Theme Food Restos

Is it only me, or have others noticed the opening of more and more of what I call “themed-food” restaurants in Paris?  Oh, there have always been traditional brasseries that have beautiful displays of oysters and other crustaceans outside and menus replete with choucroute inside, but the appearance of the Bar au Huitres and l’Huitrier refined the category even more and saw them single out bivalves for the most part.  More recently, even more oyster places have popped up, with the appearance of l’Ecalier du Bistro, L’Ecaille de la Fontaine and l’Ecume St Honore. By the way, if you haven’t had the Utah Beach oysters at l’Ecailler du Bistrot, you’re in for a treat. And then there are the other places that concentrate on one item, served many ways.  For instance, L’Escargot Montorgueil has been around forever, it seems, well, at least since 1832, and serves up escargots in everything from the classic parsley and butter to curry sauce.  (I must confess that I buy mine cold, uncooked and already stuffed with butter, etc., at the l’Escargot de la Butte in the 18th and then take them home for broiling.)  Then there was the short appearance of the Bistro Gambas which mercifully closed before they sold too many tough as rubber shrimp, but also with a number of preparations from pastis to lemon.  And now we have Roger Grenouille featuring frogs’ legs. Meat places? You bet!  I’m not sure which has been around longest, but certainly the ones out near the La Villette slaughter house in the 19th, of which only Au Boeuf Couronné, opened in 1865, is left standing, go back a long way.  My weakness has always been for a cote de boeuf, and for one brief shining moment, like Camelot, there was a resto called La Cote de Boeuf, but now you’ll have to get it at the multi-food places like the Bis de Severo and Le Quincy.  I liked the idea of Monsieur Lapin, (what could be better than multiple kinds of bunny?), but it turns out that at least two folks in my building make it better.  And I also loved J’Go, pronounced Gigot, which I really think knows their barely cooked lamb.  Finally, there’s the new habitant of the ex-Jamin space, Meating, whose beef tartare is the tops. A couple of places over the years have excelled in game season, the most interesting in terms of “theme-ing” being l’Ecaille et Plume, now sadly disappeared, probably a victim of an excess of butter and cream in their lievre royale.  Replacing them, however, is a similarly themed place called La Traversiere, which we’ll know more about once they hit their full stride in mid November’s game season. Then, there are the places featuring items we’d think of as side-dishes – Pomze, serving up potatoes with everything from scallops (petoncles) to doe (biche) and Rouge Tomate aka Tomate, that at least in the summer, manages to serve about a dozen varieties of tomatoes in various dishes as well as sell them on the terrace in front. Finally, cheese.  Sadly, Androuet has drawn itself back to just one store, abandoning its restaurant and two retail offshoots, so cheese-lovers can no longer have all-cheese, all-the-time, and aficionados will have to retreat similarly back to places like Montparnasse 25 and Astier for cheese and….. What will they think of next?  If I had to guess, given the current preoccupation with weight and beauty, it won’t be foie gras or sausages, it’ll be salads (Bio-tiful), veggies and yogurt themed places. As usual, here are the addresses I like:   l’Ecailler du Bistrot 22, rue Paul-Bert, 11th (Metro : Faidherbe-Chaligny) T: 01 43 72 76 77 Closed Saturday noon and Sunday A la carte 25-30 €. L’Ecaille de la Fontaine 15, rue Gaillon, 2nd (Metro: Quatre-Septembre) T: 01.47.42.02.99 Closed weekends Menu: 19 €, A la Carte depends on the number of oysters, average 40 €. Le Bis de Severo 16, rue des Plantes 14th T: 01.40.44.73.09 Open Tuesday to Saturday night A la carte 35-70 € (depending on whether you have the beef) Meating 122 avenue de Villiers, 17th (Pereire) T : 01 43 80 10 10 Closed Sundays and Mondays Menus 50-60 € for lunch, 60-89 € for dinner     ©2006 John A. Talbott