The good old country life

Fete Champetre or country garden parties were a popular form of entertainment in 18th century in France and famous artists even painted these scenes in their artwork.

In Manila, lovers of French cuisine can have a party of their own at the charming Champetre, the new restaurant of Marc Aubry, which stands where the former restaurant of Marc Aubry (Je Suis Gourmand) at the ground floor of the Net One Building at Fort Bonifacio Global City.

When I used to go to Je Suis, I remember with fond foodie memories their salmon with arugula salad, foie pate,  escargots, lamb shank and coq au vin. Thankfully, Chef Marc kept some of the old dishes and added quite a few new ones as well.

The first time I ate here was with my Assumption friends and respective partners (minus A who was busy burning calories by riding bikes up steep mountains and other things of that sort). We sat at a round table by the deli and practically had to shout at each other to be heard.

The place was more upbeat and vibrant, the lighting a little too bright and the furniture a bit shaky. This is definitely your French bistro comfort food round the corner, forget romantic dates here.

Going on to the food. The menu was written in a curlicue type font, making it hard to read. It was easy to see they still had the oldies but goodies, such as the foie pate and escargot- those were ordered ASAP.

These snails as just perfect; hot brown morsels drowning in herb butter. I love dipping plain bread into its sauce!

The foie pate was creamy and delicious- you couldn't ask for a better homemade foie pate anywhere else in the city!

It seems that my friends and I always have our favorites wherever we eat, and here's what they got:

Salmon salad

Mushroom soup

Seared foie gras salad

Because I read One Big Bite before coming here, the specially ordered Steak Tartare they had eaten beckoned to me. I loooovve ordering things off the menu! I just had to try it!

So I asked if I could order it, and they said I could. Then I asked if I could have it seared like how I had it in Aix en Provence with Christophe, and they said they could! I loved the restaurant already! I got a main course portion with fries on the side. Here's how it looked

 Basically a hamburger, done the French way. And, oh, except its raw inside. And this one had tons of capers! OK I am allergic to nuts and sometimes I'll order, like a salad and take out the walnuts piece by piece. I tried taking the capers out one by one, but there were just too many! They overcame me and conquered me. I could no longer eat the thing. It wasn't the same steak tartare I had in Aix at all- duhh.

That's what I get for being adventurous.

The other, smarter diners ordered these colorful, yummy-looking dishes

lamb chops

Steak frites

Grilled prawns ratatouille

Grilled scallops and mushrooms

Onglet

As you can see, each main course in heavy and quite filling with a hefty portion of sides that can feed a small family of 4! We didn't have any more room for dessert, plus the restaurant was already empty on a Thursday  night at 10pm!

I was there again recently with a different group of friends. A very boisterous, everyone has their own opinion and it needs to be heard type of friends, hehe! Good friends to hungrily finish 3 bottles of red wine with! It was also a Thursday night, and this time the place was packed. A bunch of men in the back room, and all types of groups in the front.

We ordered the same escargot and foie pate but this time I just had to have the eggs en cocotte with Portobello mushrooms. And it did not disappoint me - it totally made up for that steak tartare (which I won't be ordering again). In fact, there are so many interesting dishes on the menu that one should come back again and again just to try them all.

I also ordered the veal cheeks bourguignon with creamed cauliflower, but it was L's overflowing seafood risotto that made me salivate. On a heap of creamy, cheesy risotto goodness there were about 4 kinds of seafood- and not just the cheap-y squid ring type, I'm talking about the jumbo prawns, seared scallops and sea bass!

I know what I'm having next time...

And we got to order dessert: the apple tart and the chocolate mousse, both extremely satisfying. Too bad I forgot my camera for that night....you will just have to go there and order it for yourself!

If this is country living, who needs the city?

Champetre
632.815.8801

Extraordinary Meals

Christmas holidays are a time when you get to eat a LOT of food, but they are not necessarily extraordinary meals. Perhaps the paella was superb, but the lechon was stale. The caviar pie was divine, yet the wine, not so much. Buffet upon buffet upon buffet, signifying nothing.

Do you remember the last time you had a truly excellent, truly extraordinary meal?

My memories of extraordinary meals did not necessarily have to do with special holiday; most of my extraordinary meals were surrounded by most ordinary circumstances.

For instance.

While in Las Vegas 2009 for my uber cool dad's 80th birthday, my sister Margie booked us a table at Blush at the Wynn, a very hip bar where tables mean bottle service. And it being the City of Sin, where prices are just another number, each bottle of whatever you want costs US$500 each.

We were 20+ strong, comprising siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles and even nephews, so of course they required us to get 2 bottles. Ouch.

At least it comes with mixers and a sexy cocktail server to pour your drinks (to make you buy more bottles).

So by the end of the night, after we had consumed 3 bottles of Grey Goose, very generously donated by brother in law Jack (thanks again Jack!) who says memories have no price, we were STARVING.

So we went off to a place in the hotel that was open for a late night meal.

