Venice restaurants: Eating off the beaten track

If you want to get away from your fellow tourists in Venice - and who doesn’t? - here are five very different restaurants to try. Three of them are on the Giudecca - one of the best places for avoiding the hoardes, especially at the weekend.

One (Dalla Marisa) is on the Cannaregio canal but so quirky that few tourist beat a path to its door and the other, Al Fontego dei Pescatori, central but newish ( a couple of years) under its current ownership so not listed by many of the guidebooks.

Altanella
Calle delle Erbe 268, Giudecca
041 522 7780

Altanella used to be former French president Francois Mitterand’s favourite Venice haunt and you can see why. It’s so discreet - down a tiny alleyway off the Giudecca, without any kind of sign over the restaurant - that it’s almost impossible to find. Inside the decor can’t have changed much in the past 40 years. Apart from the main dining room which is completely covered with paintings and the open terrace overlooking the Rio del Ponte Longo (lovely in good weather) it’s all dark pine and little booths. There’s a large TV in the corner by which the staff were transfixed during the Juve football match that was showing. After our main course was served they didn’t reappear for about 20 minutes.The food was mixed. The gnocchi, which was supposed to be a speciality was heavy and leaden with a pre-prepared (I suspect) sauce, the squid ink gnocchi not a lot better. My husband on the other hand had a nice fresh plate of boiled shrimp with garlic and parsley and one of our friends a glorious brick-brown bean soup, warming earthy and robust.

St Pierre came with rather a glutinous white wine sauce and the ubitiquous calves’ liver tasted more like lamb but the fritto misto (tiny shrimps and fish, squid and baby soles) was exemplary - a lovely light batter, fresh and sweet. House white is of the old-fashioned Venetian variety - almost medium dry but there’s a pleasant fresh cabernet franc by the carafe. Not much else in the way of wine though. This must be the shortest wine list in Venice.The pictures of Mitterand on the walls show him with dark hair which suggests the restaurant’s heyday was a good 40-50 years ago. Nevertheless it has a certain rustic charm. Go, I suggest, at lunchtime. Sit on the terrace if it’s fine. And order the fritto misto.

NB Altanella in common with quite a few smaller restaurants doesn’t take credit cards.

Trattoria al Cacciatori
Fondamenta Ponte Piccolo, 320 (near the Palanca vaporetto stop)
041 528 58 49

Service is langourous to a fault in this simple Giudecca-based trat but if you’re sitting on the quay in the sun overlooking the Zattere, who cares? The dishes are also carefully cooked and reassuringly authentic. Shrimps with polenta (14€) was perfectly cooked with tiny sweet shrimps and beautifully light and flavourful yellow polenta. Bigoli (thick wholewheat spaghetti-type noodles) in salsa was warming and rustic with a sweet-sour onion and anchovy sauce. Fritto misto (20€) was particularly authentic with plenty of small fish - at least 6 or 7 - as well as prawns and squid. A real mixed catch, beautifully fresh in a light batter. Mainly patronised by locals and the French who seem to have colonised the Giudecca. According to one website I looked at it’s the oldest inn on the island.

Dalla Marisa
Calle de le Canne No. 652 - Cannaregio
Phone: 041 72 02 11

You need to be feeling robust to go to Dalla Marisa. They don’t speak English. You have to be there at 8pm prompt.(rather admirably there’s only one sitting) There’s no menu - or bill. House wine (no choice - it’s red) is plonked on the table. Marisa herself (a sturdy grandmother in her late 60s I would say) glowers at you out of the kitchen. But the food is sublime.If you manage to get a booking you walk into a wood panelled room which looks basically like a workman’s caf - which is essentially what it is.

The first two platters arrive - two different pastas (there’s no explanation of what they are) Ours seemed to be some loosely rolled cannelloni with homemade ricotto and spinach (fantastic, the best pasta I ate in Venice) and tagliatelle with duck sauce, made from the legs, I would guess, both made from superbly light, silky home-made pasta.Next two dishes of vegetables, an unadorned platter of simply boiled artichoke bases and a murky, flavoursome stew of enoki and oyster mushrooms. Then two plates of meat - some delicious little veal rolls (involtini) with a light spinach stuffing and some braised sliced duck breast. Altogether a ridiculous amount of food.

