1.0 maybe -1.0 Le Pas Sage in the 2nd, 1, passage (pun, get it?) du Grand Cerf in the 2nd, 01.40.28.45.60, closed Saturday lunch, Sundays and Monday nights, is a place that opened just after the rentree to one hand clapping but which a trusted colleague said was an A+ find; so off we go. It's on the rue St Denis, which as my informant noted is "...famous for its sex shops and ladies of the night lurking in doorways", right next to Messages, which describes itself as an upbeat florist. The hookers are still there, also the sex shops, but it's not quite so grungy as 10 or 20 or 50 years ago.
The place is a railroad boxcar room with no lighting and heat from one pathetic electric thing and loud "world" music so it tested our hearing, eyesight and body temperature.
So the carte; cannot read it eh?; neither could we with 10x bifocals - and my loaner camera pleaded nolo. I didn't go here for a "Dans le Noir" Experience, no.
My oldest friend in Paris ordered a soup of courgette musquee de Provence aka "Fairytale Pumpkin Squash" which was interesting, while I had the Jambon “Prince de Paris” ham, reputed to be "the only jambon de Paris still being made the old-fashioned way by a local artisan, with no nasty additives." OK. But the bread was fabulous, the butter equally.
Then she had the choux farci with veal which was OK, but I thought I'd better order something different - how about a "hot dog" of Toulouse sausage with melted cheese much beloved by my fellow followers on the bloggosphere - awful bun, tough dog, so-so cheese, in sum; inedible.
At this point, all I wanted was light, heat and the freedom from funky music; the bathroom offered that respite.
Our bill, with no bottled water or dessets, and some wine in a carafe of indeterminate size and 4 coffees was 74.80 E.
Go? Huh? Nope, despite th terribly nice wait-guy who spoke Aussie English, great bread but what my pal called a menu with "weird food?"
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