French Laundry REPORT

[psifenix]

Last night (Aug. 3rd), we went to the French Laundry for John's birthday (which immediately precedes my own). The French Laundry is a Michelin three-star restaurant in the Napa Valley of California headed by chef Thomas Keller. It's definitely a "must" for the aspiring gourmet, and I can honestly say the meal lived up to my extreeemely high

Comments

[xcelerasian]

... omg. (That is all.)

[alanv]

That looks amazing.

Kind of curious how much the meal ended up costing pp. :P But kind of afraid to know.

[psifenix]

Well, the base price is $270/person (gratuity included), the more expensive option on the caviar was $50/person, the foie was $30/person, and wine for us came to something like $120/person, plus tax. It is most certainly not cheap!

[krasnoludek]

Looks fantastic! I have fond memories of our last super-expensive meal. These things are truly treats (especially when they're on someone else's tab!).

All the dishes looked great but I would have really loved to dive into the quail. Next time we're in Berkeley, we totally need to do this :-)

One comment: the "sauternes" looks too dark for a sauternes. Maybe it's the lighting, but it's really a much more vibrant golden color and this one looks more like antique gold, i.e. it's got that slightly bronzy hew. I'm sure it tasted wonderful nonetheless, but I get a little irked by places coopting regional food and drink terms (especially French ones) more for the exoticness and linguistic prestige than the dish actually fitting what it is named for. Another example from your post: "quenelle". Or the "beet bisque" (aka borscht) from my last post about the market in New Haven.

[psifenix]

You should definitely do this! The quail was excellent and the foie gras was simply out of this world. D:

"Quenelle" was my usage (I'm pretty sure the FL staff never said it), but I was under the impression that it was the right word for a "fancily-shaped scoop," which is supported by English wikipedia (we speak English in this country) even if the French wikipedia only has the original meaning. As for the Sauternes, I've gotten Sauternes that dark before at Chez Papa (which only has imported Sauternes I think) so maybe it was just the lighting... it was rather dim in the restaurant so some of the color may be off from my quick post-processing of asking Preview to do it's auto-level adjustment.

PS Quince is definitely on the docket after the baloney sandwich austerity ends.

[krasnoludek]

I think expanding the usage of "quenelle" to describe just food items in that shape, especially if they're not remotely dough-based, is a sham! Although looking at the English WP, I found out the very unexpected but cool fact that "quenelle" comes from the German word "Knödel".

Quince was so excellent. I only have one regret, which is that I ordered the chestnut pasta rather than the raviolo with raw egg in the middle. The pasta was yummy with its chestnut flavor, but when I tried Christian's raviolo, it was decadent. I'm kicking myself for not wanting to order the same thing so that we'd get to try more things from the menu.

[psifenix]

Oh, and also "Sauternes-style" was the sommelier's explanation; it was nowhere on the label.