I have not been to a Cafe Rouge for, well, ever.
One of my lovely wife Nina’s favourites, we’d pretty much be in the one in Putney most weekends for some snack, a bottle of vino and a chat. Ollie sat in his buggy, or in the first few visits was not even with us in the first place. We loved Cafe Rouge, we really did.
So then when I happened to be in Bath with my family and we were looking for something to eat for dinner and walked passed guess what, yep a Cafe Rouge – I just had to go in with Mary, Ollie, Amy and Jude, and so so glad we did. It was just like I remembered. Mock French interior, based on a sort of Parisian bistro, but it does look really good and classy. A pint of Stella Artois Cidre to start proceedings and then we ordered the following;
Amy decided to have ham and cheese toasties with chips – French style though, so really really nice.
I had the half chicken roast. Rubbed in special Cafe Rouge herbs and spices with a melted garlic butter dip – OH YES!!!
Served with frites with some sort of shaker salt/herb over them. Really good.
Oh my God this one was incredible. My starter choice.
A rather strong and pungent blue cheese with rosemary and garlic, roasted in the oven and served with slices of apple and crusty bread. Seriously a fantastic dish that I will absolutely be stealing for my next party. It was so good. The crisp and tart of the apple cut through the cheese. Wonderful!!!
Ollie comes in strong with deep fried camembert in bread crumbs served with pomegranate coulis.
And the winner winner chicken dinner was crusty bread with foie gras terrine/pate type thing. Holy cow this thing was just too good. Smooth and silky with the liver after tones coming through slowly. Not overpowering though, this was so subtle, so tasty, so good.
There is no excuse if you are in the UK, this is a chain, so plenty of locales to attend across the UK. I’ll go again for sure on this trip to England.
I suggest you sneak a peak too if you happen to be here.
