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Cafe Provencal - Revisiting an Old Favorite

A Kirkwood institution, Cafe Provencal still proves why it's this area's go-to place for classic French food.

Kirkwood is overflowing with wonderful restaurants and food choices. I think it’s great to experience a new place, but revisiting old favorites is both a pleasure and a reassuring reminder why Kirkwood attracts great restaurants. Take , for example, one of St. Louis’s premiere French restaurants and a Kirkwood staple for many years; no matter how many times I eat there, it never fails to please.

Café Provencal is located in the Woodbine Center next to a real estate agency and a salon. Don’t let its unassuming façade fool you; they serve some of the best food I’ve eaten in St. Louis. They present a classic French menu priced a la carte or with two prix-fixe options – three or four courses. I usually choose the four course option because I can never pass up dessert.

We had three starters: L’escargots, snails in garlic herb butter sauce; Trio de Provence, olive tapenade, eggplant caviar and goat cheese; and Coquilles St. Jacques, scallops in a creamy white wine sauce. Snails are not my favorite, I think it’s a texture thing, but these are always cooked to perfection and dipping bread into the garlic sauce is almost worth skipping the snails. The trio was a lighter starter, served with toast points; this is a very shareable appetizer. The tapenade was a little salty, but I prefer it that way, the eggplant caviar was a savory dip and the goat cheese was an excellent complement to them both. The scallops were prepared to just the right tenderness, and the sauce was rich and creamy, a filling starter probably best ordered a la carte or with the three course option.

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Soups and salads were served next. Some of us had one or the other or both. Café Provencal’s seamless service had dishes coming and going without a hitch. The Soupe a L’oignon Gratinee, better known as French Onion Soup, was served in a traditional brown crock with Gruyere cheese melting over the edges - delicious. Tomato Bisque was the soup of the night, and the generous bowl of silky tomato soup was perfect on a chilly night.

The salads were unremarkable. Salade Verte was a typical salad of field greens with vinaigrette. Salade Cesar was a tasty but average Caesar salad. Salade des Bettaraves was the one standout; beets, capers, goat cheese and bacon over greens with vinaigrette.

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We ordered nearly every entrée choice on the menu. Steak Frites is a staple of any French restaurant; the generous strip steak with Bernaise sauce and fries was well-seasoned and satisfying. The other beef offering, Daube de Beouf, was a fork-tender beef stew served with a Butcher’s Wife sauce – a tomato-based sauce with a slight spiciness.

Porc Grille was also served with Butcher’s Wife sauce. The thick, bone-in pork chop was succulent, accompanied by creamy garlic mashed potatoes. Poulet DeBergerac was a large chicken breast with cheese wrapped in a flaky puff pastry. This dish was so rich I could only eat half, and, unfortunately, a fellow diner with the same entrée found his chicken to be dry, though he enjoyed the puff pastry.

By far the favorite entrée of the night was Saumon a la Moutard. This salmon dish was heavenly. The fish was cooked to perfection even though the piece of fish was inconsistent in thickness, as salmon tends to be, the thinner end was as tender and flaky as the thicker end. The mustard sauce was a spicy delight, slightly creamy but not nearly as heavy as some French sauces can be.

Dessert did not disappoint either, though not true for some at my table. The original dessert they ordered at the beginning of the meal had run out by the time we were ready for it. Chocolate Mousse, Chocolate Torte and Crème Brulee were delicious, house-made, alternatives that satisfied everyone’s sweet tooth. 

Another fine meal at Café Provencal proves it’s worth going back to old favorites again and again.

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