Jim and GM 2022

Monday night’s dinner was at our personal favorite spot on the island. Very under the radar here but absolutely amazing if you love great food and French wines and IMO the absolutely best service on the island: Le Papillon Ivre. Probably the best French wine list of any place I’ve been to. Julie and her staff just seem like they love every minute of their jobs and both the food and wines are incredible. Unfortunately I don’t have any food pics because we were so excited for each course that I forgot but these were our two favorite wines from this trip. The white we ordered a bottle of and the red by the glass. You choose which option is best for you


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this is one of the best red wines I’ve had. Absolutely amazing. If she still has it, try it, or don’t and save it for me for next year

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if you haven’t eaten at Le Papillon Ivre, try it, you won’t be disappointed. Not only great food and wine, but fun, fun, fun too. We just love it. Just tell Julie what types of wine you like and let her pick for you. We had some aged cheese she brought out for us just because she thought it paired well with the wine we ordered (it absolutely did), some amazing oysters, escargot Bourgogne style that were better than we had in Burgundy, a stracciatella cheese and ham dish that was incredible with some bread, an eggplant dish that we have ordered before and loved, a beef Bourguignon that was amazing and had just a drop of sweetness to it to set it apart and was very tender which brought out the switch to red wine and perhaps a couple more items that I’ll add when I think of them (there were so many!!!). Each was great and really creative and I’ll stress again the service which was incredibly attentive and helpful. A must try.

Fantastic review! and I’ve tried both of those wines. You’re on the mark, IMO — wonderful choices!
 
Very nice review of an underrated gem.

I’ve had a similar lunch at that same spot in Lorient. ;)

Thank you for sharing!!
 
Tuesday night was a no reservation/no plan night which usually means takeaway pizza from Les Bananiers and this night was no different. When we arrived it was empty. Thinking back now a few days later, I can’t remember if it was early and before the dinner rich or not but I’m guessing it likely was. I asked if we would be able to sit if we preferred and they confirmed we could. After thinking about it for a while we decided we were looking forward to eating “at home” and decided to proceed with the takeout instead and shuffled back to the pizza area to place our order and wait and watch aaaaaannnnnddddd enjoy a glass of white wine.

always enjoyable to watch one of the hardest working people on the island do his thing. So we ordered, enjoyed our wine and probably watched Luigi make about 50 pizzas while we waited and literally every single one of them looked delicious!!!

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we also passed on our condolences when we sat and chatted for the loss of Thierry who was always so friendly and good to us and told them how he taught our kids “L’addition s’il vous plait” which they still use from time to time wherever we are to let us know they are done and ready to go
 
Our choices were the usual Tartufata which I think I have ordered every time I have ever ordered from Les Bananiers, a new pizza called chèvre miel which is with cheese and honey and whatever else made it incredibly tasty and a vegetarian pie. Apparently the chèvre miel was too tasty to wait for the picture…

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Tuesday was also All Saints Day so after we ate we walked over to the cemetery. Coming this time of the year we always just miss the gourmet food festival as well as missing the holidays and the big “races” on the island, but we feel totally lucky that we are here for this day. It’s such an amazing display to walk around at night with all of the flowers and candles. Not even one grave was empty. So we put a couple of candles of our own on the large cross in the middle, thought our thoughts, and walked around enjoying the peacefulness and beauty of the display. I always leave wondering why this isn’t done everywhere. Usually we come much later and are the only ones there or part of a very small group, but since we were a little earlier this time there were still a lot of people walking around even though the early crowd had long gone.

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Johnny Hallyday’s grave always an amazing display

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The cemetery visitors are adults and children. Good to see the little ones participating and bringing flowers and candles. Hope for the future.
 
Thoroughly enjoying the Jim A posts, thank you for the which beach, dining spots & pix each time, living vicariously from your posts !
 
