Petillant, Naka Meguro ペティアン 中目黒

"Petillant" can be loosely translated as fizzy or sparkling. Sounds like my type of place! Well actually the reality of this little bistro down the end of the Naka Meguro shopping street is a bit more down to earth, but pleasant nonetheless. On a recent visit for lunch I sampled their lunch set which is quite keenly priced. You can select a 1,000 yen set with an entree and main, or an 1,890 set with fancier ingredients. Of course I chose the latter, ordering a scallop terrine for the entree and the choucroute with pork and sausage. Being a Sunday, I also treated myself to a couple of glasses of their house white, and topped off the lunch with a chocolate terrine for dessert with a scoop of raspberry sorbet.

The scallop terrine was more like a mouse and, as you can see in the picture, looked just like a fresh mozzarella and had a very similar consistency. Drizzled with a basil oil, it tasted fresh, not too fishy and went well with the crusty baguette it was served with. Unfortunately they did not replenish the bread...The choucroute was quite nice, especially the sausage which tasted great with the mustard. The piece of boiled potato hiding underneath the cabbage was ever so slightly undercooked (I like my potato pretty soft I must admit). The wine tasted pretty cheap and not really worth commenting on other than that. The dessert was another matter though - the chocolate terrine was rich and dense (none of the obvious retorts please!) and went terrifically well with the raspberry sorbet.

Overall, I found the food to be pretty good, the wine pretty ordinary and the service to be quite pleasant. If you're on a budget you could do a lot worse than coming here.

http://www.nakameguro.cc/c2/8/in/petillan.html
Tel: 03-3792-3567