Butterfish with a miso sake glaze in a pineapple mirin sauce. (Photo by Maxwell McAdams)
There is something new on Lancaster Avenue — a building that could almost be mistaken for a Parisian style home — small, with a bright yellow awning and quaint white lace curtains. On a cold winter’s night, behind those homey curtains the dishes are hot and the wine is plentiful.
“To me atmosphere is everything,” said restaurant owner Darlene Boline Moseng. “Even if the food is great, if the atmosphere doesn’t exude joy, it means nothing to me.”
Inside A la Maison, the elements of a traditional French pantry comfort all the senses, and in rustic elegance, “exude joy.” From the brass pots and pans that bedeck the walls like tapestries, to the French inspired paintings, each piece of décor, brought from Moseng’s own collection, has a story to tell.
“The bread mill that we use for instance was originally supposed to be in a film where Meryl Streep would portray Julia Child, but I managed to purchase it in Paris,” Moseng said.
From across the dining hall one can smell the French baguettes being molded on that mill. Once baked, the perfectly crisp exterior of the long baguette arrives in plain view for all guests to see. Rapped once against the giant cutting station that boasts traditional French cutlery, a cloud of flour departs and the light brown loaf, steaming when cut, is distributed to those lucky few who have wrangled a reservation.
Moseng, a former caterer, 11 years out of The Restaurant School, was surprised at the crowds of 99 plus gathering on the weekdays. “I didn’t imagine I would see crowds like this until I had completed my renovations,” Moseng said.
These renovations will include a coffee and crepe bar for the younger crowd and an expanded menu for the dining pleasure of all.
“One renovation I’m really looking forward to is our outdoor patio seating, come summertime,”
Moseng said. “It will be so romantic with music playing, candles, flowers.”
Despite January’s inclement weather, it is, in fact, the “abbreviated” menu, featuring a fare of impeccable tradition with sleights of unexpected innovation in several dishes, which brings the crowds to Maison.
One such dish lent itself to the “starter” portion of the menu. Escargot was baked in chartreuse butter and delicately laden with herbes de provence, garlic, parsley, and chives — the chives being the atypical ingredient of this mélange. Smooth and rich, a layer of creamed spinach helped raise this traditional dish to new heights giving it a far more palatable texture than the chewy experience that so often characterizes escargot.
Also notable among the appetizers was the frisee salad with duck confit, lardons, and crispy truffled potatoes. Even though the frisee suffered considerable heat stroke from the overheated porcelain dish, the salad was wonderful.
With an ample portion of duck confit, tender and lightly seasoned, the lardons, or pork, complemented the simple and savory duck with an extremely sweet and salty flavor akin to fresh pork rind with a Peking rub. The potatoes, gently soaked in truffle oil, were the hot crispy cubes of starch needed to round off this staple of French cuisine, a citrus vinaigrette flavorfully elevating it to a level of culinary excellence difficult to achieve with such a simple dish.
One of the popular home cooked entrées in France is the coq au vin. Although it is traditionally a fricassee of rooster cooked with a fine red wine, lardons, mushrooms and garlic, I was surprised to find Maison’s version slightly bland — a po’ boy version if you will.
Chicken sautéed in red wine with a touch of lavender over a bed of noodles, no oil and no butter, the coq au vin, sadly, was dry and the noodles even drier. Throw in parsnips and carrots, we may languish in the simplicity of a dish so often complex.
Thankfully, other entrées such as the duck breast with cherry port demi-glace, and the boeuf short rib bourguignon, earned high marks from both myself and the other restaurant goers.
One of the most outstanding entrée selections was the butterfish with miso sake glaze, in a pineapple mirin sauce. Moist and tender, the butterfish, coaxed to delicate perfection, flayed under the weight of fork like warm butter. The pineapple mirin sauce, although slightly overpowering in its acidity, was acceptable with the calming, sweet, mellow blend of miso and sake.
“If one dish in the restaurant would cause me to celebrate, it would be this one,” said Andrew Gown, a French patron at the restaurant
A self-admitted eavesdropper from the table next door did not agree, however. “Dinner was mediocre, but dessert on the other hand ...”
Yes, dessert was excellent. From the salty/sweet profiteroles rolled in a thick, warm molten chocolate soufflé sauce over vanilla ice cream, to the pot de crème, a thick French chocolate pudding, dessert was a moment to be savored.
I enjoyed an elegant creation of crepe de crème en glaze with mixed berries, basking under a ginger raspberry drizzle that weaved its way across the pastry and through every bite, this delicious dessert reigned as Maison’s crowning achievement.
All in all, Maison was a pleasant surprise having expected a restaurant much less refined in the tradition of Ardmore’s other venues. The ambience was really quite pleasing and the food was, for the most part, excellent – simple yet well executed.
In fact, I find myself reminiscing on my meal and looking forward to going A la Maison once more.
