Disclosure: I was a guest of the property for this meal.
It should come as no surprise to any regular readers that I eat out a lot. But what you don’t see is that I also cook a lot – and, if I may be so bold, I cook well. Which means that when I’m looking for a restaurant to fall in love with, I’m looking for more than just good food. I want an experience; I want ambiance. I want to feel cared for, and I want my palate – and my brain – to be challenged by what I’m eating.
The newly opened Le 21 ticks all these boxes.
Braden Perkins is the chef-owner behind this new spot in the 6th arrondissement. His is a name foodies in Paris should already know well: Previously of Ellsworth and Verjus, he’s been a staple of the Right Bank dining scene for years. With his new Left Bank venture, he’s taking over a speakeasy-esque dining room with an unapologetically nerdy tasting menu that’s absolutely delicious – and a steal at 98 euros.
The room itself is spectacularly cozy and warm, and Perkins’ attention to detail is on full display, from the precision of the lighting to the space afforded to each table to the judicious storytelling that accompanies each course. I particularly loved the format of the menu, which offers almost a cheat sheet of what’s to come – and what’s transpired – while also leaving a few things to the imagination (including where the syntactical divisions between courses lie).
Before I dig into the meal itself, I want to offer a bit of a disclaimer: I typically don’t review places that have only recently opened, but when I was invited to give this spot a try during their soft opening, I couldn’t help but give an enthusiastic oui. This means that my account of my meal may differ from what’s on offer in the weeks and months to come.
The meal begins with a palate-whetting, brine-filled bite: olives topped with anchovies and accompanied by crunchy breadcrumbs. I loved starting things off with something acidic and fresh, especially given the richness that was to follow.
Perkins shared that he’s frequently frustrated by how diminutive the first hors d’oeuvre in a fine dining context can be. His amuses, on the contrary, arrive in a massive wave of five. For me, the star among them was this eggshell stuffed with perfectly jammy egg yolk, house-made brandade, and chives. It was richly flavored without being too heavy and an absolutely delicious start to the meal.
A close second was the mussel marinière, which united several classics of French and French regional cuisines. Mussels, Perkins explained, were cooked whole in their shells in the manner of a marinière beneath deeply caramelized onions and puff pastry, a bit in the manner of a tarte tatin. The shells both protected the tender mussels and suffused the dish with even more brininess. While the pastry could have stood to be baked a touch longer, ultimately, this married the jammy sweetness of pissaladière with the welcome creaminess and brininess of mussels. (And the dollop of crème crue to one side, a nod at typically-sweet tatin, was more than welcome.)
Perkins puts a lot of thought not just into the flavor of each dish but also its concept, as is showcased with this trout rösti, topped with a trout tartare and cooked, he told us, in trout fat. While the flavor was on-point, conceptually, this rösti missed the mark a bit, as the trout fat didn’t really come through on the palate. Make no mistake: It was delicious, and if hadn’t been told about the trout fat, I wouldn’t have missed it. But the storytelling promised one thing, and the bite delivered another.
One unfortunate downside of the sheer bounty of hot hors d’oeuvres served all at once is how easy it is to overlook something. These tiny cappelletti filled with Jerusalem artichoke and topped with caviar certainly sounded delicious, but I’ll admit that by the time I got to them, I was so conscious of things getting cold that I missed out on the unique textural elements Perkins described for us afterwards. Would that I could go back in time and give it a bit more attention!
The broccoli was, for me, the least exciting of the amuses. Paired with bottarga and topped with crispy rice, it was indeed tasty, but it paled in comparison to the other offerings.
Perkins is a food nerd, pure and simple, and his love of French cuisine and arts de la table shined in the next course, which was served with just one utensil: this odd spoon-ish thing that, he informed us, was a saucier, or a spoon designed to be used to serve oneself sauce from a communal dish.
It was perfectly paired with this rich lobster thermidor, served with a thick Brillat-Savarin foam.
The idea behind this interactive dish designed to share was to spoon the rich sauce, which featured loads of generous hunks of lobster…
…onto ultra-buttery parker house rolls, which in and of themselves were a thing of beauty, topped with a demure sprinkle of seaweed.
An accompanying giardiniera provided a slightly acidic counterpoint, but it wasn’t quite enough to cut through all that (delicious) fat. I would have liked a touch more sharpness here to give a bit of respite from the richness, especially considering the dish that was waiting in the wings.
Low lighting makes for a romantic ambiance, but it’s not terribly conducive to great pictures. And yet this char-grilled cabbage was a thing of beauty, served with grapes, homemade XO sauce, and slow-fermented apples.
While mind-blowingly delicious (and probably my favorite dish of the night), it was also, unfortunately, just as rich and fatty as the lobster, which meant that unfortunately, at this point, I started experiencing palate fatigue.
Luckily, that was counter-balanced by the next dish: steak tartare served atop a beef-fat-cooked flatbread and combined with loads of fresh tarragon and briny capers. I loved the flavors here, especially at this point in the meal. That said, there was one downside to this format aptly identified by my dining buddy, the inimitable Peter Shelsky: The top-quality dry-aged beef got completely lost, both due to the dice and the powerful seasonings. For all our palates could tell, the tartare might have been made with tuna, which would have suited us both fine. But given the storytelling behind this dish, which was inspired by a beef-on-bread pairing Perkins discovered in Portugal, we both wanted the steak to shine more.
Much of the produce for this meal comes from Edward Delling-Williams’ Normandy farm, and Normandy lent a touch of influence to in this non-alcoholic answer to a trou normand, too. A cup of shaved ice was layered with peanuts and blueberries – both slightly American winks at Perkins’ roots – for a refreshing palate cleanser. The peanut, in particular, nudged this into next-level deliciousness for me.
Dessert, like the hors d’oeuvres, came in a parade, though with one fewer, this series felt a bit less overwhelming. The star was a cake made with roasted wildflower flour and crowned with a bonkers wildflower ice cream. A rich caramel drizzled onto the plate made this into something akin to the very best sticky toffee pudding you’ll ever try.
The hot gianduja saw two chocolate shortbread biscuits plunged into a creamy hazelnut cream, all of which was drizzled tableside in hot chocolate.
A revisited cannelé baked in a taiyaki mold boasted a dense, eggy texture and – thankfully – a very balanced sweetness.
This seasonal offering of nixtamalized pumpkin was super surprising. I’m a massive pumpkin lover, and I’ve never quite had anything that managed to achieve this crisp yet tender texture before. Yet another not-too-sweet offering, it achieved the perfect balance with the richness of the cake and the gianduja.
The last morsel was a sip of citrus peel infusion I loved for more than one reason. Not only did it upcycle all manner of potential food waste from the other courses, but thanks to its slight acidity and floral bitterness, it formed an excellent bookend for the richness of the meal.
If you’re a food nerd who often finds themselves leaving fine dining establishments hungry, Le 21 is the spot for you. The menu is ultra-generous, especially for the 98-euro pricetag, and the clever winks at French fine dining traditions dotted with a few American twists are positively delightful. But ultimately, what I love most is that here, deliciousness is never sacrificed on the altar of nerdiness.
Le 21 – 21 rue Mazarine, 75006