Le Diplomate is a wonderful French restaurant. The place is huge, with a big bar area, two dining areas and a large outdoor patio. Reservations are a must here, and we were lucky to get our 5:15pm Sunday dinner reservations. By 6pm, the entire restaurant was full of diners.
We started with the bread basket, an absolute must here. The raisin date brown bread is heavenly, as were the other breads in the bountiful basket. My husband had the escargot to start, and I tried the warm shrimp salad with avocado, and a lemon beurre blanc.
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| Escargot |
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| Warm Shrimp Salad |
The salad was so delicious, and the lemon beurre blanc was so light and tasty. I would have been happy with the salad as my entree. I had the Sunday special, Coq Au Riesling, which wasn't all that exciting. My husband enjoyed his veal dish much more.
The sommelier recommended a lovely French white wine that was delightful.
Desserts are fantastic at Le Diplomate, and we shared a light and chocolaty pot de creme and profiteroles. Next time, I would stick to the bread basket, shrimp salad and dessert, and all would be good with the world.
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| Chocolate Pot de Creme |
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| Profiteroles |
The service is wonderful, although we did feel somewhat rushed. A long, leisurely dinner seemed not to be in the cards here as they are very popular and most likely wanted the table.
The next night we visited The Founding Farmers, a farm-to-table restaurant which is also a hugely popular place. We had 6:45 reservations, and when we arrived we found a seat at the bar and had just been served our Fraise Flings when the hostess informed us that our table was ready.
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| Making our Fraise Flings |
We shared the bread, chips and crisps basket with the best homemade potato chips I have ever had. It comes with four dips- green goddess, onion, romesco and pimento cheese- that can easily be shared by four people.
I had the chicken and waffles, which comes with mac and cheese and as my other side dish I chose the sweet potato, topped with hazelnuts and maple glaze. The fried chicken was great, but the sweet potato was the highlight. It was so sweet and yummy.
We ate so much that we skipped dessert and headed out into the middle of a terrible thunderstorm. Thanks goodness for Uber!
Le Diplomate's website is here.
The Founding Farmers' website is here.
Sounds fantastic! I have yet to try a farm to table place, but I really want to this summer or fall.
ReplyDeleteFounding Farmers is just across the street from my office - and they do so many things well! Really great food. I still haven't been to Le Diplomate, though I have heard from several sources that the food is fantastic! Your photos make me want to go there immediately.
ReplyDeleteToo bad about the cherry blossoms - hope you had a great rest of your trip anyway!
You share the most wonderful restaurant meals with us. Yummy! The desserts at the first restaurant look amazing. And I'd be happy with salad and then dessert too. LOL
ReplyDeleteThe Founding Fathers sounds like a restaurant that we have in our area, Jack Allen's Kitchen. I'm going to write about that one in a couple of weeks. Jack Allen has a new cookbook out and so I'll tell about that as well. Thanks for taking us along on your eating events. :-)
That chocolate dish is calling out to me.... Cheers from Carole's Chatter
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