The Michelin star is the highest distinction to which a restaurant aspires. The French guide is, by far, the most important prescriber and recognized gastronomy worldwide, but are restaurants valued with the same criteria in all countries?
It is a question to which the gastronomic critics who have visited Michelin-starred restaurants outside of Spain the most, who always point to the comparative tort that operates in the guide between the restaurants of his country of origin and the rest.
I never fully believed it. The truth is that, in all the years that I have been visiting France – my wife is half Gallic – I have always eaten very well and it seemed to me that, in general, the average gastronomic level is somewhat better. But I had never been to a Michelin restaurant. Until last week.
It goes without saying that a single Michelin restaurant cannot offer us a complete vision of the establishments that the guide selects in France and this is only an opinion column; but the truth is that, of the dozens of tasting menus that I have tried in my life in Michelin starsthis has been, by far over the rest, the worst.
L’Auberge du Prieuré
The chosen restaurant is L’Auberge du Prieuré, located in the charming town of Moirax, just ten kilometers from Agen, the capital of the department of Lot et Garonnein the southwest of France.
The menu, curiously, is full of Spanish products such as Galician beef or Iberian pork.
It’s a beautiful area, but very little tourist, known among the French for the manufacture of prunes. But, although there are no foreigners, the terrace of the restaurant, where all meals are served in summer, is full.
At L’Auberge du Prieuré the chef officiates Benjamin Tourselwho inherited and kept the star obtained in 2008 by the previous chef of the place, Michel Trama. According to the Michelin Guide, Toursel “has forged its own distinctive modern style, peppered with bold and creative notes that often surprise the diner.”
The letter, curiously, is riddled with Spanish product such as Galician beef or Iberian pork, two of the main dishes on the tasting menus this summer. And, at least on our visit, there was hardly any local product or specialties, something that in Spanish Michelin stars seems almost mandatory.
The prices: cheaper than I thought
Taking into account that in France everything is more expensive In Spain, at first glance, the Michelin star menus did not seem high to me.
As in all restaurants in France, water is always offered for free, served in a jug
L’Auberge du Prieuré has two tasting menus. A short one with snacks, three savory passes and two sweets, for 80 euros and a long one, which is served only at night, with snacks, four savory passes and two sweets, for 98 euros. The dishes, in addition, are repeated in one menu and another. Since we went at noon, we chose the short one.
From what I have been able to investigate, they are more or less standard prices in the Michelin restaurants in the area, which rise, as in Spain, in the big capitals and, above all, in Paris.
What has surprised me the most, for the best, are the prices of the wines. The restaurant’s cellar, full of references to appellations of origin in the area, such as Bergerac, Buzet or Duras, has wines from 12 euros and many references between 15 and 25 euros, something very unusual in Spanish Michelin stars. Also, as in all restaurants in France, water is always offered free, served in a jug, as soon as you sit down. The drink, therefore, does not unnecessarily raise the food ticket, which is appreciated.
The food: so-so
A beautiful town, a pleasant terrace, a good 20-euro claret wine, super-rich bread and butter… Everything looks good until the dishes begin to parade. First, some cute looking snacks, but quite bland. The crunchy with ricotta and mushroom is saved, but the zucchini with ham and the prawn broth are super bland. They don’t know anything.
The next dish seems interesting: a tenderloin of raw tuna with rose petals and rhubarb accompanied by rice with seaweed and a geriano wasabi. The tuna – I suppose, actually, bonito from the north, or frozen bluefin tuna – is delicious and the wasabi is very curious, but the rice, which wants to be sushi-like, is very old. It’s a paste.
Then comes the best dish on the menu, and the only one that seemed worthy of a Michelin star, a Florence’s onion –a type of elongated onion reminiscent of calçots– with mushrooms that was really good.
The salty part of the menu ends with a Galician beef, accompanied by a meat sauce with orange, a capuchin béarnaise and carrot pulp. It’s rich, but apart from being a little overdone and quite scant, it’s not a surprising dish.
After this they offer us a Cheeseboard, for which you have to pay 15 euros separately. Since we are hungry, we ask for it. And they are very good. In this I suspect that French restaurants outperform Spanish ones.
To end, two desserts, quite classic, but rich: a peach with ice cream and matcha tea and a goat curd with a thin and crispy dough. The petit fours they are served, and charged, with the coffee, at a price of 5.50 euros per person.
This restaurant in Spain would not have a star
Leaving aside the desserts, which we could have perfectly found on a Spanish Michelin star menu, the truth is that the menu at L’Auberge du Prieuré has been disappointing: nothing has surprised us, there were no great products and not even the service was great, because they took a long time to serve between courses.
France 9 (Lonely Planet Country Guides)
The comparison with Spanish Michelin star restaurants is not even sustained. To give some examples that quickly come to mind, it is amazing that a restaurant like Vandelvira, in Jaén, does not yet have a star and L’Auberge du Prieuré retains it. But I say even more, last week I was eating at Canteré, a restaurant in Hecho (Huesca) that has a Bib Gourmand. Except for the type of service and presentation, its 39-euro menu gives a thousand turns to what we have eaten here.
If the economy allows it, this will not be the last Michelin star that I try in France, and I hope this has been just a bad experiencebut of course in my next visits I will go with much lower expectations.
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