1. Our landlord here in Saint Jean de Luz recommended Le Suisse as the best of the Basque seafood restaurants.
I am in no position to comment on the other twenty or thirty establishments - but Le Suisse is amazing.
Note that there is no way I would have walked into a place called Le Suisse looking for Basque food on my own.
2. This is a genius-cook-does-things-his-own-way restaurant and not a mindlessly-replicate- grandma's-traditional-recipes restaurant. The menu does NOT look like the menu in competing establishments.
3. The most iconoclastic recipe was gazpacho made with tomatoes (which is normal), beets (?!?), industrial quantities of heavy cream (?!?), and smoked codfish (?!?). My wife and I died and went to heaven.
4. A merlu for 2 was the standard Mediterranean whole baked fish cut open with tomatoes and onions and flavor ingredients. This is normally a dull dish even when pulled off with grace and style. Having a very fresh flavorful wonderful fish helped.
Having lots of very thin pickled hot pepperoncini cut into the topping changed everything - and sent the dish over the roof. The pepperoncini being thin kept the fire from overwhelming the other ingredients and drowning out the fish. The heat added fire and power to what is otherwise cliche of the week.
5. Poached fresh peaches with homemade ginger cookies and gooseberry whipped cream ended the meal.
I used to think good peaches only came from Georgia and Fredericksburg, Texas. Well, le Languedoc and les Alpes produce peaches that can more than hold their own against America's finest. Poached expertly, they attain noble status.
And gooseberry whipped cream? One of life's little treats .....
6. Just for the record, Le Suisse offers more than just fancy chef-prepared food.
They sell lots of plain ordinary shellfish platters featuring the magnificent seafood of the region. Many people were chowing down on tables loaded down with tons and tons and tons of crustaceans.
I had a selection of local raw oysters. Two out of the three types were standard French raw oysters - pleasant enough. The top of the line oyster was an artisanally raised oyster for extra size and extra taste. OMG!
They also have a Basque tapas bar, and a plain old cafe where you can have coffee or a beer.
The fancy restaurant, the tapas bar and the plain old cafe share exactly the same chairs and tables out on the terrace of the Plaza de Louis XIV. Management doesn't care if you are having a top of the line menu gastronomique, a handful of Basque tapas, a beer, or just a coffee and a cigarette.
Our night, we were the only table having fancy dishes. A few tables were doing loaded platters of fruits-de-mer. (Note that those giant platters of seafood come with a hefty price.) Many more tables were just groups of friends smoking cigarettes and drinking. There were a few tables of families taking their kids out for ice cream - with the concomitant strollers and crying babies.
You are sitting out on the plaza with fine nineteenth century buildings, and a nice breeze - so the cigarette smoke will blow past you and out into open space.
The crying babies? Well, I am sure the babies will stop crying when they realize what culinary wonders the world has in store for them. read more
