Le Gaulois, Alexandria, VA

Leo took me to dinner as a "pre-thank you" for helping him move tomorrow. We went to King Street in Old Town Alexandria (my first visit!) and landed at a place called Le Gaulois ("the Gaul," which, judging from the cafe's logo, refers to Roman era, wild, Gallic tribesmen). Leo started with a French Kiss (think kir royale with Chambord instead of creme de cassis) and I had a Dubonet Rouge with a splash of soda and a twist of lemon. Then, we ended up eating the same things.

We began the meal with an "entree" of the chef's charcuterie plate, an assortment of meats and pates which were wonderfully rich and varied. I particularly loved the duck liver pate. Next was a creme de moules, or cream of mussel, soup that was a lovely soup with shelled mussels and strips of julienned zuccini and carrot in a thin cream soup. The plat premier was a rich grilled pair of shad roe topped with bacon strips and served on a bed of sauteed fresh spinach and accompanied by two little parsleyed potatoes and a tiny bowl of steamed brocolli, julienne turnip, and julienne carrot.

Our second plat was a non-traditional but wonderful canard a l'orange presented as a series of thin slices of rare duck breast adorned with manicured orange wedges plated in a circle on a mirror of light red wine and natural juice reduction sauce, surrounding a small puff pastry "bowl" of wild rice. Our salade was a simple plate of mesclun greens in a light French style olive oil vinaigrette. Three cheeses, a chevre, a brie, and a hard cheese the name of which I didn't understand from the waiter, with slices of green apple and several red raspberries were the next course. The hard cheese was good, and I always like chevre; the brie was rather young, I thought, but edible.

For dessert, Leo selected for us a fruit crepe with strawberries, blueberries, and something I wasn't quite sure of (diced poached pear??) garnished with a nest of candied orange peel threads all floated on a lake of thin zabaglione sauce which was lightly broiled before presentation. We ended the meal with a very nice espresso.

Our wine with dinner was a surprisingly economical and pleasant bottle of 2002 L'Enclos de Saint Jacques Bordeaux Superieur recommended by the waiter.