Gastroville

This more recent December meal confirmed yet again that the ingredients sourcing at les Ambassadeurs is simply mind boggling. Literally everything is perfect. There are few restaurants in the world were such meticulously selected ingredients are served consistently throughout a meal and throughout meals. This was my fourth meal under Piege’s tenure at les Ambassadeurs and I continue to be surprised at very high level of ingredients served. Quite a feat. Well almost perfect as it says in the header. The white truffles served were somewhat muted as were the black ones. Even if it is early in the season for the black, I have had significantly better black truffles scored on the “black market” this season.

Piege’s strengths i my opinion lie in when he modernises classic French dishes or dishes with roots in French classic cooking and without compromising the deliciousness by overly complicated presentations and applying modern techniques achieves a result that feels so obviously great. His onion tart in March was an example of this as were the fantastic endives with ham and truffles from a meal just after Piege took charge of les Ambassadeurs. I think however that some dishes become overly complicated. Like his casse-croûte of lobster in March and when he used the same concept for the scallops and pumpkin in this more recent meal.

Piege composed a meal for us that featured some white truffle and black truffle dishes as well as his signature dish langoustines with caviar.

The meal started with Piege’s TV-platter. It was somewhat changed since March, although only in the details. Although all items are well conceived and well made, for the frequent goer may like some alternation. The one objection I may have is the cylinder with snails’ mousse inside. On the three occasions I have had it; I have not managed to eat it without dripping on the napkin. A cornet would be more convenient although perhaps less original for Piege.

The first dish served was one of Piege’s signature dishes Caviar golden d'Iran/nage corsée/langoustines. As can be expected here, the langoustines were of unbelievable quality or perhaps like Nerieds disguised as langoustines, which a good friend once said when commenting on the quality of langoustines he had at l’Ambroisie. The caviar was good, even Vedat, who knows his caviar from consuming huge quantities of black market caviar over the years in Istanbul, would have conceded that the caviar was of good quality. So what is there not to like? Well, the langoustines explained to be “en tempura” were deep fried in a wrapper of a dough that was somewhat crispy on the exterior but almost soggy inside and a little too greasy, which all somewhat tainted the impression of eating the langoustines. The wrapper has really nothing to do with tempura and is hardly an improvement over a feather light perfect tempura like Gagnaire can serve instance. It is really not an improvement as a trial to remake tempura. Actually, serving the langoustines in this poor spring roll style fashion has improved nothing compared to just serving them as they are in the natural state cooked in any fashion. The side dish of nage corsée was well made but the sushi style piece of langoustine with it made little sense. Langoustines are in my opinion not one of the most interesting produce from the sea to eat sushi style unless cut very thinly. Although this dish displayed fantastic ingredients and impressive craftsmanship, I frankly find it overreaching and boring.

The egg dish that came next was much better. Like an oeuf Florentine but served as a golf ball sized cracking cromesqui of egg yolk. It was really excellent, and to my taste better than Pacaud’s more classic Florentine egg version, although the shell appeared slightly too thick and the squeeze effect of punching a hole in it stained on my jacket. This dish displayed that fantastic deliciousness that Piege can capture in remaking a classic dish.

The rolled toasted bread came next, or casse-croûte of lobster as it was called in March. This time it was filled with scallops and pumpkin slices. It was served with Alba truffles slices and slices of pumpkin chips. Scallops and pumpkin go very well together. The two different sweet notes of the two produce marry in an interesting manner. The white truffles were rather muted although to the restaurant’s defence it was cut in pretty generous and thick slices. The scallops came across as imperfectly prepared. Personally, I find this preparation a good example of when a dish is over worked and when the visual presentation of the dish seems to have gotten priority over the appearance in taste and mouth feel. The dish becomes more of a decoration rather than being visually appetising.

The probably best dish was the sweet breads façon Crécy, another squared preparation much favoured by Piege. This was an exceptional dish even if it was eclipsed by the extraordinary sweetbreads dish in March.

Cheeses from Antony were of course a real treat and included fantastic camembert, Saint Nectaire and l’Abbaye de citeaux and a comté from 2003.

Dessert was a variation of one of the desserts from March. Leaving aside that I don’t really favour desserts made with banana for their usually cloying mouth feel, this was excellently made. But again, a bit too much of a decoration.

It was perhaps too much to expect another stunning meal on the level of the ones in March. I am unsure if any restaurant is able to consistently perform on such level. There is no doubt that Piege is a technician in the cuisine that sets a new standard. Having said this it was an excellent meal but my impressions are somewhat negatively affected by the for me somewhat overworked aspects of some preparations. They lack spontaneity, simplicity and obviousness of truly great dishes and I know that Piege is capable of doing better than this. Therefore I rate this meal less than previous meals but it is still a highly recommended restaurant that is one of very few that is capable of turning out extraordinary preparations. It will be interesting to follow Piege’s developments. Gastroville rating of this meal: 17/20.

It will be interesting to see if Michelin will elevate les Ambassadeurs to 3 stars next year. Even if this last meal was not as great as the two March meals, it did prove that it is a restaurant with consistent high performances and les Ambassadeurs is clearly performing better than many French 3-star restaurants and probably most non-French. Piege is also, with Cordeillan Bages the one that has impressed most on me and Vedat of the current espoirs whereas for example le Meurice provided me a really disappointing meal in March that was simply not acceptable for the prices these meals command.

Finally a few word about the excellent wine service at les Ambassadeurs as it deserves special mentioning. Not only is the wine list very extensive and well chosen, but there are also – not common for Paris – a number of relative bargains. It also highly recommended to seek advice from the knowledgeable David Biraud who is the chef sommelier and responsible for the wine service.

David recommended a 1993 Meursault-Perriers from Roulot and it turned out to be quite a surprise. I had the last of my own bottles from this vintage before 2000 and asked the several times if the wine was not past its prime. David persisted that it was not. The first tastes revealed a fully mature Meursault, but the real surprise came later during the meal when the wine, after having been opened for a while, changed completely and smelled and tasted like a much younger wine. It was quite a stunning wine for lovers of the style in which Jean Marc Roulot makes his wines. We followed with a 1991 Pommard Rugiens from Hubert de Montille which must be considered as one of the excellent value at this restaurant.