Les Halles - Review

It's been a long week. We needed to go out for a nice relaxing dinner. After intense negotiations, we chose Les Halles. It's a place we've talked about going to for some time. Biscuit Boy came home from work early and was able to take Sophie out for a quick walk before we headed out.

When we got into DC, we noticed a larger than usual number of police cars stationed on almost every corner in the area around the restaurant. My first thought was extra police being out because it was Cinco De Mayo to catch a few party hardy folks with one too many margaritas under their belt. But then I thought, no....I bet there's going to be a motorcade. The White House is a few blocks from Les Halles and the number of police cars was a bit excessive.

So after about 10 minutes of unsuccessful attempts to find a parking space, we decided to let the Valet park. We walked up to the hostess and she offered us an nice outside table with a great view of our valet-parked car. Dang it all, there were parking spaces right across the street that we never saw! Ce la vive.

The weather was absolutely beautiful and we were both starting to unwind as we sat at our nice outdoor table and contemplated what to order. Biscuit Boy decided to get the Moules Frites Mariniere. Me, the Steak Frites. We also ordered the Escargots for an appetizer. We enjoyed escargot greatly on our cruise back in October and wanted to see how these compared.

We sipped on our wine and enjoyed some crusty French bread and before long the escargots arrived. Six little compartmented little escargots swimming in their own pool of butter, garlic and parsley, yum. I liked them well enough but thought they could stand more garlic. The ones one the cruise were a bit more tender than these were too. But it didn't stop us from eating them all before we could snap a picture of them.

Soon after we had finished the escargots, our entrees arrived. First to be set on the table were the mussels, a huge bowl of them. The frites were served in a separate bowl. What you can't see in this picture is the incredible broth in the bottom of the mussel bowl. Oh my God it was good. Just give me a bowl of that and a loaf of French bread and leave me alone.

Next my steak frites, a thin slab o' beef with the fries and a little bitty salad that looked more like a garnish.The steak was very flavorful and tender. The frites were crisp and fresh. I ate about half of the steak and put the rest aside so I could help Biscuit Boy finish the mountain of mussels. Guess what I'm having for lunch today.


Shortly after our food arrived, the hoard of police cars suddenly came to life. It turned out to be a motorcade. Since the camera was still out, Biscuit Boy snapped a few quick pictures and the assemble of vehicles whizzed by. Not sure if it was the prez of the VP but it was an impressive sight even if I can't stand the idiot Bush and his trigger happy VP.

With that little bit of excitement over with, it was back to the task at hand, dinner. We managed to finish all the mussels and had the rest of my steak and our leftover frites boxed up. I wanted dessert, Biscuit Boy only wanted coffee. I conceded. After all, we had just had a lovely, relaxing dinner, the weather was great and we were in no hurry so why quibble over dessert. A pot of French pressed coffee would be nice. That is until the waitress came over and asked if we would like dessert. We said no, just coffee please. But she countered back in her sweet French accent, "We have a lovely petit four plate that is perfect for sharing over a pot of coffee and it's very light." A quick look at each other and we said sure, why not.
The plate was so pretty with 6 miniature desserts sitting there waiting to be eaten. Clockwise from the top is a macaroon, a sponge like cake with apricot filling (at least I think it was apricot), tiramisu, triple chocolate mousse cake, a cream puff with chocolate filling and in the center a strawberry nested on a pillow of fresh whipped cream.

And it just like the waitress said, perfect for sharing and very light. We lingered over our coffee and nibbled on the desserts until it was all gone. And reluctantly, we got our check and headed home. It was a very relaxing night and made some of the rotten parts of the week melt away. We'll be back there again soon.