I've enjoyed French cuisine, both "haute" and "country" since my first trip to Paris when I was 12 in the 1960s, and I have to rank this among the best.
We were taken by friends whose favorite restaurant this is - one immediately notices the...vast, comfortably decorated spaces - the main dining room contains well spaced, large banquettes, heavily upholstered with floor and wall treatments that help to mute sound and make conversation easy, a luxury in modern restaurant dining and reminiscent of restaurants long gone in the more glamorous days of the 1940s and 1950s.
We opted for "traditional" service, i.e., a bottomless tureen of delicious soup (in this case the Friday special vegetable which was more complex in flavor than most I've had), a salad (in my case a REAL Caesar Salad - if it hasn't got anchovies it's not a Caesar - perfectly done, by the way, with just the right amount of cheese), and an entree, which was a really well done Chicken Breast a la Diable - I was very fond of the sauce which I had never had before, and the breast was properly sliced, pounded and very moist/tender and served with steamed fresh vegetables and rice. I could not decide on desert from the varied menu so our hosts suggested a superb Tarte Tatin which did not disappoint.
Unfortunately we learned that the property had been sold to a developer and that the restaurant will close temporarily in the coming year and re-open in a smaller space in the apartment building to be built on the current site. While I'm sure the food will be just as extraordinary, it will be a shame to lose the comfortable, dining spaces of the current restaurant - we will definitely be returning as often as we can to sample other items on the menu and enjoy the current ambience before that happens. You should too.More