Wrong. We walked in at 8pm, the place was packed with no discernible organized seating activity. After walking toward some empty tables, large vicious dogs descended upon us and blocked our way. Not only that but this 80 pound (metric measures are failing at the moment) girl jumped into our path and instructed us to back away from the tables. "They are all reserved" I hear. Oh, okay. She says there is the table of pain free if you would like that (but in French so I have no idea what she is saying). She smiles while she says this, so like stupid tourists we smile too and follow her into the pit.
Our table is under the stairs in the aisleway. Bonnie takes the Harry Potter seat under the stairs and I take the chair in the aisle. Great. Oh, and there are no printed menus they admit to (until it is an ordering fiasco and magic English menus appear). The draw of this place is that they have cassoulet, recommended, known for it. I have been waiting for a decent cassoulet since Kerrytown Bistro closed (and that was fake cassoulet anyways). So I get the cassoulet, Bonnie orders duck (not wild duck, chasing them down costs much much more). We order a bottle of wine, which comes from a cellar that might have been used to film any number of horror movies. It only had a half door for gods sake!
After all that, and being whacked by passersby every few minutes, the cassoulet is amazing! Everything I imagined authentic cassoulet would be, including the pool of grease you see to begin with but then magically is gone after you eat the whole thing. For dessert, Bonnie had their profiteroles, which got rave reviews, even though the waitress brought two instead of the one that was ordered. Somehow after tasting the first one there was no complaining about the second one!
We roll home to the hotel, fat and happy.
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