Paris Guide: Clamato
Address | 80 Rue de Charonne, 75011 Paris, France
On our final full morning in Paris we woke up early to hit the gym (trying to keep it balanced). After packing our bags and leaving them with the concierge we headed to Michelin-starred chef Bertrand Grébaut and Théo Pourriat's Septime. Our whole time in Paris I had set up to be notified if any reservations opened up. None had so we thought we'd try our luck for a walk-in table. We arrived just 15 minutes after opening and already the tables were seated and in the full swing of service. The host checked to see if we could be accommodated for lunch but they were fully booked. He recommended that we dine at their sister sister restaurant next door, Clamato, seafood house.
When we entered Clamato we were taken past the bar and to a table, made of reclaimed wood, by a large window looking out to the gardens. The setting was warm and inviting with wood planked ceilings above and all the bright colors of autumn against the heavy sky as our backdrop. Behind us sat three couples from America who had just arrived that morning and were waiting for their Paris based friend. Other than that there were a couple of people at the bar. We ordered our wines and, hungry because we had skipped breakfast, took bites of bread while reviewing the menu.
Almost immediately we decided to share the seafood tower. It offered crab, oysters, welchs, clams, and the special of the day uni. When it arrived at our table it looked like a work of art. It was delicious but be prepared to work for your food. Breaking and digging into that crab is a job, albeit one that the reward makes worth doing.
Our server had recommended that we each order three main dishes because, she advised, they are small. We started with three and would see how we felt after that. As our dishes arrived we were glad we hadn't over ordered. The portions are in fact generous and the dishes rich so anymore would have been too much. It also may have been because we started with the seafood tower but by the end of the meal we didn't have room for dessert. For mains we started with mesclun, poire conference, haddock. This was Lynette's favorite and I agree it was really good.
My favorite dish was the Reuben Sandwich de Pastrami de Thon. It was an interesting concept to have a reuben with tuna. The flavors were good. I would just pull back on the mayo.
Omlette a La Poutargue, moyaonnaise au citron. I liked the presentation of this dish and the omlette itself was good. You can see from the photo that the egg sits in a shell of thin sliced bread. The mayo could have used more lemon or something it more or less tasted like mayo and we didn't love it with the egg.
Overall, it was a nice experience. Next time I'm going to take making advance reservations more seriously! Would still love to try Septime.
