le petit deux
le petit deux is relatively new to the Newcastle scene but its head chef and owner, Lesley Taylor, is not. le petit deux is the more casual bistro reincarnation of Restaurant Deux, a restaurant that received rave reviews in its two year life. The new restaurant is a French bistro to a tee with a short, well-priced menu, a few tables and a bicycle out the front, and a modest fit out.
The breakfast menu is short and to the point and it didn’t take long for me to make my decision (for once). Service was a little slow and with only three tables in the room it didn’t seem warranted but it was a Sunday morning and we weren’t in too much of a rush to mind.
Latte.
Lattes all round was the only way to start a lazy Sunday morning. The milk was a little thin but otherwise a nice coffee. I don’t add sugar to my coffee but I thought it was quite cute to serve the coffees with individually wrapped sugar cubes – I’ve never seen sugar cubes like that before (yes of course I have seen sugar sachets, but these were much cuter).
Latte
Croque madame – house smoked ham, gruyere, Dijon mustard, béchamel sauce, fried egg ($12.90).
You read correctly, a croque madame does include Dijon mustard. But don’t worry, I’m still the condiment hater I’ve always been and ordered my toasted sandwich sans mustard. I was a little worried it might be too cheesy with both gruyere and béchamel but I needn’t worry, with the thick style bread the cheese didn’t overpower. To be honest the bread actually overpowered the cheese and ham – not from flavour but from texture. A good croque madame has crunch, but can there be too much crunch? I think there can be. le petit deux use high quality ingredients which was evident in my sandwich but while I loved the flavour combination I found the dry outer edges of the croque madame were too crunchy and let the rest of the toastie down.
Croque madame - house smoked ham, gruyere, Dijon mustard, béchamel sauce, fried egg
Poached eggs, asparagus, hollandaise, prosciutto crumble ($16.90).
Poached eggs and prosciutto, this one had Dylan’s name all over it. They were out of asparagus so Dylan opted for mushrooms instead. Changes aside, the eggs were certainly nicely poached with what Dylan tells me was a gorgeous hollandaise sauce (I’ll take his word for it). Mushrooms were the wrong choice to substitute as they were too much for the creamy hollandaise and egg combination. It’s quite a shame they were out of asparagus as it definitely would have made this dish something a little more than what is was.
Poached eggs, asparagus, hollandaise, prosciutto crumble
We enjoyed our breakfast though I’m not convinced we saw the best le petit deux has to offer. We might be better off returning to check out the lunch menu. I hear the steak frites is sensational.
le petit deux
27 King Street
Newcastle NSW 2300
(02) 4929 2323
le petit deux Website
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