some above average bread (nut or cerealed small rolls), accompanied by two slabs of herbed butter, which effectively reduced our appetite. Our choices:

- foie gras with fig, honey, and fruits (left)

- blue turtle with a cauliflower cream (left)

- truffaud de canard, with foie gras (right)

- St. Pierre fish with small vegetables (left)

Much to my initial chagrin, the turtle dish arrived in a glass, but it was pretty interesting--two layers of heavy creams, followed by fresh turtle meat, with plum tomatoes crushed on the bottom. The preparation of all the dishes was above average, with more than a hint of an imaginative flair emanating from chef Jean-Baptiste Debreux's kitchen. An apparently greater degree of care is taken in the preparation of desserts, which fall on the heavy and somewhat ostentatious side. Some excellent small pastries came along with the bill, and by now you know this is a gesture that ranks high on my list of guilty pleasures. I don't have images of our dishes, but here are a few samples from L'Ecu's web site:

Our humble bottle of Bourgueil ’96 held up well, surrounded as it was by a relatively short but well chosen, impressive wine list. Some excellent bottles are available for the true connoisseur – for example, a Château L'Evangile (Pomerol) 1983 can be had for 190€ - but if you ask me, I’d rather buy a bottle like that for my cave, at 90€ online (http://www.chateauclassic.fr). My advice for the budget conscious diner is to select from the more reasonably priced excellent bottles listed under ‘Divers’ on the wine menu, which is where we spotted our Bourgueil at 23€.

As the wait between courses expanded exponentially from one dish to the next—a copy of War and Peace wouldn’t be a bad idea to bide one’s
time waiting for the dessert to arrive—certain realities began to set in during the meal, best summed up by words like ‘aloof' and 'over-priced.’ Ever one to try to look on the bright side of a dinner out, there are two major gripes that must nonetheless be acknowledged. The most galling aspect of the meal was the wait staff’s practice of keeping diners' wine bottles far away from their table at various rest spots along the room’s perimeter. And although this happened behind my back, Co. assured me that at one point, a waiter filled a glass with our bottle at another table! Sacre bloody bleu! That is not a way to endear one’s customers. My second gripe pertains to menu items that are unavailable. That I don’t mind – it’s inevitable – but better to be informed before one makes a choice, rather than after. I was all psyched for a langoustine entrée, only to be told when giving our order that the crustaceans were now out of season and unavailable. It is no small leap for the psychology of the taste buds to handle a langoustine to tourteau expanse.

My recommendation? If you want to splurge for a nice
lunch along the Marne one sunny summer weekend afternoon,
give some thought to visiting L’Ecu. But be prepared to first
wipe off those plastic chairs on the terrace before sitting.

And don’t forget to tip the parking guy – the next smoldering
Peugeot could be yours.

L’ÉCU DE FRANCE
31, rue de Champigny

94430 Chennevières sur Marne

tel.+33.01.45.76.00.03

Overall note (out of 10): 7- Food: 7- Ambiance: 8.5 outside (but the chairs really are plastic), 6 inside Price/Quality: 5 (too expensive for the quality) Our visit: 133€ for two, including
wine (3 lefts, 1 right, & 1 dessert) Service: 2.5 (never, ever confuse which wine goes where!)
This is a restaurant that gets some of the little things right, but not the big picture.