Akasiro Japanese restaurant
8 Little Newport Street, London WC2H 7JJ

Reviewed on Monday 27 April 2009 late evening.

After two weeks in the South of France and a long weekend in Paris, it is nice to be back to London! Why again the Akasiro? 1) it is good 2) it is late in the evening 3) it is just a few tube stops from St Pancras Eurostar station 😉
As starters we ordered the age tofu (£4.50) and the spicy sushi salmon (£4). Both were good but it is better to eat the age tofu first because after the spicy sushi (with some really hot bits) you do not feel much of the age tofu taste.
For the main courses, we took again the tempura udon (£8.50 – see previous reviews to see why “again’) and tried the Bulgogi which is a Korean barbecued beef (£10). The tempura udon was like everytime: fine. The bulgogi was good but I found it a little too salty, probably because the meat was marinated in the soy sauce (as it should be).
I had a green tea ice cream (£3.50) as dessert. It was very good, not too sweet nor too creamy and a little bitter.
The drinks were two Asahi beer (£5.80) , served chilly as usual.

Asahi beer

Spicy salmon sushi

Agedashi tofu

Hot tempura udon

Bulgogi

Cost and conclusion: another very decent dinner for £36.30 which is a good value for money. The service is very nice and despite the late time we were not hurried to leave at all. It is the 5th time I review this place

Restaurant Chez Clément Elysées
123 Av. des Champs Elysées, 75008 Paris
www.chezclement.com
Reviewed on Sunday 26 April 2009 lunch time

Av. des Champs Elysées. Chez Clément is located on the right side of the avenue.

Chez Clément is a decent chain restaurant. It is open all day so you do not have to wait until 7.30pm to have your dinner for example. Chez Clément Elysées, as its name hints, is located at the beautiful Champs Elysées avenue. It is closer to the Arc de Triomphe than to Le Louvre museum located at the opposite end, as you can see in the background of the photo above I took from the Arc.
I have been here several times and never had a bad surprise. This one is decorated with spoons and forks all over the rooms, walls and handles included. It must be a pain to keep them clean but they were clean This time we ordered l’escalope de volaille (14.90 euros), un souris d’agneau (18.90 euros), une fillette rouge (red wine – 8.70 euros), a bottle of Vittel water (5.30 euros) and ended the lunch with two espresso (5.60 euros).
The souris d’agneau (lamb knuckle joint) was the meal of the day. It was perfectly cooked but it could have been warmer. The vegetables and the sauce were good. The escalope de volaille (chicken breast) was breaded and served with a tomato sauce. It was well hidden under a huge crispy pancake supporting a salad. Please take a look at the photo to see what I mean.

Souris d'agneau

Escalope de volaille

Cost and conclusion:  it was 53.40 euros service charge included. Really not bad considering the decent lunch and the pretty expensive location!

Restaurant La Place
3 Place Cambronne
75015 Paris, France
Tel: 01 47 34 10 59
Reviewed on Saturday 25 April 2009

La Place is a good bistro to stop by in you are near the Eiffel Tower. It is about a 15-minute walk from it, a lot closer if you are at the end of the Champs de Mars near the Ecole Militaire. The nearest metro station is Cambronne, named after the general famous for his reply at Waterloo battle.
The restaurant is nicely decorated, with sophisticated dark walls and rustic wood tables. It feels like a fashionable pub.
As starters we ordered a millefeuille de tomates & mozzarella (7.90 euros) and a tranche de foie gras (13 euros). They were followed by a magret de canard (17 euros) and a tartare poelé (15 euros). The wine, very good by the way, was a carafe of 50cl Chinon (14 euros). We also had two coffee (6.40 euros).
I was curious about the millefeuille of tomato and mozzarella: a millefeuille (French word for thousand leaves) is a pastry made of several layers of puff pastry filled in an alternated way with sweet cream if it is a dessert, or with spinach etc if it is a starter. Well, no pastry here but alternated tomato and mozzarella. It was served cold, with a salad dressing and nice balsamic vinegar sauce that was lightly sweet. It was good. The foie gras was good too, coming with some chutney.

Millefeuille de tomates et mozzarella

Tranche de foie gras

The magret de canard (duck) was great, served with a gratin dauphinois. The tartare poelé aller retour is a raw minced meat mixed with cornichons/shallots/herbs/spices that had been quickly seared on both sides. It was excellent, with a great spicy taste and not too spicy to mask the taste of the meat. It was served with a salad and good crispy frites.

Magret de canard

Tartare poelé aller retour

Cost and conclusion: it was 73.30 euros service charge included. Not cheap but the food was great, the surrounding cosy. Compared to many tourists trap places near the Eiffel tower, this is a good spot!

Café Marco Polo
121 rue Saint Lazare
75008 Paris
Tel 01 43 87 36 05
Reviewed on Saturday 25 April 2009 lunch time

Les galeries Lafayettes

Café Marco Polo is located right in front of the Saint Lazare train station and a 15 minute walk from the Galeries Lafayette on Boulevard Haussmann. I have been there several times and it was always good
We ordered two pizzas: a pizza royale (14.90 euros) and a pizza soufflée/calzone (13.60 euros). As drink we had a bottle of their red wine of the month (14.90 euros). Not much to say beside everything from the pizza to the wine was good! The pizzas were crispy. The pizza royale could have had more cheese though.

Pizza royale

Pizza soufflée

Cost and conclusion: It was 43.40 euro service charge included. I noticed that lately France is really becoming an expensive country and it is not just because of the currency exchange pound-euro.  Almost 15 euros for a pizza is quite a lot, compared to a steak etc. Well, still a good lunch and I am glad to live in “cheap” London!

Pizzeria l’Arlequin
Route de la Roquette, 06370 Mouans Sartoux, France
Reviewed on Thursday 23 April 2009 lunch time

L’Arlequin is a restaurant I used to go often, like twice a week when I was working for a start-up company in Mougins/Sophia Antipolis since it was just 3 minutes drive from the office. That was 8-9 years ago. Nothing fancy but a decent always updated meal of the day and a good range of pizzas. You can get a menu meal of the day + dessert for something like 11 euros. Pizzas are in the 9-11 euros range. I did not bother to take a photo of the menu since I was on vacation and this site is for reviewing restaurants based in London mostly 😉
It has been a long time since I was last there and I was nicely surprised that the owner still recognised me
It was a nice sunny day so we decided to have lunch on the terrasse, protected by parasols. A waiter saw that Henri the boxer was struggling a little with the heat so he came quickly with a bowl of fresh water. That was very nice of him and I like restaurants in France or Belgium where dogs are welcome.
The pizzas were fine but they were better cooked in the past. Still, the base is very thin and crispy. One special thing here is they have a pizza au foie gras et au foie de volaille (pizza with foie gras and chicken liver)! It is the only place I have seen such a pizza. It is a little heavy so the best is to share it with someone who has another kind of pizza.

Hot goats cheese

Pizza au foie gras et au foie de volaille

Pizza aux aubergines

Henri the boxer watching people eating

Please feed me!

Cost and conclusion: I did not pay for the lunch I recommend l’Arlequin if you have to eat something quickly in the area. If you want a better setting, go to Mougins or to Valbonne.