Aix still marks the spot
January, 2005
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SUMMARY: Seriously outstanding French and European food in simple but very cosy surroundings. Open for lunch and dinner every day except Monday. Expect to spend around £26 per person for three courses without drinks and service. Main dining room is smoke free.
I CANNOT imagine why there isn’t a queue out of the door of this wonderful restaurant which is almost certainly the best restaurant in London (and possibly the country) north of Islington.
Perhaps it’s the restaurant’s inauspicious surroundings, hemmed in between numerous pizza takeaways, fried chicken outlets and kebab joints, but those who have successfully navigated these rough waters have found in Bistro Aix a safe harbour and an exquisite understanding of food, and so will you.
Chef proprietor Lynne Sanders trained in some seriously important French kitchens (including that of the legendary Alain Ducasse) before opening this restaurant – her first – four years ago, and since then she has developed her confidence significantly since I first reviewed the restaurant soon after it opened. You will not find here dishes recklessly piled high with exotic ingredients; instead you will encounter thoughtful taste and texture combinations. Thus there is a pure foie gras terrine which is served with caramelised apple condiment to cut the richness. Barbary duck breast comes with delicately spiced pears, and the roasted sea bass fillet is accompanied by a citrus and coriander sauce with some grilled avocado.
And I must immediately mention the prices. There are some starters over £10 and main courses over £15, but most are closer to £5.50 and £13.50 respectively, and so an average for three courses should be somewhere around £25 a head – and this is for food that would cost at least twice or three times as much in one of those pretentious West End or Kensington joints where the name of the chef is printed larger than the name of the restaurant.
There is also a weekday set menu offering three courses for £15, with choices such as borscht and terrine maison, followed by guinea fowl or moules frites and ice cream or sorbet for dessert. House wine is £12, and there are lots of other wines under £20.
It is one of those places where it is really difficult to choose just one or two things from the menu; there were at least three or four starters that appealed to me. But I settled on frito misto, a plate of mixed seafood, crisply fresh and perfectly fried in a light batter and served with a heavenly tartar sauce and a chunk of lemon.
My chief culinary adviser fell prey to the charms of foie gras, simply pan seared and then served on brioche with grapes in eau de vie, green apple and with a little frise salad. Slipping a morsel of this goose liver into your mouth and experiencing its almost liquid intensity is one of the great sensory experiences of our time. (And if that doesn’t get me into Pseud’s Corner, nothing will.)
I can also recommend (from memory) Lynne’s classic onion soup and the house soupe de poisson (done Parisian style, with white fish stock, croutons, gruyere and saffron rouille).
The main courses are equally difficult to choose from, especially at this time of the year when there is a game pie of mixed wild birds (teal and stuff like that) and venison that is individually baked and looks just like one of those real pies that you might have seen on the shelf of that butcher shop in Yorkshire in the 1950s. Utterly mouthwatering and, as my adviser found, so generous in size that it was impossible to finish.
I was sorely tempted by a lamb shank daube, braised in red wine with orange zest and green olives and served with buttered (oh, heaven!) noodles. I was also tempted by the wild venison, the sea bass filet, the guinea fowl and the Aberdeen angus rib-eye steak, but in the end it was that exotic promise of the Barbary duck breast with spiced pears that won my heart. It was pink, and tender and balanced to perfect splendour by the pears and the green pepper sauce. It also came with crispy fried pommes dauphines with melting interiors.
After that, I was happy to cool my overheated spirit with a boulle of lemon sorbet and another of exquisite lavender honey ice cream (a first for me, that). But my adviser was still in full cry and unstoppable mood, and ordered crepes Suzette – partly, I suspect, to see if they would match up to the crepes I make.
Our verdict was that Lynne’s crepes and her sauce are as good as mine, and that’s pretty darn good. She makes the sauce with Cointreau while I use Grand Marnier and a bit more lemon and orange zest, but we both make crepes so delicate and thin that they are almost transparent, and we can both be proud of ourselves.
Life has now become a search for excuses to go back there again and again.