Lintillac, Paris

I paid a visit to this restaurant after reviewing some good reviews about affordable but good foie gras served here.

But what I got was disappointment beyond contempt. I wouldn't say it was worse than my previous dining experience in another French establishment, but it's pretty bad.




First of all, to avoid disappointment, I called up early a day before to make a reservation.
And when I arrived, it was still early and we were the first customers there. It was empty.

When provided our name, we were adjourned to our table, a tiny laden square located just in front of the TOILET and the wine shelves!



We asked to change table but they said it was all fully booked, even though it was still extremely early and the restaurant was empty. When we asked why were we placed in such a horrible seating even though we reserved, they said we never specified which seating we wanted. So what? You just put us in the worst seating in the restaurant possible?

I don't believe that every single patron of the restaurant that was scheduled to come in for dining at least 1.5 HOURS later have requested to sit at a particular seating in the restaurant. Being very hungry and not wanting to walk more to look for restaurants, I even suggested that we could eat really fast and be gone before their guests arrive, and they refused. I strongly believed they were being prejudice, it was my first experience of racism in Paris.


wine we ordered

So the whole night I was dining next to the wine shelves where the waiters literally reached over (in front of me!) to grab the wine bottles every so often for their arriving guests. It was utterly rude and extremely bad attitude. I bet they were laughing at us behind the bars: "dumb Asians, won't leave even after we pester them so".

If I knew this was going to be this way, I would have left, but like I said, I was too hungry to begin with, and really wanted to just eat and leave.

I ordered some of the dish that were suggested online, and to my dismay, none of them but one lived up to my standards.


This must be the saddest piece of Foie Gras pate I've seen in Paris. The pate itself was smooth, but the pairing was poor. I can't even remember if they gave us breads.


the Foie Gras de Canard was another mediocre dish. It was nice, as most cooked well foie gras would, but again, nothing special. No sauce whatsoeve, only couple of plums to pair with. I might as well bring home a piece of foie gras from the supermarket, seasoned with salt and pepper and seared it myself.


my partner ordered the duck confit, I've never been of a fan of duck confit so I wouldn't know how to comment on this dish. Though it was a pretty small dish.

The only thing that excelled superbly in this restaurant was their chocolate mousse, however the sad the presentation was.



Sadly, I got wasted that night after finishing half a bottle of wine and puked out all my delicious chocolate mousse onto Paris pavement not long after. 

KFC @ Paris

One of the best KFC Burgers I've had was in Paris.

The French paired their burgers really well with bacons. They perfected the concoction if anything. Even Mcdonald there has made its CBO (burger with bacon and chicken and bacon bits on the buns, divine) a top notch 'cuisine'.


Bacon with grilled chicken on ciabatta bun (ciabatta! in KFC!)


Another favourite is the boxmaster, which is a tortilla wrap with deep fried chicken piece, cheese and hash with lettuce and mayo.



Just yumz... 

L'Ardoise Restaurant @ Paris

It was a restaurant highly recommended by a friend that turned out terribly wrong.

It was meant to be a meaningful New Year's Eve dinner. I was in France, and of all places, Paris. 

A fine dining experience was to be expected. And L'Ardoise was strongly suggested; and soon it would be added to my list of series of unfortunate events in France. 

This was a long time ago, and my first lesson to French fine dining: always reserve before arrival. First rule of thumb to the start of any good dining experience, always call up to reserve a table, and always ask for the best table. With the best view, in a quiet corner, avoid seating close to the toilet or entrance. 

In this case, I called to reserve, but didn't inquire about a table. In Malaysia, it is fine to assume when you call up to reserve early, the restaurant manager will automatically assign you to the best table, or a reasonable one; but in France, if you don't ask for it, you get a table, but you don't get guaranteed a good one, and in most cases, you will be allocated to one of the worse tables in the house. As you've guessed, I was seated terribly close to the entrance. 

Upon entrance, I was asked to sit down immediately, and was served an amuse bouche (basically a pre-appertizer, usually comes in bite-size serving). I assumed it was complimentary since we weren't given any menu. So I ate it. And then looked through the drinks menu while waiting for the food menu. It didn't come. So I asked for it. 

To my utter surprise, the waitress told us we have already been served first course of that evening's set menu. And it cost 80 euro each. That was more than RM700 at that time. And we weren't even given a choice! Neither were we informed about the fix set menu info on NYE's dinner, since we read up all the reviews and knew what we wanted to order that night. 

We could have walked out, but it was NYE and we didn't know where else to go and we felt bad for having eaten the first course, thought now that I think back, we SHOULD have walked out. But in my defense, that was not knowing what we would be expecting next. 

Food came. First, second, third, fourth courses. Appertizers were good, first main and second main, bad and worse. 

some bisque soup that was decent

by now we were impressed because scallops and sauce were great. 

This was when things go downhill, the foie gras that came in a jar was tasteless, possibly because it was steamed and there's the taste of lard and fat and well.. nothing else. It was one of the worst foie gras I've ever put in my mouth. 

Really good dessert, perhaps the only thing the French can never do wrong; apart from good appetizers, the French can really do excellent dessert. 

When the main course chicken (before the dessert) arrived, it was too much to bear. The chicken was SO DRY and TOUGH it was impossible to even chew and swallow. We complained this to the waitress, to which she just shrugged and said: " well we can't do anything about it."

WTF?

"Well, if you could head in and inform the chef, that's all we want" we said. Which was true. We weren't looking for any compensation, but if the food's bad, I think it's the customer right to voice it out, and an opportunity for the chef to improve.

"Okay I will do that but we can't do anything about it" said waitress.

WTF x2 ?!

Few minutes, she walked out from the kitchen.

"The chef said he cannot do anything about it." she said. 

Effing serious? Are you running a restaurant? Are you qualified to even be in the service line? 

And then we realized the senior French couple sitting next to me were having something we're not. They were having a la carte food! (with wine) Did we just got conned into having the set menu?

Furthermore, what's with the horrible service attitude? Well, apparently it's extremely rude to complain that the chef's food is horrible in France. I suppose it's also the best response to tell their customers there were nothing they could do about it. Viva la France, indeed.