23 February 2012

AN EVENING IN ALSACE

I had heard good things about Ile de France, a French bistro in Remuera Rd, Newmarket that has settled into the space in the old AEPB building, occupied briefly by the Mecca coffee chain. So when I heard about a seven course Alsacien dinner, matched to fine Alsatian wines by the guys of Maison Vauron, I booked six places.

We had a fabulous evening last night, where every course was deliciously simple and very ‘authentique.’ The canapé, a generous slice of duck liver pate with black truffle kicked the night off, followed by some slow cooked pork rillettes with the most amazing bread. (Apparently made by a young baker, Tetsuya but not that Tetsuya.)

Anyone who has visited Alsace knows it’s not a place to take anyone with a faint appetite for it’s a cuisine rich in fat, sausage and meat and where vegetables are rarely sighted unless you count choucroute as a vegetable – not fresh of course! This meal prepared by chef/owner Gilles Pabst, a tall young native of Alsace now resident in Auckland, lived up to expectations. The pate and the rillettes melted in the mouth, and then escargots, presented with rich dark mushrooms on toast.

Next; the snapper matelot (pic above) with onion jam ravioli, and a tender ballotine of chicken stuffed with foie gras and Champagne. The obligatory cheese course (a meal would not be French without cheese) was croustillant of Munster, the rich buttery cheese oozing from its pastry case, and we finished, groaning with spiced poached seasonal peaches with ice cream, cherry sauce and almond tuiles.

The pace and service were excellent, and the Maison Vauron boys kept us entertained and well in touch with the wines; pinot d’Alsace, pinot gris, pinot blanc, riesling, gewürztraminer and an audacious Albert Mann pinot gris Altenbourg vendanges tardives to finish. Best wine of the night? The Marcel Deiss 1er cru Engelgarten 2007. A wine so amazing I have written about it on the Wines to Drink page of my website.