Sitting on Flamands as I type this but that’s still a few days away since my posts are well behind real life and feel like I’m in a little bit of a Time Machine as I’m typing this. Dinner reservations were for the chefs table at Zion on Wednesday so we decided on a hike to Colombier that day. Looked like there were some new rocks barricading the very end of the turnaround but still plenty of room for us to park. It was a little cloudy which was great for the hike over.

Whatever you do, don’t hit reverse by mistake from the parking spot.


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uh oh. Going to have to fix that pic on WiFi later I think


almost there. love this walk. The payoff is always worth it

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merci Mr King :up:
 
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The “boomerang” catamaran with blaring music seemed a little close to shore for Colombier, but what are you going to do…

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Had been too long since a trip report, thanks for posting! Looking forward to seeing posts from all of you going this month and next.
 
No. New item is chevre with miel pizza
Ding ding ding we have a winner. I think I saw you post about it a week or so back which is what put it in my Mind and made me search it out as we arrived. Mental note - always take Amy’s recommendations as they usually are spot on (at least for us). See our soon to be posted Santa Fe Dover sole post which I’ve been suggesting to GM for three years now as I keep reading your recommendations of it. :heart1:
 
So, our second trip to the Zion Chef’s table. Couldn’t possibly be better than the first from last year but our hopes were high. We decided on not just the chefs table, but the wine pairing as well again. Lots of pics coming so I hope they aren’t too much. Just skip by if so.

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our menu:


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We started with a couple of rum cocktails when we sat and waited for the magic to begin.
The amuse bouche on a sea rock. The presentation Is half the fun. One was tuna I can’t remember the other but want to say it was also tuna based. There are always a ton of ingredients and I won’t try and guess and say something wrong so just watch and enjoy.

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followed up by arancini with the most amazing whipped potatoes from the magic canister that we always love so much

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I have the wine pics but I think that would just be too much and will leave my summary on the pairing at we absolutely loved the choices of wines with each dish and thought all of the wines were good. Personally though the pours were a little smaller than last year from what we recalled and we think next time we will just pick a great bottle of wine in lieu of the pairing. But again, the choices were really really good, we just felt maybe better bang for you buck picking a bottle instead as we ran out of wine a few times before we got through the food item.
 
The squid was very tasty with a little flavored ice cream, curry and a little spicyness.

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the escargot was one of our favorites with parsley and garlic jelly with a smoked garlic light foam. The escargots was under everything and so flavorful when all taken together

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I love duck but don’t often eat beets so I wasn’t sure what to make of the duck breast tartare with beets and nuts but was really happy with it and we both after eating it felt we may add items with beets to our diet in the future based on how much we liked this dish. There was a beet ice cream and a beet slice and also a fermented beet so it was about as “beets” as you could get but it was really good and the red wine choice went with it fantastically. The presentation too was great IMO

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We’ll take a quick time out here for a pic of Jean Baptiste and staff and our view of the kitchen as we sat and enjoyed our experience. A great chef, artist and according to my dining partner not so tough on the eyes either


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Only so many comments I can make about one meal so here are the rest of the pics. The scallops in particular were incredible. I can give a little description on anything in particular if I can remember and the menu above will give a quick description of each as well


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scallops and squid ink ravioli with lobster and eel inside above and the squab below


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the two desserts

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and the extra dessert which was really cool. It was a mojito Jell-O shot in a lime skin. One of the more creative items I’ve had. Even though you knew what it was it was tough to get yourself to accept you weren’t about to eat a lime. Really tasty

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lastly a little rum to finish off the night held by one of the amazing staff. They really all were incredible. The kitchen staff and the dining room staff were all very professional and very attentive and we loved watching them make not just our dishes but the dishes for the rest of the guests as well

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This is an amazing meal.

Lovely presentations and gong some place twice..double your pleasure and double your fun. Why not?
 
Wow! Just wow! Everything looks and sounds amazing. Did you make your reservation well in advance? We’re there for 2 weeks. Can we wait or should I do it now?
 
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