Don’t know about you, but Barnet isn’t exactly known for its prize winning restaurants. If there are any there, gosh, they’ve certainly passed me by.
So when a press release came tumbling through my letterbox telling me about a new French place in that part of the world listing some decent sounding dishes, I just got tad excited and promptly booked myself in.
I have to add though that the environs didn’t quite give me an adrenalin rush what with the long trek from the tube station and the establishment itself down a mews. But what the heck, can’t win ‘em all.
We say:
What kicks in first is the robustly flavoured tapenade and boy, does it get addictive. Sometimes greed gets the better of me because what followed as starters – a creamy spider crab and coconut bisque with crème fraiche (£5.95) and a friend’s seared king scallop with beurre blanc and puff pastry (£8.75), were no doubt acceptable, but somehow the flavours just didn’t impact. I blame the tapenade for killing the palate!
Follow on with very generously portioned mains featuring pan fried veal chop with croquettes potatoes – not very fashionable these days – onion and spinach in morel sauce (£22.50) along with rabbit leg (my friend’s choice, I’m too squeamish to eat cuddly bunnies) with mustard mash in prune and armagnac sauce (£13.75). The former boasts a good meaty chop while the latter rabbit item was so so albeit in a rich sauce.
Service wasn’t quite up to par and a table close by was heard making complaints about the delay in their order.
While all in all this is a decent enough neighbourhood restaurant, what nailed this place for me – and quite unexpectedly so – were those damn finely flavoured home made ice creams (£5.50).
The list seemed endless, but might I suggest any of the following: pannetonne and raisin ice cream, tahini and sesame seed, coffee and tobacco or even oak smoked banana with chocolate chip.
Do I think this place is cheap? No I don’t. But if you are in and around Barnet, drop in, it’s worth it. Now that sounded almost like an ad tag line, didn’t it?
ADDRESS
206 High Street
Barnet
Herts
EN5 5SZ
tel, 020 8347 8206
POSTED...
Sun 1 Oct 2006 at 6:04pm
