i’m hoping you were not so distracted by the blood and gore of the last post that you missed the bit about the delicious salad. yes, after three weeks away in the land of the free, deborah returned to brunch at le grand café at the alliance francaise. it’s like a bermuda triangle, is it not, this little section of clarence street with bécasse and plan b on the east side, and the newish le grand café forming the third point right across the road? you pop in, and then disappear for quite some time — who knows when you will re-emerge? last year, when we lunched at bécasse, we must’ve been there for almost three hours. wednesday, at the more casual outpost (yes! you can play a game of “count the stripy skivvies”, haw haw!), we lingered for around three-and-a-half.

we arrived early, 11am, because i’d been reading around the traps that it gets busy at lunchtime! and things sell out! as it turns out, we were maybe too early: quite a few of the menu items were still being prepared. but as we cast our eyes over the neat stacks of filled baguettes, the countergirl retrieved a tray of salad bowls from the kitchen and began filling the display case.

“is that the nicoise?” i breathed, in awe. atop the leaves, the fat slices of chargrilled tuna glistened like rubies. there were segments of hard boiled egg with sunny yellow yolks. later, as i dug down into the bowl, i would find tiny olives and halved grape tomatoes. such dainty treasures, shining in their delicate dressing. it made for joyous eating, and i did not feel in the slightest that i’d missed out on anything by not ordering the frisee with lardons.

the salad nicoise had come highly recommended by the friendly french countergirl. i got the feeling though, that she would’ve been happy to recommend everything. when we joined the queue the second time, for dessert, she spoke highly of the blueberry danish, perched up high on a mountain of pain au chocolat, as well as all the steamed puddings on display. if we’d have kept pointing, she would probably have gushed over each one.

ordinarily, i expect i would’ve gone down the path of chocolate. most likely the pot au chocolat with its helmet of mixed nuts, or the wedge of flourless chocolate cake, or the slender little beam of a chocolate brownie. however, i’d worked my way through an extremely sweet hot chocolate with the salad, and i thought that any more might knock me over.

so i got the blueberry pudding, and it was light and sweet, and served warm with a quenelle of slightly sweetened whipped cream… altogether pleasant, although i think that i might have preferred double cream.

the room was quiet when we arrived, with just a group of uniformed school boys in the banquettes by the wall, drinking coffee from takeaway cups, and eating croissants — some sort of french immersion class i suppose. the lunchtime crowd swept in, in a couple of waves, and then trickled out again as we lingered over tea (gunpowder green leaf tea, with jasmin, in a large round pot, with a removable strainer, le sigh of contentment). i resisted going up to the counter for a third time — the takeaway danish doesn’t always win — but i have begun making plans for pastry-fueled morning work sessions in the coming weeks.