Dessert isn’t a big feature of Marisa meals but it was worth making room for it. On the night we were there it was a small bowl of mascarpone, mixed with a little liqueur (possibly grappa) and lightened with a whisked egg white and served with dry dipping biscuits. Delicious.. Non dessert-eaters are offered grappa.

The wine - just red not even white - chilled and slightly fizzy like a dry Lambrusco - comes in 1 litre carafes and is totally undistinguished.No bill, as I say. The amount we owed (€175 for 5 - a bargain 35€ each even though I suspect they charge tourists slightly more) was scribbled on the paper tablecloth.If you’re prepared to do away with the usual restaurant niceties - and even be treated like an undesirable necessity Dalla Marisa is a unique and rewarding experience.

Mistra
Giudecca 212a
Tel: 041 522 0743

Mistra has about the least conventional approach of any restaurant in Venice. You approach it through a boat yard and up a cast iron staircase.The view at the top over the lagoon is just breathtaking. Luckily they’d also seated us by the front window so we could look at it all through lunch. When we got to the table there were already several plates on it. A dish of salmon marinated with fennel, fresh anchovies with capers, tiny balls of mozzarella and sweet and sour fennel. Our waiter said he’d wait till we’d eaten our starters before taking our order (although there’s a menu outside they seem to ignore it).

A dish of whipped stockfish and some deep fried zucchini strips arrived (delicious together though the stockfish was slightly too creamy)Then the waiter rattled off a list of possibilities. Pasta with shrimps, prawn or lobster or a mixture of seafood. Whole baked fish in the oven or baked in salt. A mixed salad or a selection of veg. We chose a bit of each.Everything took a long time to arive but was worth the wait. Both the pastas one with scampi, one with lobster were terrific especially the lobster one which came with a huge claw. Although we’d only ordered a portion of each there was more than enough for four.

Our two seabass arrived with ceremony, one roast with accompanying vegetables (potatoes, peppers, aubergine and tomatoes) the other encased in a pile of salt which they dismantled at table, carefully cracking the salt crust, removing the skin and taking the fish carefully off the bone. Both were impeccably cooked and beautifully sweet.

Desserts - a decent creme brulee and some fresh pineapple were simple and good. With our coffee and infusions they brought free limoncellos.An eccentric place, with slow but charming service and deliciously simple food, obviously much loved by the locals who bring their families for Sunday lunch. Our bill for 4: came to 220€

NB Even though this seems out of the way make sure to book. The first time we tried to go there on a Sunday we couldn’t get in.

Al Fontego dei Pescatori
Cannaregio 3726, Calle Priuli (off the Strada Nova)
041 520 0538

When Al Fontego dei Pescatori say their speciality is fish they mean it. The owner ‘Lolo’ ran a market stall in the Venetian fish market for 30 years and is still president of the Rialto market traders. Hence the emphasis on raw fish preparations such as ‘the clock’ - 12 different types of raw fish including scampi, prawn, seabass, sole and scallops and seabass tartare with raspberry -an odd but surprisingly successful combination (a tartare of tuna with strawberry was less good). We also tried a carpaccio of octopus with coriander which again was beautifully fresh but could have done with more coriander. (Lolo, who is passionate about his produce, serves his fish with just olive oil and balsamic vinegar - most diners, I suspect would welcome a squeeze of lemon).

Primi were good on the whole.. Fresh tagliolini with fresh tomato and raw scampi was a great dish - fresh and original, pancakes with prawns and artichokes sublimely rich and creamy, Tagliatelle with squid ink came with a rather heavy tomato sauce that disguished the squid ink flavour and accompanying scampi..though I have to say my husband loved it. Gnocchi were a little heavy and underseasoned. .The four of us shared a fritto misto which was excellent - fresh and crisp - one of the best we tasted.As elsewhere in Venice the wine list is good. We picked a delicious - Eleo Lison Tocai 2006 a lush, rich full bodied peachy white, so good that we had a second bottle.

