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A detour into Luxembourg

Blogs & Photos

27/01/2010A detour into Luxembourg

Blogger Mrs Cupcake took a detour into Luxembourg from Germany to sample one of the many Michelin-starred restaurants.

Recreation spots for children in Luxembourg

We're in Nürburg, Germany right now, so that Mr Cupcake can drive the famed Nürburgring race track.

It's been a very drizzly, and very rainy day. Actually, our entire trip thus far has been all rain and cloudsThough I must say, I'm happy being in rainy Germany compared to our previous destinations. The mountains and little villages are very picturesque and very quaint.

Since Mr Cupcake was driving today, and it wasn't nice out, J9 and I decided to take a little detour and go to Luxembourg. It wasn't a planned route, but we were talking to the one of the owners at the Ringhaus where we're staying and he suggested the drive. It's only an hour from where we're staying.

Why Luxembourg you ask? Well, it has the highest concentration of Michelin-starred restaurants per capita in the world. We decided to pick one and have a leisurely lunch. We settled on the two star La Tables des Guilloux. It was described as 'country' on a random internet page. We decided that would be a more unique experience than the other two star Italian restaurant nearby.

We headed off to Luxembourg with our Garmin 370 GPS (which is awesome in Europe btw except for Ireland) to guide us.

The restaurant is located in a little village outside of Luxembourg City. It's actually hard to distinguish the restaurant from the other houses along the little lane.

One inside, I was pleased to find they had a bunch of peonies - my favourite flower. For me, this was the sign that it was going to be a good meal.

In Luxembourg, they speak French. Fortunately, J9 was able to invoke her high school French vocabulary from years past. If one cannot speak French, like moi, fear not: the servers are friendly and some of them speak English.

We started off with an aperitif. J9 was able to try a white wine from the South of France. She then decided she was going to like France (our next stop).

We were also given a piece of crostini with foie gras and mackerel with a light mustard sauce. I'm not a big fan of mackerel due to the fishiness, and this was no exception. However, I did really enjoy the mustard sauce. I also find the more I eat foie gras, the more I adore it. It's the creaminess and smoothness along with the slightly salty flavour. It's dreamy. In recent history, the foie gras I've eaten has been prepared very airy and light, but this was more dense. I think I prefer it this way.

Crostini with foie gras, mackerel and mustard sauce

The entire menu is in French, so I had a difficult time trying to decide what to order. J9 went with the special which was an asparagus ravioli.

It had chopped pieces of asparagus and artichokes covered in a thin blanket of homemade pasta. The unique part of the pasta was that it wasn't crimped like the ravioli we all tend to know. If it hadn't been for the butter sauce, it would have been a waist friendly meal.

Since I didn't want to decipher the menu in detail, I decided to go with a fish. I ended up with a lovely piece of slightly seared St. Peter's white fish in a creamy tomato and basil sauce. The fish was light and had many fine serrated pieces. Like the mustard sauce in the first dish, the sauce on my fish was very well prepared. In fact, I couldn't get enough it. It also went very well the crusty bread that was on the table.

With such a lovely, leisurely meal and a crappy, rainy day, we couldn't pass up dessert. I wasn't sure what was on most of the menu, so I asked one of our servers what his favorite dish was. Without hesitation, he responded with the chocolate cake. I wasn't going to argue with the man, so I ordered one! J9 on the other hand went with the cheese plate.

This chocolate cake was very similar to the molten chocolate cake that have become ever so popular in many restaurants these days. Don't get me wrong, it was still lovely, but what saved the dish was again the sauce. It was a beautiful vanilla sauce with chopped up hazelnuts. It married very well with the chocolate cake and I was pleased with the direction our server had steered me.

J9 topped the meal off with a cup of coffee. Our server then brought out a complimentary dish of dark chocolate chunks.

And a plate of cookies and caramels. This was a nice ending to a very pleasant meal.

Our meal was about EUR 106 including alcohol, tax and gratuity. It was well worth the venture into the Luxembourg…

Read more from Mrs Cupcake on her blog Delicious One.