I ❤️ Paris

We had a lazy morning after another 18,000 steps yesterday. After donning our glad rags, we caught the metro to meet up with Anne Pleash, current Balli of the Cairns Chaine des Rottiseurs, for lunch at the 3 Michellan starred, Guy Savoy. Some of you will remember we celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary there back in 2009, with an amazing dinner experience at his original restaurant near the Champs Elysée. It was a memorable occasion and Roger had been angling for a repeat visit to his 'new' venue in the historic Monnaie du Paris, on the top-floor overlooking the Seine. He's been there for just over 10 years now so the pressure was on and it seemed a fitting location to meet up with Anne, another lover of good food and wine.

Not much has changed in 17 years, except the red carpet all the way up the stairs is considerably longer than the original restaurant's 3 metre red carpet, just across the pavement! The greeters were there to meet us, as was, Chef, Guy Savoy as well at the top of the stairs. Little did we know what lay ahead as we were seated at a window seat overlooking the Seine with just one other table of three young men, dressed appropriately in their black jackets. Anne's enquiries established that two of the guys were chefs in training, and they brought their mate along for the ride. I later discover he's an Armanien student, studying International Law.

But back to the food and wine. We chose the simple menu, six courses with matching wines and several amuse bouche to provide the surprises. I'll let the menu and pictures tell the story, suffice to say it was all beautiful but for me the lobster was the absolute standout. The service was impeccable, the wines superb, but as it was a lunch service there was not quite as much pomp and ceremony as we'd experienced originally. However, we had seen Guy Savoy pop in to speak to the table of young men behind us on numerous occasions, and concluded that they may have been angling for an apprenticeship. When he came over to chat with us, he proudly announced that one of the boys was his grandson, which enhanced the whole experience as we felt privileged to have shared our lunch in such special family circumstances.

After coffee, with the tiny madeline popped under the specially designed coffee cup, petit fours and one more glass of Guy Savoy champagne, we finally departed around 5pm. The staff had the vacuum cleaners out in the other dining spaces! A quick metro home for a refreshing GnT at our local bar with a bowl of salty peanuts which constituted dinner, and it was not long till we were crawling into bed.Read more