Monday, March 22, 2010

St Job Soirée

In case you weren't aware, Place St Job is one heck of a dining bonanza. Avenue Jean et Pierre Carsoel, running down the hill into the square, is lined with restaurant after restaurant - every one that I've tried makes for a great night out. Prime restaurant real estate!

Our most recent excursion landed us at La Soeur du Patron. The Uccle/St Job restaurant also has an Auderghem branch, with almost the same menu. I had heard a few positive rumors about this place, so at the end of a long work day, we treated ourselves to a meal.

The interior is quite chic, with red walls, and soft lighting emanating from unusual light fixtures. I have to admit that "real" (i.e. non-fish eating) vegetarians are going to run into some issues here, but if you're fish-friendly (or even better if you're carnivorous), you'll be pleased.

A page of standard Belgian starters was followed by a page of carpaccios. Between the three of us, we were off to a running start with a tuna carpaccio seasoned à la japonaise, scampi croquettes, and a salmon tartare on a bed of taboule. As I said, short on real vegetarian options, although their page of salads looked delectable, with one or two vegetarian choices, and several others probably easily adaptable to a vegetarian palate.

For mains, they offer pastas (mostly with meat or fish), fish choices, plenty of meats, and a page of "world food", again, all with meat or fish. We opted for a lime-glazed salmon, and a perch with yellow pepper coulis (also duck with calvados, mushrooms and apples for my truly non-veggie friend). The fish were both accompanied by nicely seasoned vegetables but the fish themselves were a bit on the bland side.

On to dessert: L'Arabica was delicious although I must admit I did not commit the list of ingredients to memory. Suffice it to say, it involved meringue, mascarpone, chocolate, coffee, and I think some ice cream. Very tasty.

For our second dessert, we couldn't resist their wildest offering: speculoos ice cream with parmesan shavings and balsamic vinegar coulis. Yes, you read that right. Sound weird? It was. The flavors were (obviously) diverse and I was very aware of different taste sensations happening in different parts of my mouth. But the flavors never really came together in a coherent way, making the experience intriguing but not worth repeating.

The bill worked out to about 45 EUR per person, although we paid a bit less after scoring a RestoPass discount. All in all, a nice meal with some adventurous flavors; worth a visit, but not for every day.

La Soeur du Patron
Ave Jean et Pierre Carsoel 5
1180 Uccle
Tel: 02.374.08.80

Chaussée de Wavre 1700
1160 Auderghem
Tel: 02.675.00.92

http://www.lasoeurdupatron.be/

Both locations closed Saturday/Sunday lunchtime
Sunday evenings are complicated - Uccle is open Fall/Winter on Sunday nights, Auderghem in Spring/Summer, at least according to their website. Call ahead in any case, as reservations are a good idea.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Good review! I've enjoyed eating at the Auderghem branch of this restaurant as it's near my work. The menu there seems somewhat different but its really delicious.

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