This is a comparatively new restaurant (or new under the current ownership) where the welcome is warm and the prices fair (our bill for 4 came to 186€) Some of the combinations of fish and fruit are a bit off-key so stick to the less adventurous-sounding dishes. Lolo is passionate about his produce and you won’t get fish any fresher than this.*We didn’t get to it this time but on our last visit four years ago enjoyed Antice Stellato. Reviews indicate it’s still good.

And a couple of practical points: most restaurants, especially popular restaurants need to be booked ahead . And leave yourself plenty of time to get there. Some of them are hard to find. The normal way of giving an address in Venice is the district followed by a number but I’ve included the street too.

Venice restaurants - the big hitters

Eating out in Venice is not cheap, as we’ve discovered, but there are ways of mitigating the cost (essential if you’re spending a fortnight in the city!) Here are five of the more classic Venetian restaurants we’ve been to. Some less expensive and off the beaten track options over the next few days.

Vini da Gigio
Fondamenta San Felice, Cannaregio 3628a
041 5285140

Vini da Gigio has the charm of a well worn leather jacket. It was our first visit but I imagine most people there - mostly locals - come to this deeply traditional trattoria every week. Being one of the rare Venetian restaurants to open on a Sunday evening it's completely packed. (They manage to fit in two sittings so you need to eat early or late)

The big draw is a fantastic wine list which ranges all over Italy but also the rest of the wine world with France being a particular strength. Prices are hard to credit - a Comte Georges de Vogue Chambolle Musigny 2000 for example listed at just 95 euros.

Pursuing our current interest in natural wine we chose instead one of their current recommendations, a bottle of unfiltered Trebbiano from the Marche, a Chaioro 2006 from A Z Camelli which shows that this workhorse grape can be intriguing in the right hands. (It reminded us of a Marsanne though with a little more acidity)

Its slight earthiness was spot on with my husband’s plate of smoked fish crostini (swordfish and eel, I think) and fared reasonably well with a more challenging mixed vegetable antipasti of courgettes, carrots and peppers, spinach, aubergine and artichoke - the latter quite a feat)Our main courses - a lightly battered and fabulously fresh fritto misto (I'm afraid fritto misto is non-negotiable in my husband's book) and sweetly charred grilled squid were quite exemplary. This is definitely a place to eat fish.The only downside is that it would be easy to run up a hefty bill. As elsewhere in Venice the starters and primi are not significantly cheaper than the main courses. We managed to get away with 92€ for two but that was for only two courses and a bottle of modestly priced wine.

Verdict
Really good food, great wine and efficient, friendly service. This is a warm and hospitable place, perfect for a first - or last - night in Venice.

Al Covo
Campiello della Pescaria, Castello 3968
041 522 3812

We didn’t set out to eat at Al Covo having been put off by reviews saying how expensive it was but ended up there when we found our booked restaurant Corte Sconta unexpectedly shut due to a death in the family. We were glad that we had - we had a really good meal with great service that didn’t break the bank.It’s another Venetian institution with all the traditional dishes done impeccably well. I went for the saor, a sweet and sour dish of boiled and fried fish and vegetables, dressed with onions cooked with vinegar and seasoned with capers, pistachio nuts, pine-nuts and pink peppercorns (about the only time I’ve ever been convinced of their usefulness - they struck just the right exotic, aromatic note.) It’s hard to explain just what it tasted like - sharp and slightly spicy, a bit like a Moorish escabeche - but it was very tasty and absurdly generous - I could have dined off that alone.

My husband had another Venetian classic risi e bisi which usually looks and tastes like a pea risotto but here was transformed into a vivid green pea soup with rice. The dish made the best possible use of new season’s peas (and their pods) and some excellent parmesan.Inevitably he had to try their fritto misto which was generous to a fault - a huge plate which included little fried sole and scallops as well as the normal prawns, squid and assorted small fish and a few matchstick chips.

