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The French Laundry - Michelin 3-Star Restaurant in Napa Valley | | Category: Gourmet Dining | 2008-02-27 |
| | |  | | |  | | The French Laundry, the international acclaim Michelin 3-star restaurant, is owned by the world famous chef Thomas Keller. This 62-person restaurant is located in Yountville, California, in the beautiful Napa Valley. The food is mainly contemporary American with French influences. Chef Thomas Keller’s plates rely on the freshest, simplest, and high quality ingredients that come from the local family-owned producers and the vegetable garden just across the street from the restaurant. The French Laundry serves dinner seven nights a week and lunch on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Dinner reservations are available from 5:30 pm to 9:00 pm and lunch reservations are available from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm. Reservation must be made exactly two months in advance, not a day early or a day late! The reservation line is open from 10:00 am to 5:30 pm Pacific Time. The reservation line is always busy and it does not take messages. | |  | | In March of 2003, while we were in Rome, we had the most memorable and wonderful dinner at the Michelin 3-star restaurant, La Pergola in Rome Cavalieri Hilton. We were so impressed by Chef Heinz Beck’s dishes and La Pergola’s spotless services. At the time, The French Laundry was not rated but it was considered as the Michelin 3-star restaurant in the U.S., so we decided to give it a try and were hoping it would be as good as the La Pergola. After several days of trying calling the French Laundry, H finally got through and made the reservation. Exactly two months later, we went to the French Laundry with high hope and expectations. | |  | | There are three menus that the guests can choose from, the prix fixe menu, the tasting menu, and the vegetable tasting menu. Each menu is US$240.00 (including service charge, as of 2007). For the tasting menu, guests can choose either the seven courses or the nine courses. A special tasting menu is available by arrangement only, with approximately twenty courses about US$400.00. | |  | | The menu changes daily so don’t come with expectations for a particular dish. The average meal takes about three hours to four and one-half hours and an extended meal can stretch to as long as six hours, with a break suggested midway to relax in the French Laundry’s garden. | |  | | The food in the French Laundry was not as impressive as we expected. To us, most of the dishes were average and nothing extraordinary. Some of the presentations were interesting, but did not make us wow. The service was no way near La Pergola’s service standard. Our servers were still raw and they should had gone through more training before they worked in the dining room. Overall, our experience with the French Laundry was quite disappointed. Disappointed at the food and disappointed at the service! Paying such a high price for having dinner in the French Laundry, it was not worth it!! But, this was back in 2003, hopefully, when we go back again, the food and the service will exceed our expectations. | | | | For those who can not get enough of the French Laundry, there is the French Laundry Cookbook. | | | | The French Laundry 6640 Washington Street Yountville, CA. For Reservation:
+1-707-944-2380
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www.OpenTable.com | | |
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