Luxeat

Happy Holidays!

Les Ambassadeurs

Despite of the ancienty of the dining room -18th century ballroom with cold marble floors and walls, heavy curtains and crystal chandeliers, Jean - François Piège, the  chef of Les Ambassadeurs,is the 21st century man.

Jean - François Piège's menu that night didn't contain any sashimis or other  exotic dishes interpretations nowadays so popular among the chefs  "étoilés" (and not really "étoilés" ).In fact it seemed to me that Piège cooking is quite "bourgeois",let's call it " bourgeois revisited"  . How can you call "Noix de Saint-Jacques en casse croûte potiron,tartufi di Alba" or  "Vollaile de Bresse comme une poule a riz,tartufi di Alba" otherwise?  The dishes were hearty but so fine that  next day I  was still thinking of the beautiful, almost poetic marriage of tastes. (Unfortunately the pictures i took were not as good as the food.You can see some beautiful pictures at "A LIfe Worth Eating" blog).

Domm-first Michelin star for the Baltics?

Its been a while I know Javier Lopez Ruiz- not personally, but through his cooking in La Provence restaurant in Vilnius. Tuna tartare prepared in front of you, fresh oysters, sea bass baked in salt comparable to the dish prepared in France ,or, less Mediterranean speacialities such as suckling pork “shashlik” . La Provence was one of the first restaurants in Vilnius that would have fresh oysters and fresh seafood ( flown directly from France) on its menu , and one of the first to have a foreigner as a head chef, a young and energetic Spaniard Javier Lopez Ruiz with experience in Au Crocodile (Strasbourg) under his belt.