I opted for a primi of homemade stracci pasta with lamb ragu and cherry tomatoes which was good but slightly less interesting than it sounded. A bit like a bolognese.We had no room for desserts (a shame, they looked good) but were served excellent strong espressos with home-made biscuits for just 3 euros each.

We chose modestly from the splendid wine list - a half bottle of very enjoyable Filippi Castelcerino Soave (just 12€) which went surprisingly well with the saor and a simple fruity Valpolicella Valpantena from Secco-Bertani (15€)

The only real downside is that the atmosphere is a bit hushed as is the way in upmarket restaurants in which there are more tourists (albeit well-heeled ones) than locals. (And celebs of whom there is a wallful of pictures by the kitchen including a grinning Sting)

I preferred the atmosphere at Vini Di Gigio but a wet Tuesday lunchtime is never going to be as fun as a Sunday evening.Verdict: Expensive (our lunch cost 131€ plus service) but if you chose carefully Al Covo won’t set you back a great deal more than many far less competent restaurants. And the food and service are really very good.

Fiaschetteria Toscana
Salizada San Giovanni Grisostomo, Cannaregio 5719
Tel: 041 528 5281

I must confess we went to Fiaschetteria Toscana because we heard there was a demon lunch deal for 24€. In fact we even checked. First of all they said there was no deal. Then they said it was 28€. Then when we got there we found it wasn’t on (they clearly only offer it when business is bad or out of season.) No matter. Like most of Venice’s more expensive restaurants you can get by if you don’t eat more than two courses.

The menu is slightly more adventurous than some of the restaurants we’ve been too. Smaller portions too, which makes the two course strategy a bit of a stretch if you have a healthy appetite.But they’ve got the hang of cooking polenta, at least (by no means always the case in Venice). The best of our four starters was a lovely dish of cooked shrimps, seasoned with a bit of chilli, drizzled with olive oil on a mound of lovely light polenta. Our pasta starters - a dish of black tagliolini in lobster sauce and tagliolini with scallops and julienned vegetables were slightly less impressive, a bit short on their respective seafood (I suspect the lobster had been pre-cooked). Salt cod puree with polenta was well done but less interesting. Somehow I missed ordering a plate of raw fish with zucchini, tomato and camomile and poppy jelly which sounded intriguing.

Main courses were good too.on the whole although my beef carpaccio with rocket and parmesan was only a starter size portion. Gnocchi (with asparagus and bacon) were featherlight - absolutely delicious. Fritto misto (with courgettes) was fine but not the best we’d had. However it came with a splendidly vulgar commemorative plate under the ‘piatto del buon ricordo scheme.

Spaghetti alla vongole which came wrapped in a packet was again fine but less good than some of the less expensive trat versions we’ve eaten. Maybe we should have had grilled fish, a speciality of the restaurant which was slightly offputtingly priced by the 100 grams.. There are also some lovely vegetable contorni. The baby courgettes and courgette flowers and fresh peas which come from the market gardens of S. Erasmo and Cavallino were mouthwateringly good.We were sufficiently tempted by the look of the desserts to try an almond tart and a pear tart which were both delicious, light and elegant.

For wines we dipped into the well-priced wine by the glass list - an extraordinary dark amber Garganega 06 from Fasoli (€5.50) which was almost oxidised, a glass of Orvieto from Salviano (€4.50) (fine with my lobster pasta), a Sangiovese Romagna from La Zerebina (€5.50) and a rather oaky Cabernet ‘Cor Rominger’ 93 from Alois Lageder €13. Total bill: 216€ for 4

Verdict: An elegant, stylish restaurant with some interesting modern dishes which depart from the usual Venetian repertoire. Also (unusual for Venice) easy to find as it’s on one of the main tourist streets between the Rialto and S. Marco

Locanda Cipriani
Piazza S. Fosca, 29 - 30012 Torcello
Tel. (+39) 041 730150

I have to confess a sentimental attachment to Locanda Cipriani and the island of Torcello on which it is situated, about an hour from Venice over the lagoon. I remember eating there on my first visit to Venice some 30 years ago and can still taste the incredibly creamy seafood risotto I ate. So it seemed the perfect place for my husband’s Big Birthday Lunch.It didn’t disappoint. Well, it did slightly on the food front - we’ve eaten better in Venice but it didn’t matter in the least. The weather was perfect and we sat out in what I’m sure is a rose garden in season overlooking the church and the Campanile.

