Pastis

publication date: Jun 16, 2008

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author/source: Tim Altork and John Breech / STAFF

First Impressions
John: For the better part of this past decade, the French have gotten a bad rap stateside. Why? Well there’s a multitude of reasons why, but unfortunately, I don’t have time to go into them right now.

However, if there are two facets of French culture that have always been impervious to verbal assaults, it’s their wine and food. And that’s exactly what the French-themed Pastis restaurant was serving up on a recent Wednesday. For most potential diners, Wednesday isn’t exactly a fashionable night of the week to eat out, but you wouldn’t know it by the crowd that had already manifested itself at Pastis.

As we were taken to our seats, we were given the option of sitting outside, so we did; even though Roswell appeared to be in the middle of a class three hurricane. However, don’t fret if you make the same choice as the outdoor tables are covered. Our host also mentioned that the outdoor tables were seated first-come, first-serve, but the rest of the restaurant was available for reservations. The view from outside was nice and the only negative thing about the whole experience was the never-ending sound of sirens. I seriously thought they were filming an episode of COPS in downtown Roswell.

Tim: This was my initial experience at Pastis, which has been in downtown Roswell for over 10 years, and my first thought as we made our way to our seats was that it felt authentically old European.

The upstairs outdoor seating had an old, worn-in, comfortable feeling, like the porch could just fall in at any minute. And if it did it would somehow be quaint.

Let’s just say they won’t be rehearsing the show “Stomp” on the Pastis porch any time soon.

Appetizers
John: For an appetizer, we decided to go with the Pastis sampler. There are only six appetizers on the menu, and the sampler features three of them. So if you’re eating an appetizer, the platter is a no-brainer. It features cured meats and cheese, vodka-cured salmon (apparently they like curing things) and calamari. I’ll let Tim, the meat and cheese authority, go into detail on that. I’ll describe the calamari.

Calamari seems to be a trendy appetizer, but not everyone can make it taste good. Pastis’ calamari was easily the best I’ve had at any restaurant in the area. It wasn’t chewy at all and the breading was both light and tasty. The marinara and spicy aioli dipping sauces left a little to be desired. Next time I’m at Pastis, I think I’m going to sneak in some spicy ginger soy sauce for the calamari.

The vodka-cured salmon was good, and when combined with the diced red onions on the plate, it became great. My only wish is that I would have realized what the onions went with before the salmon had disappeared.

Tim: Curing was something they did as a meat preservation method in the medieval times before they had the technology to capture cold in a box. Technology has made a lot of things obsolete – like the medical use of leeches, for example – but somehow curing meat survived the advent of the refrigerator, and for that I am grateful.

A small pile of thinly sliced cured meat and a stroke of brie cheese on a crispy slice of French bread makes for a light and delectable appetizer. If I had it to do over again, I would have left off the calamari (although it was quite tasty for squid) and the salmon (not my thing) and just gone with the Farmhouse Platter as my appetizer.

Entrées
John: Head Chef Brian Obermeyer stands by everything on his menu. Which is good, because sometimes I go to a restaurant and ask them what their best dish is, then when they tell me what it is, I think to myself, “does that mean the recommended dish is that good or does it mean that everything else tastes like something out of a high school cafeteria?”

We ordered the filet mignon, the braised Australian lamb shank and the shrimp linguini. I’ll start with the filet because it was remarkable. I usually don’t use the word remarkable to describe food (or anything for that matter), but it’s really the only word I could think of that could do the filet justice. It was tasty, juicy and tender.

As a matter of fact, if my dad had been in town on Father’s Day, I would have bought him a filet, a necktie and a gift card to Kohl’s (so he could buy more neckties). The lamb wasn’t as tender as the steak, but it didn’t have to be. The meat came right off the bone and every bite was more delicious than the one before it. As for the shrimp linguini, it was linguini with shrimp. Sure there were some grape tomatoes and cheese in there, but as is the case with most linguini’s, I always get the feeling that I could prepare the dish at home.

Tim: We try to get steak wherever we go because it’s such a staple item. So we’ve had a lot of steak in the past couple of months. That said, without any hesitation I can say that Pastis’ filet was the best steak I have had as a member of the Dining Duo.

Steak purists would cringe at the way it was covered in a robust pepper sauce, but that sauce complemented the meat to create a flawless combination of flavor. It was one of those dishes that, when you finish, you wish you had another one waiting for you.

The linguini is basic, but it’s a good option if you want a lighter entrée. The shrimp was tasty and the veggies give it a fresh feeling that you just can’t get from steak or lamb.

Dessert
John: It seems like Pastis has a sampler for every meal and dessert was no exception. We ordered the trio sampler that consisted of crepes, crème brulee and profiteroles au chocolat. As if our belt buckles weren’t loosened enough, we also ordered a molten chocolate cake. Forget the sampler though. Once I took a bite of the chocolate cake, all of my problems disappeared. I forgot about everything; ex-girlfriends, the economy, the fact that my oil hasn’t been changed in seven months. Everything was so clear.

Unfortunately, the sampler had the opposite effect on me. I liked crepes as a kid, but something has changed in the last 10 years and I just can’t eat them. Although somebody at our table ate them, because they were all gone when our plates were cleared. The crème brulee was crème brulee. In other words if you like crème brulee, you’ll like this. As for the profiteroles, the sliced almonds were a nice touch, but I think all the other desserts just fell short of the molten chocolate cake, which I tried first.

Tim: As we’ve said before, it’s hard to go wrong with a dessert. Desserts and barbecue are two of the most subjective food genres out there because there are countless varieties and nuances with both. And unless there’s a rotten ingredient in them somewhere you can bet the farm it’s going to taste good.

That said, I liked the chocolate cake and the crepes. The other two didn’t do it for me.

Overall
Pastis had an eclectic crowd; there were a couple couples, there was a group of women celebrating a birthday (or maybe they just saw Sex and the City, I can never tell what women are doing) and there were a few drinkers at the bar. The point is this… The French have finally done something right and it’s called Pastis.

John: A-
Tim: B+