About Last Night
Let me tell you about last night. I might be getting a little ahead of myself here but I’m going to make a bold statement. Even though we are just one week into a five and a half month trip around Europe, I predict that last night will go down as one of the top five experiences of the whole trip. It was just that good (Warning: vegetarians please look away now).
We found the restaurant, A La Table de Chanelle, in rather around about way. Mr T has been keen to try the infamous, hallowed wines of Clos Rougeard for some time and a few days ago he searched restaurants in Loire that serve their wines. It turns out not only was there a restaurant 10 minutes drive away, but they mention on their website they are the home of the official Clos Rougeard Fan Club. Too good to be true! We weren’t sure what to expect from a food perspective, but we thought it would be secondary to the wine. How wrong we were.
When we pulled up outside the restaurant, it seemed very quiet indeed. Uh oh, I thought. Nice and quiet for us to embarrass ourselves speaking French again. To our surprise, chef and owner Philippe de la Roche and his wife were standing at the door to greet us. It was only then that we found out Monsieur de la Roche had opened up just for us and we were the only guests for the night. Normally, this sort of set up would make me a little nervous, I tend to embarrass myself more when everyone’s looking. But it could not have been more perfect. It was like being welcomed into a family home.
There was no menu confusion at all for this meal. There’s four options for main course, all of them are cow related. The side dishes you get are whatever they want to cook that day. Monsieur de la Roche cooks what he likes to eat and you can’t say fairer than that. We went for the dry aged Côte de bœuf for two, with a plate of bellota ham to start. The ham came with a wedge of Bordier butter from the famous butter maestro Jean-Yves Bordier of St Malo. And the ham isn’t just any ham, it’s the very best pata negra ham from pigs who have been fed the best acorns from the very best region of Spain. Monsieur de la Roche, it can be said, is not messing about.
While the slab of beef was on the fantastic looking grill a few feet away, we all muddled through together in a mix of English, bad French and entertaining mime which made it so much fun. When he asked if we wanted a white wine to start, both of us were a bit flummoxed. We'd come for the red and hadn't given much though to anything else. We stammered a yes and off he went to select something that he enjoys drinking himself. Turns out he chose to start us off with a glass of Saumur Blanc du Bois from Bruno Dubois, a young winemaker from the region. It was one of the better white wines I’ve ever tried and Monsieur de la Roche talked about Dubois with great excitement about the next generation of winemakers in the region.
And then, to the main event. Mr T and the Monsieur talked at length about the choice of red wine and the legend of Clos Rougeard. We ended up with a bottle of Clos Rougeard “Les Poyeux” from 2011. What an absolute joy of a wine it was. I know I’ve said this a lot lately but it was one of the very best wines I’ve ever tasted in my whole life. Monsieur de la Roche is dear friends with Clos Rougeard winemaker Nady Foucault (a Loire Valley legend) and I wonder what came first, the love of the guy or the love of the wine because Monsieur de la Roche’s eyes light up when he talks about both.
When the food came, it was out of this world. Monsieur de la Roche had created the perfect plate: the beef was cooked exquisitely and it was accompanied by the most delicious puréed carrot with orange, potatoes and an endive pastry combo that I can't even describe. I didn't even believe him that it was endive, I thought I must be mistranslating until he showed me the bag of lettuce. Incredible! He even had special pepper from Madagascar for the beef seasoning. The wine, the food and the company was nothing short of epic.
Over dinner, we learned that Monsieur de la Roche wasn’t always a chef. A long time ago he used to own a Triumph garage and he owned more than 80 Triumph motorbikes. He doesn’t ride anymore but he’s still clearly a petrol head and proudly owns a bright yellow Chevy Camero. He must be one of the only people in France to lay claim to that kind of fame. We couldn’t love him any more if we tried!
When it came time to part ways, Mr T was bestowed the incredible honour of being inducted into the Clos Rougeard Fan Club by the President himself, Monsieur de la Roche. What a night. What a meal. What a guy!