The restaurant as you can see from the website was founded in 1934 by Giuseppe Cipriani who founded the world-famous Harry’s Bar and the Cipriani. Hemingway stayed there as have many celebs and royalty. It’s the most discreet of places.

There were two set menus but neither looked particularly appealing so we ordered off the a la carte, trying not to tot up the prices. The restaurants signature risotto alla Torcellana con verdure dell’estuario (estuary vegetables) was the remembered creamy texture but lacked the definable taste of separate spring vegetables. A lobster salad was sweet and fresh and a dish of asparagus spears with a salsa meranese (chopped hard and soft boiled egg, I think, seasoned with chives and parsley) quite wonderful.- well worth replicating with the new season’s home-grown asparagus.

The inevitable fritto misto (fish and vegetables) was generous in quantity but was weighed down with a slightly heavy batter. Not as good as many we’ve had. Grilled fish with herbs was fine - exactly what you’d expect. We also had a couple of side salads and an outrageously expensive side dish of new season’s artichokes which was delicious - as well it might have been for 16€

Desserts - a chocolate cake with orange confit, chocolate mousse in a pastry basket and ice cream with chocolate sauce, were old fashioned and heavy - the weakest part of the meal.The bill for 6 of us was 507€ which since we’d stuck to house wine (a well-priced, Soave-style Breganze di Breganze from Maculan at 20€) wasn’t cheap (there’s a 9 euro cover charge but service is included) but given the occasion, the unique situation and the seamlessly discreet and attentive service was well worth it.

Verdict
The food isn’t tops but the location is. A perfect place for a Significant Birthday.or any other special occasion.

Corte Sconta
Calle del Pestrin, 3886 Castello
041 522 7024

We finally got to Corte Sconta on our last day (previously it had been closed owing to a death in the family). And it proved a great place for a final lunch.It’s not flash - the various dining areas have an almost Edward Hopperesque starkness to them but it’s friendly and the food and the service was great (though there are adverse reports on some sites that service slips in the evenings).

Of course, being Venice it’s not cheap but being old hands by now, we ignored the suggestion on the table that they should make a selection for us which we reckoned would have easily have added up to 70€ each and asked for a menu from which we ordered two starters, a pasta, a fritto misto (well we had to for our last meal!) a cheese and a dessert.Highlights were a fantastic dish of clams with ginger, squid ink spaghetti with scallops and white asparagus, the fritto misto (not the best one we’ve had though up among them) and some superbly aged cheese from an impressive cheese menu. My mixed seafood starter was fine (and 8 euros cheaper than if I’d left the selection to them) but I was less impressed by the crabs (an overrated and expensive Venetian speciality) and the dessert a liquid zabaglione which tasted fine but had the unfortunate appearance of a curry sauce.

We shared a bottle of light but very gluggable still Prosecco and a couple of glasses of red (a Cabernet Franc and a Merlot/Refosco at a very reasonable 4 euros a glass). The total bill for what by our standards was a major blowout was 146€

NB A couple of practical points: most restaurants, especially popular restaurants need to be booked ahead . They also have slightly erratic closing days so if there is a place you particularly want to go, make sure you arrange your other bookings round it. And leave yourself plenty of time to get there. Some of them are hard to find. The normal way of giving an address in Venice is the district followed by a number but I’ve included the street too.

See also my review of Alle Testiere

Paris tips and trends

Last post (for the moment) from Paris! A quick run-down of the most interesting food and wine ideas I picked up for those of you who haven’t time to read the full reviews:Sardines - cheap, sustainable - this summer’s must-eat fish, it seems. Grilled (Le Temps au Temps), served with red peppers and black-eye beans (La Gazzetta) served whole in a tin with seaweed butter (Cristal de Sel)

Dishes la barigoule - i.e. served with braised artichokes and, usually, bacon.

