We were travelling through the Bordeaux region and were getting hungry. We drove past one of the few restaurants on the main road through one of the towns that was open.
The first thing that caught our attention was that the place was full, usually...a very good sign. It was around 1.30pm and there was only 1 table left. The other thing we noticed was that everyone in the restaurant were French and looked like locals, not tourists, also a good sign.
Once we got the menu which was in French translated, we ordered a number of different dishes. WOW, the food was exceptional. It wasnt fancy or pretentious, just really top quality produce, beautifully cooked and presented and arguably one of the best restaurants we ate at the 2 weeks we spent in France.
We got a chance to have a chat with the chef at the end of the meal as most people had left by then and he was lovely. We spoke about how nice it was to have modern French cuisine as opposed to "old school" cooking. If we understood him correctly, we think that he had worked in a Michelin star restaurant previously and felt that often in fancier restaurants there isn't a lot of "love in the food". He was probably right. This was his restaurant and his dishes showed he put love into every dish.
If you are travelling around this area of Bordeaux, you must pop in and have a mean at Le Bontemps.More