Charmed, I'm sure
At Bistro Calais, ambience jibes with eatery's unpretentious,
casual cuisine
By ALISON COOK
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
There are days when I'd swap my kingdom for a
great bowl of soup and a really, really good salad. Those are the
days I'm glad Bistro Calais has opened its tall French doors on a
sleepy side street just south of River Oaks.
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E. Joseph Deering : Chronicle
The Salade Niçoise at Bistro Calais includes tuna atop green
beans, boiled egg and potato, with anchovy-spiked dressing,
anchovy fillets and wine-flavored niçoise olives. |
Picture it: sun shining on the curious,
Disneyesque storybook vista at the heart of the Gardens of Bammel
Lane, a block-square collection of 1930s cottages transported from
elsewhere and restored to mint condition. In full view of the
bistro's tables, a fountain burbles. Trim white fencing marches in
all directions. A graceful, old-fashioned greenhouse reaches,
arabesquelike, skyward.
Inside a long, high room, on mustard and black
linens, sits a bowl of gently curried cream of carrot soup. It is
studded with rustic croutons that have been crisped to a turn in
butter.
Or, a bowl of intense onion soup under a mantle
of heat-blasted Gruyère croutons lies waiting to shanghai your
palate with a sneak shot of warming red pepper. It's a deep, rich
French classic, custom-tuned for the obstreperous Houston palate.
To the side lurks the perfect house salad — not
too big, not too small, not a mindless throwaway. It is brightly
dressed with a mustard vinaigrette. The mix of greens pops, from
buttery Bibb to crisp romaine to burgundy-hued radicchio. Nubbins of
crisp bacon and walnut jump up the textures.
Ready to transform the experience are a glass of
good-quality Domaine des Berthiers Pouilly-Fumé, a sauvignon blanc
from the Loire Valley. Or Perrin et Fils Vacqueyras, a big red Rhône
with a countrified personality. The knot-shaped yeast rolls are pure
American granny stuff.
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E. Joseph Deering : Chronicle
A bowl of mussels. |
Bistro Calais is French not by reason of DNA, but
by choice. Houston-born Phillip Mitchell, one of three principals
(with Roy and Jane Knapp), spent the last eight years at the
French-owned Café Rabelais, and six before that at the French-owned
Bistro Provence. He still consults with Rabelais owner Chris Paul —
who is married to the daughter of Bistro Provence owner Georges Guy.
The Calais chef, Francisco Luna — here's where the going gets very
Houston — has worked at La Strada and Carrabba's.
Somehow, this United Nations of influences comes
together here, although not always as one might expect.
Mitchell has the connections and instinct to have
compiled an appealing wine list that is long on attractively priced
French selections. I noted with delight that an entire subsection is
devoted to whites of the Loire (when is the last time you saw two
Muscadets on a Houston wine list?).
And more delightful still is a robust red Rhône
selection that includes two wines from Jean-Luc Colombo, darling of
oenophiles, but also a dark-toned, earth-and-leather
Châteuneuf-du-Pape Les Sinards that is a true bargain at $48.
Elsewhere this one could cost $65 or more.
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E. Joseph Deering : Chronicle
Bistro Calais' back garden area. |
The wine list wouldn't matter if the food didn't
charm. But it does, in unpretentious, casual fashion.
The main-dish salads are particularly winning.
There's a careful niçoise, with authentic canned tuna crowning a
lively mix of crunchy green beans, boiled egg and potato. The
anchovy-spiked dressing and silvery anchovy fillets flying over a
constellation of teeny, wine-flavored niçoise olives seal the deal.
A green salad livened with blue cheese
vinaigrette gets a fan of seared rare steak and colorful peppers. It
makes an ideal lunch or light supper.
Entrees are more of a mixed bag. There's a
red-winy Provençal rabbit stew that is very satisfying, even though
the kitchen's slight tendency to oversalt comes close to getting in
the way. A special of steak frites with home-fried potatoes bore a
green-herbal marinade, like a French chimichurri. The beef was
clearly inexpensive choice grade, of the loose-textured sort not to
be ordered rare, but the dish showed some promise — and it had one
of those great little house salads on the side.
Bouillabaisse came equipped with plenty of
blameless fish and shellfish, but it was more like a tomatoey
cioppino than the soulful classic from Marseille. I have yet to
encounter a Houston bouillabaisse I would order a second time, and
this effort did not change my mind.
The modestly priced roasted Cornish hen, stuffed
with an intriguing savory-sweet mix of chopped walnuts, bacon,
endive and raisins, was an unreserved delight. (The cook in me
promptly began to parse the recipe and come up with a version I
could do at home, preferably with one of those organic, never-frozen
whole chickens.)
A slight oversaltiness lurked down among the pan
juices, but with good mashed potatoes as a balance, the dish worked.
I wish I could say the same for the huge pile of
colorful grilled vegetables alongside. Why anyone would think to
make them sweet as honey was beyond me. Please, please, save it for
dessert.
Or maybe not. Desserts here have been a weak
link, from a tough-crusted fruit tart to tough-skinned profiteroles
to a too-goopy bread pudding.
Brunches tend to give me the willies, from the
pasted-together word itself to the often-weary buffet spreads the
genre seems to spawn.
Not here. Bistro Calais does a bang-up job with
its $8 Sunday buffet, wisely limiting the entrees to made-to-order
omelets and crêpes.
Just watching chef Luna flip a thin, custom-made
omelet together with bacon, goat cheese, green onion and baby
spinach was a pleasure. And the crêpe folded over sautéed bananas
made a fine dessert.
Beautiful fresh fruit added to the festivities,
although the selection of breakfast pastries was mediocre. At this
price, perhaps one cannot expect more. Folks who require a dish with
"Benedict" in its name may order two a la carte versions, but the
hollandaise is thin, disappointing stuff.
If mimosas don't inspire, the presence of a
reasonably priced excellent French nonvintage champagne (Pommery
Brut Royale, $57) does. This bottle can make your afternoon, and
Bistro Calais provides the setting for it.
With the French doors flung open and sun filling
the spacious room, the invitation to linger is implicit.
It was explicit, too. Brunch here goes on until 4
p.m., and during the rest of the week, when most restaurants close
between lunch and dinner, Bistro Calais is open continuously.
How very civilized.
Phillip Mitchell, who seems genetically disposed
to taking care of people, recounted with some amusement the tale of
customers who arrived for a late holiday lunch with guests fresh
from the airport. They ate, talked and, when 4 o'clock came around,
decided it was time for a bottle of wine.
In due course, they decided it was time for
dinner.
Bistro Calais is that kind of place. Would that
there were more.
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