I love me a quick-and-easy standby, a restaurant where you’ll always feel at home. And Aux Deux Amis is just that spot.
It boasts a lot of the things I look for in a neighborhood staple: it’s unassuming but friendly; the menu is short, sweet, and inexpensive. And it also has some added bonuses: ultra-friendly service and one of the best natural wine lists on the block. (And we’re in the 11th, here.)
My apologies for the quality of the photos, which do not belie the deliciousness of the food. The lighting here was decidedly not my friend.
Aux Deux Amis’ menu is small and built for sharing. On this particular visit, we started with a classic – oeuf-mayo – which our friendly waiter (who I believe is also the owner, though you wouldn’t guess it from his genial, laid-back yet efficient attitude) informed us is quite literally just that: an egg and mayo. We got two and confirmed his warning.
Not that I’m complaining. Oeuf-mayo is a bistro staple for a reason.
My favorite dish of the night was one we almost didn’t order: mussels and fragola pasta with a pesto rosso broth. Heady and redolent with garlic and sweet, perfectly cooked mussels, this dish was a recommendation from our lovely waiter. A+
The mussels may have been my fave, but this steak tartare was a close second. I love me a good steak tartare, and this one definitely did not disappoint. The ultra-tender hand-cut beef was served on a puddle of anchovy-infused sauce (possibly a mayo?) and sprinkled with crispy wakame and sesame seeds. I sopped up as much sauce as possible with crusts of excellent bread.
Yum.
This dish of mullet with cucumber and fennel was also tasty, with caper berries and lovely little fennel sprigs, as well as a cucumber and fennel gelée. It was maybe slightly less exciting and punchy than the other two dishes, but it was a technical success, with super tender high-quality fish and a nice marriage of flavors.
To accompany our dishes (each of which was between 12 and 14 euros – frankly a steal, given the quality), we enjoyed a maceration white from Catalan Tanca els Ulls Vinyaters that has since proven absolutely impossible to find.
Guess I’ll just have to go back.
Aux Deux Amis - 45, rue Oberkampf, 75011