This was the perfect way to celebrate a reunion with visitors from out of town. After hearing great…read morethings about Le Jeroboam from work friends, my partner booked a table for the four of us. A quick glance at the foie gras and truffle-infused menu was enough to convince me! Though it changes daily, the chalkboard menu still boasted fungi flavors when we dined there last week.
Our table was down the winding staircase in a well-lit section of the cellar. We were between the bathrooms and a larger dining area, but it was so well-insulated that until another couple arrived and sat at the two-person table behind us, we felt like we had the place to ourselves.
Our waiter was personable (every member of the all-male staff was extremely friendly) and bilingual. Unfortunately they didn't write out English versions of the menu, so my boyfriend and I had to translate each item for our guests: no easy feat with fairly uncommon ingredients such as chervil and Iberian black big blood sausage.
We followed our waiter's advice on the wine and ordered a light red Burgundy. Almost tart but pleasantly so, it was the perfect accompaniment to all of our dishes, even the seafood.
I knew instantly what I was going to order: the black truffle and foie gras en croûte, and the grilled octopus with chorizo as a main. While waiting, we were served little bites of buckwheat and comte cheese as an amuse-bouche. Surprising, yummy, and no doubt homemade.
The foie gras was incredible, and I could have ended with that. The octopus was elegantly displayed and chewy enough (but also crispy at the end of its tentacles), but the Basque-style sauce didn't do it for me. Served atop a bed of nutty black rice with slivers of artichoke and dotted with squares of chorizo, the poulpe might have been better with lemon, or in a cold rice salad with olives to give the soft chorizo a kick. I couldn't even finish the last tentacle because it felt boring after the explosion of foie gras and truffle (and, yes, probably also because I used up a roll of bread to soak up that truffle oil and dressing).
Why was this starter so incredible? For one, these guys don't use watered down truffle oil: my portion included cereal-sized nuggets of actual black truffle. And speaking of portions, it was much larger than expected: no teensy, pricy essence of meat and mushroom--this plate could have been a main dish on its own. The biscuit-sized piece of foie gras, a centimeter thick, was enveloped in a billowy, airy pastry and cozied up to morsels of black truffle. There was a creamy truffle moat, and a small green salad topped with strips of red beets. And then, the biggest surprise of all, a perfectly round mound of cep ice cream. Cep. Ice cream. It was sweet, it tasted just like cep, and the flavor was divine.
My table mates were equally impressed with their dishes (veal, scallops, sea bass tartare), but I think we all agreed: the best plate by far was my foie gras delight.
We were too full for dessert (does the cep ice cream count?), even though I'm sure Le Jeroboam would have exceeded expectations here, too.