Also seems to diminish their antipathy to wine. A short-term trend while artichokes are in seasonIndividual cheese plates - one cheese and an accompaniment such as sheeps cheese and rocket sorbet (Le Temps au Temps) Bleu d’Auvergne and pear pure (La Gazzetta) or Bleu des Causses and poached prunes (Les Papilles). Makes wine matching much easier

Cocottes - stews and other braised dishes presented in a cast-iron casserole. (Les Cocottes, Cristal de Sel, Les Papilles)

Simple seasonal veg cooked this way are a great alternative to soup. Homely and comforting

Soup in a tureen (Les Papilles) - pile the topping ingredients in the bowls then ladle the soup around them.

Looks fabulously cheffy but basically a cheap, easy-to-prepare starter with no last minute fiddlingVerrines (les Cocottes) - sweet or savoury dishes, layered in a glass. Great way of presenting starters and dessertsCold pizza. Doesn’t sound too appetising but think of it more as transforming a thin crispy pizza base into an open sandwich. Top La Gazzetta-style with creamed goats cheese and mandolin-thin raw beetroot and fennel.

Coffee and mini desserts.

Not spotted by me but reported recently by Terry Durack in his Indy blog Eat. Don't feel you have to make them yourself - just buy them in (easier in Paris admittedly) Alternatively serve with a glass of sweet wine or cognac.Natural (i.e. unsulphured/unfiltered) wines - seemingly in every trendy Paris joint. Some are much better than others which makes for a frustratingly inconsistent experience. The best are great, the rest weird. There’s nothing to disguise the failings of the winemaker or vintage.

Corsican wines. And Corsican charcuterie and cheese, come to that.

Everything Corsican seems hot right now. Presumably because the French can’t bring themselves to eat or drink anything that comes from outside France (unless it's Japanese or Italian) and Corsica is about as exotic as it gets. Tiramisu and Patrimonio Rappu from Domaine Gentile (Il Vino) is a tremendous pairing though.

Four great restaurant finds in Paris

Even if you’re the most enthusiastic gourmet you can’t eat in 3 star restaurants all the time. And for most of us the prices of Paris’s top restaurants simply put them out of reach. Here are four very varied alternatives, discovered by my husband, an assiduous researcher into places that are off the beaten track, which we ate in with great pleasure last week

Les Cocottes de Christian Constant
133 rue Saint-Dominique, Paris 7e (Metro: Ecole Militaire)
Tel: 01 45 50 10 28

Les Cocottes which refers to the cast iron casseroles in which many of the main course dishes are served is the fourth restaurant of Christian Constant, the former chef at the Crillon. His three others Le Violin d’Ingres, Cafe Constant and Les Fables de la Fontaine are conveniently in the same street which enables Constant to flit easily from one to the other (we spotted him casting his eagle eye over operations, wiping a terminal screen, pointing out a customer who was waiting to pay).

In comparison with his other restaurants it’s strikingly modern with a vivid lime green colour scheme and a zinc bar which runs the length of the restaurant. They don’t take bookings and it was packed but we only had to wait 10 minutes for a seat.

The menu is imaginative, interesting enough to have two or three courses, easy to be satisfied with one. Having had a big lunch we each picked one of the two ‘verrines’ (little glass jars layered with sweet or savoury ingredients). I had a classic crab cocktail on top of a layer of shredded iceberg lettuce, my husband a triple-layered jar of chopped tuna, caviar of aubergines and tomato jelly.

Despite the lunch I couldn’t resist ordering a cocotte of confit potatoes stuffed with pigs feet which mercifully was accompanied by a salad and wasn’t quite as heavy (or as delicious) as it sounded and a little bit salty. But the cocotte of ‘legumes du moment’ hit the spot perfectly - a selection of braised root vegetables and herbs - a comforting alternative to a soup.

