Fine dining plates may well be beautiful, but I often find them more intellectually interesting than delicious, with much of the nourishment that is the cornerstone of dining elided in favor of daring. Not so at A.Lea, where the pristine plating is an invitation to taste a mastery of elevated comfort food flavors disguised as fine art.
The evening began with an amuse bouche: a creamy carrot soup topped with toasted hazelnuts and two garnishes that would prove fairly omnipresent across the board, pickled mustard seeds and shizo. It made the menu feel a bit more cohesive but also occasionally a bit samey, though I can’t complain too vociferously about something that lends much-needed acidity to the rich flavors of classic French cuisine. Above all, this bite was delicious, with the ideal blend of sweetness, richness, and savoriness: a perfect preview for what was in store.
Appetizers are copious and gorgeous, like this dish of Cocos de Paimpol (17) – a white bean from Brittany that became, in 1998, the first fresh vegetable to receive an AOC. Here, they were simmered in a savory tomato-saffron broth and studded with chorizo. A generous fresh fig topping showcased the best of the season’s bounty, and more purple shizo added freshness and a slight mentholated note.
While it was delicious, it didn’t hold a candle to the vegetarian appetizer of the day: a slow-cooked eggplant purée (16) topped with stracciatella cheese, sweet-and-sour plums, pickled red onions, and more of those still-same pickled mustard seeds. While the promised miso proved hard to detect, the balance on this dish was pitch perfect and proved our favorite of the night…
…especially when paired with hot-out-of-the-oven pita bread, which seemed to toe the line between pita and naan. Tender and buttery, it was seasoned judiciously with oregano for a slightly herbaceous flair.
Mains were incredibly generous, like this massive mushroom tart (27). Mushroom duxelles and super-sweet caramelized Cévennes onions were piled onto a base of ultra-buttery puff pastry.
Crowned with earthy roasted porcini mushrooms and – yes – more pickled mustard seeds, this dish was a bit of a madeleine de Proust, for me, skyrocketing me back to Christmas dinner, when my mother is famous for her stuffed mushrooms as well as for the caramelized shallots that typically accompany our roast beef. A puddle of rich Comté and Jura wine foam made this dish even more rich, so the pile of mesclun greens dressed in vinaigrette afforded welcome balance.
I was even more conquered by this bass (28) served with Galician mussels escabèche, gnocchi, and, yep, more mustard seeds. A samphire topping added a lovely brininess, as did the preserved lemon gel topping the perfectly cooked fish. The creamy herb and lemon zabaglione was lovely as well, though I suspect it may have sat under a heat lamp a moment, as by the time it reached the table, it had formed a bit of a skin. The mussels were plump and sweet, and while I liked the gnocchi, they paled in comparison to the rest of the dish.
By this point we were already full – almost uncomfortably so. And yet despite not having a sweet tooth, I can’t help sampling at least a bite of dessert to see if it holds up to the rest of the menu, which this chocolate mousse (13) definitely did. Made with 50% chocolate from Xoco, it was far less bitter than most, which meant I liked it more than I typically do, and my chocoholic dining companion liked it less. We both agreed that the texture was perfect and that it was lovely when paired with a tonka-infused biscuit crumble and a crown of pears poached with spices and vanilla. But what actually made this dessert sing were the tiny bits of marigold leaf, which added a lovely balancing zing to the otherwise fairly sweet dessert.
The dining room here is convivial and warm, loaded with a balance of locals and foreigners, which makes sense given the proximity to the Butte Montmartre. With a small menu that changes regularly, I’ll definitely be back to see what else they have in store.
A. Lea – 39 Rue Lamarck, 75018