Esens'All - Flavours, textures and expereinces; a delight

Drew had selected the restaurant called Esens'All from his review of Trip Advisor. And what a selection.

We travelled by REF (A) and Metro (line 2) to a station called Rome from there it was 300 yards walk to the restaurant.

Esens'All is a small restaurant which doesn't have a menu as such, just a choice of 6 or 8 course dinner. The chef discusses your preference or dislikes in advance and then he creates the menu. 

The restaurant space is one tiny room,

Looking up the Restaurant

Looking the other way

 indeed there were only 10 people eating there on the 4th of August. And the meal was not rushed. We arrived at 8.00 p.m. and left at 11.15.

So here is our meal:

First was squid, squid ink,quinoa, sesame seed powder, cucumber balls, cucumber leaves and onion. We were told we should mix it together so we had the softness of the squid with the crunch of the quinoa and cucumber, squid ink is a taste I've had before, but this mix was a real first to me, can I say what it reminded me of, no - it was an original

 

The second course was passionfruit gel, mango and yellow pepper gazpacho and feta cheese with tarragon and a toasted strip of french bread. Now I don't like sweet tastes, but this was anything but, the who knew (well the chef here obviously) that the combination of yellow pepper and mango makes a savoury taste which with the saltiness of the feta makes a perfect foil for the passionfruit - a real surprise on the tongue, but a lovely one.

Following the soft gentle flavours of the second course came the third. Pan seared foie gras, strawberries with green tea foam and small beansprouts.I mentioned yesterday that I love Foie Gras, but I had no idea you could add strawberries as a sharp accompaniment. I often think of strawberries as a sweet fruit, our habit of having them with cream I suppose. But these were tart and provided a perfect foil for the Foie Gras, the green tea foam had a gentle background, when eaten together the three seemed to be perfect companions. Drew, who doesn't normally eat foie gras, was willing to try it and only had one comment - WOW.



Next came another surprising set of flavours. This time it was ginger and preserved lemon gazpacho with cockles and a spoon of caviar. We were advised to stir the caviar into the soup to season it. As a native of Swansea I am a big fan of cockles, but this course had lots of surprises, yes the meatiness of the cockles, but also the gentle background flavour of the ginger, it started mildly, but then began to do leaps and bounds on my tongue - a taste masterpiece, the salty caviar accentuated the lemon and ginger taste to perfection.

The fifth course was pan fried scallops with poppy butter, cauliflower and micro coriander leaves, my Dad would love this, he's a big fan of scallops, and these ones were special. Two scallops cooked perfectly and poppy butter, which tastes nothing like butter, rather like eating a flower - a surprising taste which was gentle and just right for the scallops, which themselves have a delicate flavour. The shaved raw cauliflower gave the dish a crunchy balance to the soft scallops and poppy butter.

 

Then we moved on to the sixth course. This was roast duck breast on mango, sweet potato, puffed rice and a mushroom and black pepper sauce. Duck is a favourite meat of ours and the mango acted to draw out the taste of the duck, without adding any sweetness - amazing. The sweet potato, though it looks like a smear had a lot of flavour as did the sauce (the other smear in the photo below.

We split for the seventh course, there was a choice between cheese or a dessert. Drew went for the cheesecake, with coconut foam, biscuit pieces and fresh passion fruit. He said it was very, very nice with a subtle hint of lemon. I on the other hand had a lovely cheese, this was served with candied cherry and candied cherry sauce. I was worried these would be sweet (I'm not a fan of sweet food) but no however they were candied gave them a firm texture but no hint of sugar - cherry and cheese, especially salty cheese go together well, I must try them myself at home.

The final course was another dessert this one was raspberries, pesto, pistachio crumbs, apple blossom, ganache of milk chocolate and a chocolate brownie. As usual Drew had mine as well as his own. Though not before I had eaten the raspberries and apple blossom.



With the meal we drank sparkling water (3 bottles). Drew was amused that, unlike the other places we had been in Paris, this was not Italian water but 'Artisan water from Norway'.

Drew even photographed the water as its origin was so unusual.



We finished with two espressos and feeling very pleased with ourselves, and amazed by the range of flavours we had experienced caught the metro back to the hotel.

Observant readers might not that my shirt in these pictures is the same one at Friday's night meal - it has been laundered in the meantime!

A brilliant restaurant, I would recommend it to anyone who likes good food and is coming to Paris. The restaurant has a Facebook page if you'd like to see more photos


Note as Sunday night is our overnight train travel to Milan, further posts might be delayed a day or two until we get to Florence.