When I saw "Fine French Dining" as a dinner option in Newport, I was excited as we were celebrating…read morea birthday and also because I was trained in classical French cuisine. Upon arrival we were greeted quite quickly and my coat dispatched to the cloak closet. The hostess took us through the bar to a two top and let us know our Captain would be with us shortly. While waiting my partner and I both selected cocktails from the menu.
The Captain arrived and took our drink orders, also letting us know that there would be two dessert specials, both of which required ordering at the beginning of the meal as they took time to prepare. Both the Grand Marnier Souffle and the Tart Tatin sounded wonderful. Cocktails came after a short wait, and we put in our order: To Start-Beef Tartar and Sweetbreads, followed by Caesar Salads for us both; and then Duck for my partner and Filet for myself (both medium rare). We selected a hearty Pinot Noir to go with the apps and entrees. This would be one of the few times we saw the "Captain" throughout the meal, and to be honest I'm pretty sure they were short at least one server, as most of the food was delivered by the bus boy (I can't give him the honorific of commis or assistant) or the bar tender.
Bread and butter were dropped unceremoniously on the table, and that's ok because the French bread was average and the slice of butter tube was nothing special. A few grains of black or pink salt would have kicked it up a bit, a short spiel about the local bakery that makes the bread could have been nice, something about the local herbs and honey in the butter could be good (there wasn't any but hey I can dream...) Our Waiter returned with wine and offered to pour early so it could breathe but no need as it's a Pinot Noir and we have some time as we were both finishing the cocktails (which were also very well made and tasty), but the offer was appreciated. Appetizers came , and the bus boy had to be told who got which one, but to be honest the sweetbreads were just fantastic. The beef tartar was good but nothing amazing. The wine went very well with both.
This is where the night turned a bit south, as the "salads" came out. Using a 6inch ring mold, the kitchen chopped romaine to the point where it was smaller than ¼ inch by ¼ inch sized, then tossed that in a very light dressing consisting of mostly anchovies. Finally the entire ring of lettuce was crusted with bread crumbs (and I assume parmesan) providing a 1/2 inch tall salad 6 inches across with gritty topping and tasting very much of umami but not so much like Caesar salad. To the point where we couldn't eat them and they had to be taken off the bill.
Entrée Time. Once again the inability to code the ticket so that the servers know which entrée goes to which guest is just subpar. The duck, while crispy on the skin was way past medium rare and seemed a bit small for a full duck breast. Sauce and Rillette was pretty good. Filet (when I pronounced the 'T' during the ordering process the server didn't understand, but I guess that's just me being picky) was also well past medium rare, the bordelaise was fair and the beets were great. We ate the food as it was there and we were now hungry and realizing this was not to be the amazing meal that we thought it would be. Our bus boy came back to clear and take coffee orders. I was also going to get a Grand Marnier to go with the souffle and cork the remainder of bottle 2 of the Pinot Noir but when I asked for an Americano he was completely lost so I just asked for a 'cup of coffee' and my partner had a double espresso. I didn't want to burden this poor guy with more things he didn't know about like aperitifs.
The Souffle came out and busboy tried to make a show of breaking the crust and adding crème anglaise to it, but it just didn't work for him, maybe because the crème anglaise was so think it didn't pour it kinda glopped off the spoon. That's OK because when we broke into the souffle it turned out to be fancy scrambled eggs (so they overcooked or overwhipped or both). The tart tatin was again 6 inch ring mold sized and looked like a fried egg white on a piece of toast. True it tasted good but it was in no way shape of form a decent Julia Child like tart tatin. The server came over and I asked him to remove the souffle and also informed him that his tip wouldn't be so very good as he didn't check on the cook on the entrees nor the dessert until it was pretty much time for the check. After removing the two salads and the desert, our bill was still over $400 for the meal, which is, to be completely honest, about $200 more than it was worth.
