Garcon

Jesse:

Garcon:

     Tonight I found myself with some considerable resistance to dining at a new restaurant. I found this curious as I had been enjoying the restaurants we recently discovered. But here’s the rub. I wanted to go back to the restaurants that I loved. I didn't want to take a chance on a mediocre restaurant when I knew where to get a Great meal a few blocks away.

     But now I see the excitement in my friends’ faces and know I can’t let them down.

     I also know that I have a tendency to get stuck in a very comfortable rut. Do you? If you are like me, dare yourself to be a little uncomfortable and try something new. Maybe it will work out, maybe not.  You’ll at least have a new story to tell your friends, and at most, you’ll have a new place that you love. A great meal, like a great love, is worth kissing a few frogs to find.

     Garcon wasn’t exactly a frog but it didn’t make my all time favorite list either. The food was good, very good, but not great in the way that excites a dinner party and makes it memorable.

     The interior was nice. Many large windows to enjoy the action of a Friday night on Valencia St. Tonight we were treated to a beautiful sunset with red raspberry clouds.

     Candles on the tables, lots of dark wood, tasteful lighting, it was nice, very nice but not particularly distinctive. It reminded me of a good steakhouse.

    Garcon opened at 5:30pm. We arrived early  and had the place to ourselves, yet the host asked if we had reservations, saying it was best if we did because it was a weekend night and it could get busy. They did seat us and it very slowly became full around 7:30-8:00pm. But I have seen this place not at all busy on a Friday night, which partially explains why I was resistant to trying this restaurant.

     Well, on to the food, the reason why we go to all this effort.

     Our waiter arrived, and at some point in the conversation, we told him we were very hungry, but to our dismay the bread took quite a while to arrive. Durn. I can tell you that when the bread did arrive, it was very good. Yay!

      Now for the next (and my least favorite) major test, I let the waiter know of my food allergies and would he kindly double check with the chef regarding some ingredients. He frowned at first but ended up being pleasant and thorough which is always a big relief.

     Lots of yummy dishes on the menu. I chose a molasses brined pork tenderloin with cranberry beans, Andouille sausage, mustard greens and celery root for $24. 

     Even with very few customers in the place, it took 30 minutes for our food to arrive.  Not too happy.

     Luckily, when my food did arrive, the pork was perfectly cooked, very tender. Lots of mustard seeds drizzled on top. I really enjoyed the combination of cranberry beans and the mustard greens. Actually, all the flavors on my plate tasted great together.

      I was really enjoying my food when I found what looked like quite a large fish bone in my greens. It was a good 3-4 inches long. I showed it to the waiter and he took it away without saying much. Later he told me it was a stem from a  thyme sprig. That’s it. No apology, no concern, no free dessert or coffee, nothing. I was not impressed by the waiter. What impressed me was the large “twig” in my food.

     On to the restroom review. It was clean enough. A bit dark and uninspired, but ok. I give it 2.5 stars.

  

     Overall, I give Garcon 3.75 out of 5 stars.

Very good food on the edge of great but not quite there.  The kitchen was sluggish and the service cool and a bit distant.

Shirley:

Garcon ( with a cedilla, of course) is an okay french bistro, with classically trained wait staff, where I have eaten before, so there were few surprises. It's a nice place, nice food, nice people and as you can tell, not all that inspiring for me. I do like their deserts, but I tend to like deserts pretty much anywhere I go. 
I think they use good ingredients, always a plus, and they favor a European/French tradition to their menu, which can go either way, sublime or static.  To sum up the overall food experience, I believe they put too much emphasis on how many flavors they can manage in one dish and not enough on each element along the way. 

I ordered duck confit, lentils du puy, grilled frisee with vermouth vinaigrette , crispy poached egg. The frisee was raw, not grilled and the vineagrette was missing, but that was a relief because there was enough going on without it. The duck was good, the lentils my favorite. I think the egg was added to make up for the tiny portion of duck, because the crispy outside matched the crispy frisee and the creamy quality of the yolk was lost on the creamy quality of the lentils.
Now, that can sound picky, but when offered a picky menu, one should pay attention, yes?
Lentils du puy happen to be my favorite lentil, and again, they were fine. Perhaps I am more used to more robust flavors, being a denizen of the mission, but everything tasted just a little bland.
But, the desert was grande; profiterolles with cinnamon gelato, dark rum crème anglaise, fleur de sel, chocolate sauce. The dark rum crème anglaise was missing, again not a loss. Do you really need rum along with all the other flavors? It just confuses eveything.
The staff were polite, informative and responsive to our requests. Pomposity was kept to a minimum. We were allowed to wait inside a few minutes before they opened. And, $40 for a main course and desert is pretty good. I recommend that you try it for yourself. I cannot give it a yeah or nay, just an okay.

Mary:

The interior of Garcon is highly polished glass and wood, well lighted, with a small but stylish bar and comfortable seating. It had a high-class cozy feel to it. We got to see all this clearly because we arrived 5 minutes early and they allowed us our request to wait inside, out of the cold, until they opened. They handled our food limitations with grace, and there were many things on their menu that I could eat. 

 I chose two dishes, the parsnip and cauliflower soup that was on their specials, and grilled octopus.

The presentation of the soup was nice. The waiter brought a soup bowl with prepared almonds mounded in the center and poured the puree around the center until the bowl was full. I was set up to like it. We were all intrigued by the combination of ingredients, so I requested spoons for everyone so they could have a taste. The reaction around the table was unanimous. We were disappointed. It was flat; difficult to taste either the parsnip or the cauliflower in it.  For the high-end cost I would expect more impeccable cooking.

The octopus was good, well grilled.

The polish of the place was deceptive. When I used the bathroom, (there were two and I used the lesser one) very plain and not so clean, I thought…It’s classy in the dining room. Needs more work in the kitchen, and  in the bathroom. I wanted to be impressed. I was set up for it with the ambiance. But I wasn’t.

GARCON
1101 Valencia Street
401-8959