J'adore Le Crocodile

A beautiful evening after making the first stop at Fanbourg, Len and I arrived at our second destination of the night, Le Crocodile. Is it French food that you hear? Yes it is! Hate to spill this, but this is my first time having the chance to savor French cuisine, so I'm really excited to tell you my first experience at this restaurant. Well, we actually got really lucky in getting a reservation when we called a few nights before, because apparently you need to make reservation weeks ahead. We arrived early at the restaurant, but we still got seated in a timely manner. I noticed how the restaurant was full of life and laughter, which made me feel like I stepped into a local restaurant in Paris, it was very warm. Everyone seemed to be enjoying their food. Ok, so let's get into the food:) We ordered a set of the Chef's Tasting Menu instead of two because we were afraid of not being able to finish the food and an appetizer, a soup and another entree on the side.

To start off, our waitress brought us some multi-grain bread and white bread with butter on the side. The bread was amazingly soft, as soft as a marshmallow and very fresh. Len usually don't like bread that much, but the bread was so good that he complimented it. Even without spreading butter on top, it was just as delicious. While I was happily enjoying my fluffy bread, I was interrupted by another dish coming to our table, a chanterelle mushroom black truffle tart. To be honest, I had no idea what tart this was when I took my bite into it. All I knew was that the tart was real tasty, it reminded me of a quiche but was not dense and had plenty of flavor in it. The tart was steaming hot like it just came out of the oven. Oh, I'm craving for this again while writing about it right now. I had to ask the waitress what kind of tart this was. Okay, to be
honest honest, throughout the whole evening, I had to bother our waitress many times asking her what almost every single dish was. 

To start things off, I went with the Seared Mexican Baja Scallops; Crispy bacon, ginger sauce, crispy bacon.  Oh boy, did this blow me away! Everything complimented each other, the crispness in the bacon contrasted with the tender scallops and the smoky flavor in the bacon brought out the fresh sweet taste of the scallop. Although the menu says ginger sauce, the ginger was not real strong and I think the sauce was made from a cheese sauce which completed the dish with a tangy taste to it, leave you wanting for more.

Len had the Argula salad with salted Tiger prawns sizzled with vinaigrette. The prawns were lightly drizzled with mango sauce. The greens were really fresh and the vinaigrette had the perfect sourness, unlike boathouse's salad last time (way too sour). I liked how they used mango sauce with the prawns, made it tasty! They cooked the prawns perfectly, allowing them to retain their "bouncy" texture.

So here I am with my lobster bisque, all ready to get a taste of it. It clearly looks very different from the one I had at boathouse. This one did not contain any lobster meat, however it had a large dollop of  Crème  fraiche in the middle and a stick cheese pastry on the side. The soup was noticeably richer in lobster flavor and creamier than boathouse's version, but slightly thinner. Fairly, I like both of them just as much. 

As for Len: Butter poached lobster tail; mashed golden potatoes, lemon caper jus. It was just fantastic! From the lobster to the mashed potato, c' était absolutement delicieux! Len applauded on how the mash potato was the best he has ever had and I totally agree with him. Of course, the lobster reaches our expectations just as expected, very fresh and cooked to perfection. I could not believe that these were only our appetizers!

Finally time to get our entrees! Len went with the chef tasting menu's Beef filet mignon; Grilled asparagus and cherry tomatoes, peppercorn hollandaise. I don't think I remember Len NOT praising on any of the dishes we had that night. Len isn't a fan of hollandaise sauce, but I think the sauce was made fairly well so let's put that on the side. The steak was the spotlight of the dish, and it was perfect as well and even more perfect than the one at boat house. This one COMPLETELY dissolves in the mouth and was SUPER tender, it takes zero effort to chew. There was also a side dish with a piece of potato and veggies. There was of course no complaint coming from len and he said that the potato tasted very much like hash brown. 

 And finally for my entree, it was their special of the night: Sable fish and lobster tempura pasta. So much lobster that night, and of course lobster was not overcooked and was nice and "bouncy". I love fish immensely, so hardly any kind of fish will disappoint me. The piece of fish was really fat and juicy. What more can I ask for? Even the pasta bedding was excellent, al dente! 

And you would think it ends right here. I don't think so... there's still more! Here comes dessert! 

Cantaloupe sorbet with port wine. Absolutement fantastique! The pure sweetness came from the natural flavor of the cantaloupe as well as the port wine. This dessert was really refreshing after all the dishes we've had that night, nice and light. 

And you thought the sorbet was the end of it....here is the last dish of the night: Cheesecake topped with chocolate ganache, warmed with caramelized pear. We both scraped away the chocolate ganache since we thought it might be too heavy. Initially, as I took my first bite I did not believe that it was cheesecake at all. Oh boy, was it light and fluffy and the cheese flavor was not overwhelming. This is my first time having a cheesecake like this kind, it was even lighter than Japanese cheesecake! 

So I lied....to top things off and end the night with, the bill came with these cute chocolate crocodiles. However, neither of us touched it since we were very satisfied with our entire meal and we even had leftovers to take home. The service was excellent throughout the whole night. After every dish, the waitress took our utensils away and replaced them with a set of new ones. Imagine how much dishes the dishwasher would have to do...yikes! They also had a special tool to scrape crumbs off the table right before serving dessert. The waitress was super attentive with us and came to check up on us quite often. 

Ambiance: 5/5 

Food: 5/5
Service: 5/5

Price: $25 and up per entree
Overall: 5/5