It was raining, so we decided to take the Metro to our destination, Portes Vanves flea market, or "Marché aux Puces". The word "puces" reminds me irresistably of this video... FLEA ATTACK! The market turned out to be an interesting experience - there were lots of little stalls selling all sorts of weird and wonderful things. G told me not to take any photos as the stallholders might not like it, so I behaved myself.
We didn't find anything that we particularly wanted to buy, so after a while mooching around, we returned to Montparnasse - complete with accordionist accompaniment on the Metro, much to G's disdain - and had a pre-prandial Ricard on the terrace of the Select, where the entertainment mostly consisted of watching pedestrians nearly getting run over.
.jpg)
Then it was our turn to cross the road without getting run over, as we had a lunch appointment at Le Dome. This is a brasserie that specialises in fish. I'd lurked outside the day before while G went in to book, and had heard an English couple being given a choice of eating inside or in the conservatory thing at the front - it seems these may have two different menus - but we were definitely inside eating off the serious (= quite expensive) menu. Everyone around us seemed to be French, although occasionally the sound of some loud Americans at a table about half a mile away wafted over.
To drink, we had this bottle of Bienvenues-Batard-Montrachet Grand Cru 2002 from Etienne Sauzet, which was initially rather dumb as it was very cold, but then opened up after some time in the glass and out of the ice bucket, and showed its chops. It was a very fine wine and a great complement to the fish we were eating, but if I had a choice of that or the Coche-Dury Meursault we had at Taillevent, for me the Coche wins hands down every time.
I had a mystery fish to start with which was like large whitebait, while G had sardines. Then it was on to the main event, the bouillabaise for two. This turned out to be quite a piece of theatre, as after a long wait, the waiter came to our table and said "Attention!" and then presented a platter of fish to us. There were four fish and he went through the names which I have of course forgotten (clearly I wasn't actually paying attention after all), but I think red mullet was one of them, and G said something about scorpion fish which apparently you can't get in the UK. Then the platter was whisked off to a side table where the fish were taken off the bone etc and then they were served up to us in bowls, along with a simmering pan of fish soup, a bowl of croutons and a ramekin of rouille.
It was a seriously good fish soup and G had a second helping, while I was quite stuffed by this stage. Which was unfortunate since we had already pre-ordered our puddings! I had this chocolate fondant-type pudding which had the magic words "salted caramel" somewhere in the description on the menu, but I struggled to detect it. It came with a very enjoyable dark chocolate ice cream served on the side, which was great.
We had a Calvados to finish off with, and the waiter clearly approved of this choice. At no point during this trip did we encounter any of the famous rudeness from waiters - everyone was very professional.
After half an hour or so sitting there wondering how on earth we were ever going to move let alone make it home, eventually we heaved ourselves up, collected our suitcases from the hotel, which was fortunately just down the road, and grabbed a taxi to the Gare du Nord. By the time we got there and had queued for what seemed like hours to get through the Eurostar check-in, my stomach was feeling more comfortable. There was certainly no need for dinner, and G and I agreed that if (I should say when) we go back to Le Dome, a starter and the bouillabaisse would be quite sufficient!
This concludes my account of our weekend away, and thanks are due to G for suggesting and arranging it - I had a wonderful time and can't wait to go back to Paris for more.
No comments:
Post a Comment