First courses at the Café Louis-Philippe

Two of the house specialties:
blanquette de veau (veal stewed
in a white wine sauce with mushrooms)
and bœuf bourguignon (beef stewed
in red wine with mushrooms and smoked pork).

It was nice sitting out on the terrace at the café Louis-Philippe. We arrived at about 12:15 for lunch and were able to choose our own table. By the time we left the restaurant at 3:15, we had seen many diners come and go.

Tables on the terrace at the Louis-Philippe

The waitress came and asked us if we wanted an apéritif. We ordered a bottle of white wine, a Pouilly Fumé from the upper Loire Valley, which is made from Sauvignon Blanc grapes. We figured we would have that as an apéro and with at least our first courses. Then we would see if we wanted something else for the later stages of the meal.

Pouilly-sur-Loire is about 60 miles east of Saint-Aignan.

Then we studied the menu. We had already seen one attractive salad on the chalkboard menu by the front door that showed the day's choices. It was a salad with Belgian endive, blue cheese, and walnuts - salade d'endives au bleu et aux noix. Cheryl decided to have that.

Belgian endive with walnuts, vinaigrette, and blue cheese

I noticed something called the salade gourmande on the menu. It was some green salad served with slices of foie gras (duck or goose liver), slow-cooked gizzards (gésiers confits, either chicken, turkey, or duck, I imagine), and thin slices of cured ham (coppa, an Italian term — it was proscuitto, or jambon de Parme in French).

That's one rich salad.

We literally cleaned our plates. In fact, when the waitress came back to clear the table, she automatically asked if everything had been okay. Then she looked at our plates and smiled. I told her yes, we had eaten everything and then we had licked the plates. She looked startled and then laughed.

More about the rest of the meal tomorrow...