OMG.

I'm not saying this because I was drunk, but we ordered the most delicious, most satisfying, should be considered a tourist must on your to-do list, steak and eggs I've ever had. I will never forget it. Steak and eggs, next time I am in Vegas I'm coming to visit you!

Sorry, I don't have photos of that meal, as I was not in bloggin mode then, only eating mode. Instead, I am going to treat you with another one of these kinds of meals while we were in Paris: La Rotisserie du Beaujolais.

Manda and I decided to spend Day 2 touring museums such as the Rodin and the D'Orsay and to make up for missing dinner, eat at a real restaurant as suggested by the American based in Paris, David Lebovitz. Manda did her foodie research, thank goodness!

We walked all the way in search of Quai de la Tournelle, where it was located, and we were not disappointed. It being a late hour, the restaurant was near empty.

happy campers high on Paris

the menus to choose from are written on blackboards on the wall

view from our table towards the Right Bank

We each got an aperitif, kir royale, I ordered my favorite escargot as our appetizer and we opted for one of their specialties, the duck good for two. My goodness, when we saw this, we wondered, "Is that duck just for us???"

his goose, or should I say duck, is cooked

As we drank our aperitifs, we began to get very tipsy, especially on the cherries laden with alcohol

 check out the cherry bombs

We ate the most wonderful, crusty bread, but careful not to overdo it, as we kept eying the duck roasting on the spit. No one else was in the restaurant, so it must have been for us!

 the open kitchen. Look at the size of that toque!

this is what you call slow food

The escargot arrived, and these were huge, fat babies that seemed just plucked out of the backyard garden. Sooo good to dip the bread into that green goodness.

Grab shell dude

Then finally, our duck was done. And what a lovely roasted duck it was. They were going to serve it two ways: roasted and grilled. 

congratulations, your huge meal is about to commence!

the wine we had with our meal

The most exquisite duck breast served with a fig reduction and potato hay. You would trade your first born child for this dish. I swear!

We were too stuffed to eat the second course, but we had to try it. Grilled chicken leg served with a side mesclun salad. 

Which would you prefer?

No room for dessert, but we were already so happy from the food, the wine, the atmosphere, being in Paris in the fall- everything. Check out the house cat, eponymously named Beaujolais- he must get all the leftovers!

Should you ever go to Paris this year, you must make this a stop on your itinerary. Now this is what you call an extraordinary meal with an extraordinary friend.

Fabulous French Food From France

This month, the January issue of the Philippine Tatler comes out and inside is a feature of the beautiful wedding of Martin Argosino and Leica Carpo. It was a wedding dreams are made of: getting lost in the Luberon, gettting drenched in Avignon, losing a glove, finding flowers, interesting boutiques, complimentary L'Occitane toiletries, a church as cold as a tomb (but beautiful), new friends and old, a DJ who looked like Ving Rhames...

Just looking at it made me reminisce of all things French, especially the food. Ohhhh, the glorious food. Butter, foie gras, truffle oil, you name it. Food so good, even my grazing friend Amanda halfed a duck with me.

So dear readers, as a special treat as well as an agony of sorts, I am giving you a very special series of postings on "What I Ate When I Was There."

Enjoy and please don't drool on your keyboard ala Electric Dreams. That's soooo 1980's!

First, our charming hotel on the Rive Gauche in the Saint Germain de Pres district, Hotel Clement. We walked all the way here from our Luxembourg RER train stop because frankly, there are no taxis at 6AM. Good thing it was close by- my poor luggage looked kawawa compared to Manda's shiny, upright, polycarbon German-made Rimowa.

 What transportation strike?

We totally maxed out first day out, getting a feel of our new neighborhood which culminated in a touristy lunch that I am too embarrassed to post here even though I took a picture of it. Instead, enjoy the wintry colors of the Lauduree window display in the St Germain de Pres district. It's a new one and they didn't let me take a photo inside, phooey.

 So we bought a box of the assorted instead. And this little box of macarons saved our lives that night.

"How?" you may wonder. Can a box of macarons really stop a thief from stealing your wallet as he holds a knife to your throat? "Oooh lala! Laduree! Okay, I'll let you go this time..."

No. Actually we were exhausted by 6PM and decided to take a nap, saying "We'll wake up for dinner!" Biiigggg mistake. We woke up at 2AM and everything was closed! So we Facebooked and Manda Skyped until about 4AM then we fell asleep. We were the first ones down at the breakfast buffet, it was still so dark outside and only 6AM. Talk about heaven...

boil your own eggs

 bread basket of pastries

 the most delicious processed cheese in a little packet ever

 all the Nutella you can eat and jam flavors such as boysenberry

 fresh fruit and yogurt.....

We learned our lesson this morning- to respect the coffee. We both drank two cups each and the rest of the day we were super hyper. Manda freaked out a little (read: a lot) about getting a document faxed as she Skyped her Manila office. 

Promise, i'll show you real food tomorrow. Au revoir!