We passed on the tempting-looking puds which included the inevitable crumble (about which the French are curiously obsessed) and finished with a verveine (lemon verbena) infusion, again served in a cast-iron pot.There’s a very short wine list but you’d be better off ordering by the glass or fillette (25cl bottle) of wine. We had a perfectly decent Macon Villages which I’m ashamed to say I didn’t note but which went very nicely with the crab.

All in all Les Cocottes which was voted ‘meilleur comptoir’ of 2007 by Figaroscope, is a clever, stylish idea and a fun place to go for a light supper.Price of our meal for 2: 69€

La Gazzetta
29 rue de Cotte, 12e
01 43 47 47 05

Over in the 12th, the other side of La Bastille and near one of Paris’s most colourful markets L’Aligr is La Gazzetta, another bistro moderne opened last year by Swedish chef Peter Nillsson who had two stars for his cooking in Uzs.

Although it’s one of Paris’s hottest tickets in the evening when the restaurant admittedly looks wonderfully glamourous it’s the lunchtime deal which is unmissable - a basic formule of 14€ for 3 mini starters and a main dish (with a supplement if you order fish or steak)

On the day we visited the starters included a dish of marinated sardines (one of Paris’s hot ingredients this spring) with red peppers and black-eye beans, a slice of cold pizza topped with goats cheese cream, wafer thin slices of raw beetroot and fennel (delicious) and an extraordinary shot of what was described as ‘creme de boudin' (black pudding) with a pear and ginger pure which tasted a bit like spicy Nutella. (I was sure it had chocolate in it but our waiter insisted it didn’t). It was a great deal nicer than it sounded anyway and a surprisingly reasonable match with a white La Clape (Chateau de la Negly Brise Marine 2005) from a short but well chosen list, served by the fillette.Main courses were more conventional. Some excellent roast chicken with rosemary and citron and a bavette steak (the latter 5€ extra) both served with some great potato puree topped with stir-fried chard and celery seasoned with mint, which kicked a slightly overoaked but tasty Mascarone 2003 Provencal red perfectly into touch.

In the interests of my forthcoming cheese book we finished with a fine slice of Bleu d’Auvergne served with a pear pure (maybe the same one as the earlier shot?) which interestingly was fine with the Mascarone.Service is unusually friendly for Paris and there’s a great buzz about the place but a tip. If you have a choice the front of the restaurant is much nicer than the back.Cost of our meal for 2: 73€

Le Cristal de Sel
13 rue Mademoiselle (Metro, 15e (Commerce or Felix Faur)
Tel: 01 42 50 35 29

Why would you head down to the 15th for dinner when there are so many great restaurants in central Paris? Because you can get some of the best cooking in Paris for a song, that’s why. And it’s not that far - five stops on the metro from Concorde - a bit like going to Fulham.

Your destination is a curious one. An uninviting brick building with just the blackboard outside to tell you it’s a restaurant. Inside what looks like a converted Italian trattoria of the 70s - all awkward corners and beans. While there’s slightly more space than Le Temps au Temps (which isn’t saying much) it’s hardly spacious.

At the back there's a tiny but classic kitchen full of copper pans and four busy chefs, immaculate in their whites and formal toques. The improbably young head chef Karil Lopez, who bears a passing resemblance to Harry Potter, came from the Bristol and has brought his old habits with him. It’s an incongrous sight in what is basically a bistro. A mini-Bristol.

There’s no menu. A short daily menu is chalked up on the blackboard with a couple of specials - their coups de coeur - which includes their best produce including Yves Camdeborde’s charcuterie and sardinas Ramon Pena which are served in their tin. We gave them both a try. The sardines, tiny and sweet came in their tin with a wedge of lemon and a couple of pats of homemade butter with seaweed and salt crystals. It was improbably good. The sardines seemed boneless, sweet and delicate and the butter and accompanying bread was heaven. It would have made a full meal - in fact portions are all incredibly generous maybe making up for the fact that - surprisingly for the French - there are no prix fixe menus. The charcuterie is exemplary too, lean and full flavoured. The ultimate charcuterie platter.

