Sneak Peek: La Belle Crepe
When I saw what looked like an honest-to-god French creperie being built on the ground floor of the Medical Arts Building on Nicollet Mall in downtown Minneapolis, I was beside myself with excitement. In a pre-opening interview with the Strib, owner Alain Lesse said, “Everyday for the past few weeks, we've had 80 to 100 people poke their head in and ask, ‘When are you opening?’”
I think I was at least six of those people.
So, I ventured in today for lunch. I know they’ve only been open for two weeks, but it was…not so hot.
The décor is not the problem. It actually looks quite French, with a big brass chandelier and granite counters in a teeny tiny chocolate-and-buff room. I kind of felt like I was in Paris, if off in one of the more distant arrondissements.
The actual crepes are not the problem, either. The whole-wheat crepe I ordered was altogether correct: thin, tender, light and bubbly.
The menu, however, is part of the problem. There’s no plain cheese crepe, no plain ham-and-cheese crepe, no plain egg-and-cheese crepe, no plain nutella crepe. There are only more expensive combinations. The majority of items on the menu hover around $7. Fine.
I dearly love the crepes you get on street corners in France filled with a fried egg, sheets of ham, and cheese griddled until it becomes a filling, gooey grilled cheese. And so I ordered the breakfast “classic,” which costs $6.99 and is filled with eggs, gruyere, and your choice of meat (ham, smoked turkey, chicken, or bacon). What I got: Dry crumbles of scrambled egg and ham cubes folded into a crepe, with undetectable amounts of cheese. When I picked it up to eat it, the whole thing exploded like moist potpourri folded into damp tissue paper. Luckily, I spend enough time with toddlers that I have mad skills when it comes to dodging flying food, but—dang!—that wasn’t right.
I’ll be back to try the sweet crepes, like the plain sugar and lemon juice one, and the orange marmalade and crème fraiche one, mainly because they are liquid-ish and must avoid the dry-egg-no-cheese paradigm, and I’d advise you to do the same.
La Belle Crêpe
825 Nicollet Mall, Minneapolis
612-333-1100
Posted on Friday, October 17, 2008 in Permalink
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Reader Comments:
I had the salmon crepe for lunch. Other than having to sit outside and eat it and it got cold (there is just a stand up counter there)the flavor was really good. Cold crepe = not good. I want to go back and try some others though. I hope they work out....
I returned from lunch there today -- amazed that I had somehow missed this place -- and have to say I was really surprised by this review. Or perhaps the proprietor read it, because my colleague and I each had a crepe (she the ham and gruyere, I the cordon bleu) and they were exceptional -- piping hot, perfect crepes, a lovely dollop of creme fraiche, exactly the right amount of ooey-gooey gruyere perfection.
I'd say it's time for a return visit... maybe for lunch?
(also split a fresh berry crepe, which was equally delicious, and could have been made better only if the raspberries and blackberries were actually in season. Not their fault -- it's December, after all).
Hi Dara
Love your food and restaurant reviews, and wondered if you have tracked a correlation between poorly ventilated restaurants and the quality of the food that they produce? I have noticed several restaurants that make delicious meals (e.g., Red Stag, Modern Cafe, Harry's, etc.) that have such poor kitchen ventilation that I have to wash my hair and clothing after a meal there. The results are a deterrent to eating out and diminish the experience, and I wondered if it is just a device to try to get their patrons to leave with 'eau du grille' as a reminder or are they just too cheap to invest in good ventilation?
Your thoughts on this? Nancy
Hi Nancy,
Well, that's a new one on me: I have never heard of a restaurant doing any such thing on purpose, my guess in the case of the Red Stag would be that it has to do with Green standards and preserving heat in the building, and at the Modern they're just cooking their hearts out in a space with basically no modern infrastructure at all. That said, I can't say I've noticed my clothes smelling particularly when I've eaten at any of those places, does this happen to you every time you're at the Modern or Red Stag, or has it just happened once?