Dinner at Le Neuvième Art

Tonight we were booked in to have dinner at a two star Michelin restaurant headed up by Christophe Roure. The venue was elegant and stylish, and the staff were excellent. They were very passionate, knowledgeable and professional. Our sommelier used to work for Neil Perry at Rockpool, and he loves Australia and our wines.

I decided to go with a fixed price menu and Ian chose a La carte. We had an aperitif to start, me a rosé champagne and Ian a Chardonnay, and they both paired well with our amuse bouche plates, of which there were three. The first was a creamy tart, the second sardines in puff pastry with a lovely dipping sauce, and the third a quail egg in smoked bread.

For entree, Ian had crab meat with avocado, cucumber, apple and a very large blob of verbena foam. I had escargot with potato gnocchi and a spinach and mushroom sauce. They were both delicious.

For the main, Ian chose the fish and, I chose the seafood and mushroom ragout with a lemongrass flavoured hollandaise sauce, which was delicious. Ian’s fish preparation included some theatre. The raw fish fillet was brought to the table in a large square dish. The waiter poured hot beeswax over the entire fillet, submerging it completely. We then watched the fish “cook” in front of us over about 20 minutes. Once the wax had set and the fish was cooked, it went back to the kitchen to be extracted from the wax and plated with a fried artichoke. Both meals were delicious.

At the start of the meal, Ian had been presented with the wine list, which was huge and slightly intimidating, so we asked the sommelier advice. He recommended a delicious Chardonnay from a little village close to Chablis, which was very reasonably priced. It was a 2021 Vézelay and it was the perfect accompaniment for our meal.

My fixed price menu also included a cheese course. When the cheese trolley was bought over I was slightly overwhelmed by the number to choose from. I settled on four pieces and they were delicious. Then came dessert. I chose Golden Apple ‘en papillote’, Caramel Gel and Lemon Flavoured Vanilla ice-cream, and Ian had Fresh Figs and Hibiscus Panna Cotta with a warm Spiced Fig Tart on the side! We had digestives to accompany our desserts. Ian chose a 12 year old Armagnac and lucked out. It was the last bottle and there wasn’t a full serve, but what was there Ian got for nothing. I had an Austrian Tokay. We decided to have coffee, not realizing that it came with 5 petite fours. To say we were full at the end was an understatement.

We walked the 2.5kms back to our apartment, which definitely helped with the digestion. It was a lovely clear evening and the lights of Lyon were lovely.Okumaya devam et