Les Faux Bourgeois

Our meal last night at Le Crocodile was wonderful so we had apprehensions on what this restaurant might have to offer. It was written up so we could only hope it would live up to it's reputation. We took the skytrain and had a fairly long walk to get there. That was alright since we planned on burning some calories before we indulge.

The restaurant was packed which we thought was a good sign. We were seated in the back across from the bar. Our server was very friendly as he explained the specials. They had mussels on the menu but I was afraid it wouldn't be as good as the restaurant Meet in Paris back home. After some discussion, Mertz and I decided to order the Salade de Chevre Chaud; warm goat cheese crostini, walnuts, greens, beets and sherry vinaigrette. For our entrees, we ordered Le Steak Frites with a choice of red wine shallot jus, herb butter or peppercorn sauce.

Bread and butter came along and left as we were both hungry from our brisk walk.
I noticed that the bread was tasteless and the butter was not nearly as good as the one we had at Le Crocodile. Oh well, everything can't be perfect.  The salad arrived and it did look good. It was delicious. The cheese on the crostini tasted more like Brie than goat cheese but was still good. We both liked the dressing which went well with all the ingredients.

Our entrees were placed on our table and as our server left, Mertz and I stared at each other. Where's the frites? We were looking at a steak with potato gratin. Mertz was able to call our server before he got too far. She explained that we wanted the Hanger Steak. He insisted that we ordered the Filet so Mertz explained in a nice way that we wanted the Steak Frites, hanger steak and he immediately snapped and said: " I know what hanger steak is". He further told us he would change it but it would take about 20 minutes or so. He obviously hoped for us to change our mind and just settle for them. So we waited, it didn't take long when we got the right entree.  The steak was very tender though it did not have enough sauce. There was an abundance of the frites which were good. Though the steak was tender and cooked to our liking, we both thought it was mediocre at best. Maybe we were just spoiled from the experience we had at Le Crocodile.

We did order the Poached Pear Galette with Creme Anglaise for dessert.  It looked like an apple tart.  The crust was good but the pears were not quite ripe so there was not even a hint of sweetness.

It's a pity we didn't dine at this restaurant the night before last so that our last night in Vancouver would have been truly magical.