Comfort food on a cold night

A photo to give you an idea of the size...poor man, he has no idea he's about to be posted on line

 One night, we braved the freezing weather and headed out to a small restaurant tucked away in the heart of the 11th arrondissement.  Astier is one of those tiny places where you wonder how they manage to pack in that many diners.  It makes for a good lesson in space management. Given its cosy nature, it wasn't so surprising that its cuisine was also hearty comfort food albeit with a bit of twist.

I started with a veloute of potiron because I was feeling chilled to the bone and it was just the right start to my meal. It was thick and flavorful.  Those squiggle like things were actually strips of squid.  A surprising addition to the soup but not bad once I got past the surprise.

 Sometimes there a number of dishes on the menu that sound really interesting that I get afflicted by option paralysis. When this happens, I often have a habit of going for chicken! I have no idea why I would choose the most "boring" dish if you will, but there you go. This night the chicken was wrapped around foie gras and accompanied by noodles  topped off by a cream sauce. It wasn't bad but....

 I should have taken this instead...grilled succulent slice of veau accompanied by girolle mushroooms and a wonderful sauce I couldn't identify. It was yummy! This should teach me not to go for chicken the next time!

Because Astier prides itself in serving class french meals, they also have a wonderful cheese platter that's included in the dinner formula. This, I'm happy to say more than made up for my not so interesting main dish. There was such a variety of cheeses, ranging from the strong and stinky to the mild and sweet that I hardly knew what to pick.  Needless to say, I helped myself and then some!

After devouring all that cheese, there was still dessert to contend with and here I went for the chocolate served on a bed of crispy pastry served with passion fruit sauce. I normally don't like mixing my chocolate but the passion fruit sauce was surprising good. The tartness of the fruit nicely complimenting the chocolate.

One of the heartiest restaurant meals I've had in a while and one I can recommend if only to try their wonderful cheese platter!