Sadly I chose wrongly for my main course. Feeling like fish, being unable to resist artichokes and urged by our waiter who said it was the chef’s recommendation for the day I went for the roast dorade with artichoke risotto. It wasn’t that it was bad, just not as good as everything else. The fish was slightly overcooked and the risotto slightly too wet and soft.I envied my husband his pot au feu which he pronounced the best he’d ever eaten. And our neighbour’s lapin a la bire and cod en cocotte with tomatoes. My advice is definitely to stick to the bistro classics.

Except when it comes to dessert when you’re presented with a three star quality menu. (Is this the only restaurant of this size and price level in Paris to have its own pastry chef?) My passionfruit souffl with pineapple and fresh coconut was just a dream. The most delicious dessert I’ve had all year by a long chalk.The other original aspect to this place, and this may put you off if you’re a wine lover is that it has a very humble winelist, again chalked up on the board like the food.

With a couple of exceptions - an Aloxe Corton and bottles of Dom Perignon (at 160€) the wines are modest in ambition (affordable Loire, Burgundy and Bordeaux) and modestly priced. We had a Henri Bourgeois Sancerre (6€), a Brocard Aligot (4€), a minor Graves Chateau Vignolles-Peyroulet (4€) and an extraordinarily good Vin de Pays des Cotes de Var (Les Aurliens from Domaine de Triennes - also 4€). There’s no arguing here that the food is the star but it’s suprising they don’t take the opportunity to sell more expensive wine.

What it means however is that this restaurant is affordable - just over 100€ for the two of us - and sustains a local clientele which makes for a very congenial atmosphere. (On a Friday night two tables had small children with them). It’s one of Paris’s great bargains but I wonder if it’ll remain so. With that talent they’re bound to move to greater things.Cost of our meal for 2 - 103€

Les Papilles
30 rue Gay-Lussac, 5e (Metro Odeon)
Tel: 01 23 45 20 79

To say that Papilles is focussed on wine is an understatement. You sit virtually on top of it with bottles from floor to ceiling.

Basically it’s a wine shop that moonlights as a restaurant. You can drink any wine in the shop for 7€ corkage which makes for some great drinking. The ideal scenario would be to go with friends so you can try a few bottles. There were only the two of us and it was the end of a hard three days eating and drinking so we contented ourselves with just one - a faded but still charming 1995 Volnay Clos de la Rougette which went swimmingly well with our menu but I guess that most wines do. The food is obviously designed to be as wine-friendly as possible.

There isn’t a choice, by the way, on Saturdays at least, although I suspect they could rustle up something else if you really had a problem. We were more than happy with the dishes that arrived. A fabulously fresh pea soup which arrived in its own tureen enough for 4 generous helpings. At the bottom of each bowl were some fresh peas, lardons, croutons and a dollop of whipped cream which made the finished soup look really dressy.

Next was a copper pan full of classic boeuf bourguignon with its own vegetables - onions, carrots, mushrooms and potatoes. Again you serve yourself and again there’s more than enough. The heartiest appetites are catered for here.It was interesting how well such an old burgundy went with these dishes - a delicate counterfoil to the freshness of the peas, robust enough to go with the beef (though the sauce had been skilfully crafted not to be overbearing) and even to stand up to the cheese - a bleu des Causses which was served with a drizzle of sweet syrup (possibly plum) and a poached prune.

The final course was also ingeniously devised to go with almost any sweet wine you might want to drink. Pannacotta on top of a caramelised tatin-type apple base, topped with a layer of whipped up caramel froth (foam-loathers should not be put off - there was real substance to it.)

Service was charming and efficient. The atmosphere, highly convivial. Our fellow diners, clearly wine-lovers too, were leaning over us to peer at what was on offer on the shelves. The only downside is that it’s not the easiest place to get to - there’s no Metro immediately nearby but there is the enchanting Jardin de Luxembourg to walk off the after-effects of all that indulgence. On a perfect April day it was looking quite lovely.Cost of our meal for 2 - 120€