Republique

I was very excited to get invited to Republique. A couple of months ago I tried to get a reservation for 6 and they were all booked. My brother thought this was a perfect birthday gift. He himself has not been there before.

The place was well lit with a high ceiling. They had regular and communal tables. They also had a quieter room but Gary picked the busier section. We sat along a wall filled with jars of  spices you can imagine.

I got to the restaurant first and shortly after I sat, our server came and offered me a grissini. While I was munching on it, he asked me if I would like to try a certain Brunello while I waited. What could I say but "yes of course". It was a very nice Brunello which was $26 a glass. Gary arrived and as soon as he sat, our server poured him a bit of Brunello to try. Since we both liked it, he decided to order a bottle.

There were so many things on the menu that it was hard to decide what to order. Our server informed us of the wonderful Grilled Octopus Salad which we ended up ordering. The grass fed Steak Tartare with tarragon aioli with pickled red onions and potato chips sounded good as well. It had a very nice presentation with the potato chips. Unfortunately, it failed to impress us both. We were more impressed with the potato chips which was the star of this show.  If you've had the steak tartare at Ink or Hinoki and the Bird, you will truly be disappointed with this one. The octopus salad made up for the lack of excitement of the tartare. It was refreshing and had the right amount of chili and lime.

Another small plate we wanted to try was the Spaghetti with crab.That was delicious. It didn't need any Parmesan. The Steak (also grass-fed; guess these were happy cows) was served with Bearnaise sauce and French fries.  Again, the steak was mediocre at best. The Bearnaise sauce was excellent and the fries were very good. Maybe these cows would have been happier with another kind of diet.

For dessert, our server suggested the Bread Pudding and Chocolate Souffle. He informed us in the middle of our meal that the chocolate souffle takes 20 minutes so he would place the order while we were still working on our dinner. We both loved the bread pudding, a bit burnt and crunchy and yummy inside. The chocolate souffle was terrible. It did not have the right consistency. The server apologized and told us it would be on the house as they were having problems with the oven. My opinion is if something is not right, it should not be served to customers.

There are probably more good things on the menu at Republique but we were both sorry not to have experienced more of those good things.  Republique is located at 624 S. La Brea in Los Angeles.