du'Glace Bistro & Patisserie

Located in Deep River.

Situated in the heart of Main St in a rustic red 100 year old building, du'Glace is certainly inviting from the outside.
The patisserie, which adjoins the bistro, is closed in the evenings.

Once inside, you notice a small bar area to your immediate right.
Directly ahead of you is the hostess station.
It appears that the waitresses take turns, when they are available, with the hostessing duties.
My wife had made our reservation for 7:30 Saturday night.
Our reservation could not be found by the first waitress.
Enter the second waitress. She found our reservation had been entered for Friday night.
"No problem," we were told.
No one had called to confirm our reservation.
She proceeded to seat us immediately.

The dining room is not small enoug to be called intimate, but it is cozy.
There are exposed blacks pipes and support beams overhead.
The walls are painted a creamy, slightly orange color.
Two of the three walls(the front is a window) are decorated sparingly.
The third has 3 painted murals. They are nice and not intrusive.

The menu is a 4"x11" laminated card.
My wife observed that this could mean the menu doesn't change that often.

Appetizers included frog legs, grilled garlic sausage, escargot, tomato and basil tart, and a bacon & leek among a few other offerings.
Also on offer was a chicory & bacon salad with warm vinaigrette.

My wife chose the bacon & leek tart, which also came with a side of mescalin salad; I chose the chicory & bacon salad.

Entrees included trout almondine, calves liver in a bacon cream sauce, sweetbreads in a creamy mushroom sauce, coq au vin, and steak frites, among others.

My wife chose the steak frites; and, deciding I could prepare liver to my satisfaction at home, I chose the sweetbreads.

The wine list is good, but nothing special.
I had a Riesling, my wife a pinot noir. Both perfectly acceptable.

Placed first on our table were two Gruyere choux pastry.
These, of course, were light and tasty.

Then our tiny bread loaves arrived, warm, but not freshly baked, though they were accompanied by some nice butter.

Our starters arrived.
My wife's bacon & leek tart was very good, though not exceptional.
My chicory & bacon salad was exceptional. The warm vinaigrette was nicely balanced, and the bacon-oh, my!-large slab bacon was smoky wonderfulness.
Full disclosure: I love the pig-his belly, his ribs, his bacon!

So, we're off to a good start.

Then the mains arrived.

Since the mains are served with no side dishes, I had ordered carrots vichy, having no idea what that meant.
It means mint. And I don't care for mint.
Mint should only appear in juleps and my toothpaste. But that was my fault.
The creamy mushroom sauce was rich and overpowering.
The portion was too large for finishing.

Now, the is their steak frites.
The cut was skirt, which my wife ordered medium.
It was prepared to order and was a nice piece of meat. Good steak.
However, the unpardonable sin of any bistro is frozen frites.
And these were frozen frites.
Forgettable but unforgivable.

For dessert my wife ordered the raspberry chocolate tart, and I had the chocolate bombe.
Both from the patisserie, we assume.

The desserts were winners.
And one of my pet peeves is the seeming unending trend of pairing raspberries with chocolate.
They worked well together in tart form.
My chocolate bombe was indeed nice. Creamy chocolate through and through.

All in all, not a horrible experience.
But the sub par entrees don't warrant a repeat visit.

We will, however, sample the patisserie when we are up that way again.