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I was fortunate to be in Paris around the same time as Geruhage and Tomo-chan, because I really didn't have much planned for the days after Bordeaux. I thought I would take things easy and just meet up with a friend for a meal, but a month ago this friend told me that our mutual friends were in town, so I immediately asked to piggyback on whatever their program is. For our first meal together, we would check out the new location of restaurant they already know.
Maison Ruggieri Palais Royale has already gotten back a star after moving to the current premises, and given Chef Martino Ruggieri's pedigree and the fact that the old location had two macarons, we definitely had expectations. But truth be told, I should have gone to buy myself aome short-sleeve T-shirts from Uniqlo before coming to dinner. I was still wearing the long-sleeve tee I'd been wearing since this morning, and Paris was still well in the 20s even at night. The folding glass walls were open so that we had direct access to the garden inside Palais Royale, but this meant we were left without much air conditioning...
There are poems to match the dishes and menus, and the long tasting menu is named
Letter from a Correspondent. I doubt Geruhage ever entertained the idea of taking
A Short letter from a Correspondent... The menu lists dishes by their main ingredient, followed by a short poem from the chef's wife.
Zucchini with flower and watermelon "ham" - the zucchini came with a tarragon sauce, the flower was covered in a sauce made with cumin and tomato. The strips of dehydrated watermelon
"jambon" were chewy and sweet.
Grissini with Parmigiano-Reggiano - these are the thinnest grissini I've ever seen.
AR-TO - combination of arthicoke and tomato, made with artichoke jelly and an ice cube made of tomato water. And tomato powder on the rim of the glass.
Foie gras - the fatty liver from young ducks in Landes came with jelly made with artichoke and bitter herbs, which tasted like Cantonese turtle jelly (龜苓膏) to me... thanks to a little it of sweetness from the artichoke caramel on top. Bitterness is not one of my favorite tastes, so...
Mini baguette - nice and stretchy
quignon.
Udon - so we have "udon" that is flat... plus some
orecchiette which were pretty
al dente. The sauce, made simply with tomato water and
beurre blanc, was very nice. We were told it was butter even though the menu mentioned
beurre blanc, and that explains the acidity in the sauce.
This braided bread was soft and fluffy, but boring... Definitely a step down from the mini baguette.
Lobster - the
homard bleu from Brittany came with ice plant and strips of pickled cucumber, along with a creamy, green foam as well as greenish lobster coral.
The lobster itself was barely cooked and seemed pretty raw.
Almond - an interpretation of Escoffier's
blanc-manger à la française made with almonds, covered with
lardo di colonnata and mushrooms. The
lardo was so nice, and this did come with light flavors thanks to the almond and olive oil, mixing savory with sweet.
This crunchy piece of toast with herb butter was pretty useless. It might as well have been a piece of common garlic bread from a chain restaurant. At this point, I'm thinking Chef Martino should fire whoever is making his bread.
Red mullet Red scorpionfish - the menu said red mullet, but this was introduced as
rascasse. This was very tender. Served with some chicken liver and
cime di rapa on top. A piece of grilled squid came on the side, with a fish reduction. The flavors here were pretty nice.
Sourdough - OK, finally back to something decent...
Olive oil and butter
Beef Veal sweetbreads - Geruhage asked to switch his beef course to sweetbreads, and I followed suit. Served with turnips cooked in butter, and seaweed sauce. The seaweed in the sauce was very nice, but unfortunately this also came with black olives... and I had to deduct points for that.
The sweetbreads were pretty good, having been fried to a light crisp on the outside. But it was still far from
the amazing version I had at L'Air du Temps all those years ago...
Strawberry - the combination of the sweet meringue with juicy strawberries, plus the perilla leaf and herb sorbet, was very nice.
Peach - we had peach sitting on a puff pastry, topped with peach sorbet garnished with some basil.
Kouign-amann à la rhubarbe - this had been "deconstructed" and presented as strips without the usual sugary glaze, and meant to be dipped into the rhubarb sorbet.
For some strange reason I thought the sorbet tasted of raspberries...
Vanilla cookie
We took it easy with wine at dinner tonight and just ordered one bottle.
2023 Pierre Girardin Le Châtaignier - big nose of toast with flinty notes. Very dry and lean acidity.
We thanked the chef and the staff, but needed to run. There was a show to catch.
Tomo-chan had requested to go watch the show at
Moulin Rouge, as she has never been. Well... It's been 32 years since my first trip to Paris, and I haven't really been interested in going to see it. But since someone is organizing the activity... I might as well go along and pop my cherry along with another friend.
This place was PACKED! One is practically next to one's neighbor, and you'd better hope that no one is reeking of strong BO... I have to say, though, that I had no idea what to expect from the show. I didn't realize this was practically non-stop for an hour and a half. The can-can was expected, as was some of the performers being topless. In the end, I was somewhat pleasantly surprised.
It's been a long day from Saint-Estèphe to Montmartre. Time for bed...
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