French Open Trip 2018 Day 5: Joel's Perfect Day
If I was to describe to someone my perfect day, today would probably be it. It had Jenn, Paris, tennis, French food, and French wine. But I'm getting ahead of myself lets start at the beginning. Today marked the first day of two in which Jenn and I were going to Roland Garros. We had grand plans originally. We were going to wake up, have an early breakfast, and take the subway down to Roland Garros.
What actually happened was that we woke up late, ran to Starbucks, and got an Uber to drive us to Roland Garros so we could get there a little after the gates opened for the second day of tennis. Our Uber driver wasn't sure where to drop us off so he just stopped in the middle of a crazy busy road and told us to get out, so we did. A few seconds later a police officer pulled him over. Not sure if he got a ticket, but we hope not. After going through security we walked around the grounds, took some photos, and took in the small but beautiful facilities. In comparison to the US Open, the grounds here in Paris were significantly smaller.
We then made our way to Philippe Chatrie Stadium and to our seats. There we got to watch four matches starting with Kvitova who won in three sets, Djokovic, Wozniacki, and Nadal. If you had told me that we'd get to see both Djokovic and Nadal in the same day I would have thought you were crazy but somehow we did and they both looked in top form. We had such a nice day at Roland Garros. We had great seats (thanks to waking up at 1 AM a couple of months ago to purchase them), enjoyed some decent hot dogs, and a Nutella crepe.
We stayed until the end of the first set of the Nadal match before walking the ten minutes to the subway to take us back to our hotel. We quickly got cleaned up and changed and jumped into an Uber to take us to dinner. Every time we come to Paris we like to enjoy amazing food. Last time we ate at Spring and this time it was Saturne. I'll just say it now, it was easily one of the best meals we've ever had in our life.
What we loved about Spring, was also true about Saturne. Every day is a new menu, and you don't know what you're going to get until they serve it to you. Saturne is pretty simple you have two options. You either get their tasting menu with or without their wine pairings. That's really it. There aren't any decisions to be made outside of that. As you can guess we both went with the tasting menu with the wine pairings. The meal started off with a delicious Prosecco that got refilled more than once and three snacks. The first was the brown buttered asparagus wrapped in a leaf. It didn't look good but its flavor profile might have changed our lives. Up next were two more small tasters/snacks. First were two oysters in a beautiful foam that had me licking the bowl. The final snack was a small homemade cracker with fish, onion, and flowers. Perfection.
Next up was the appetizer, raw tuna in a tomato gazpacho. I love tuna, Jenn loves tuna, and we loved this dish. We've had fresh tuna before, but there was something about the flavor combination of the tuna and the tomato gazpacho that took this over the edge. It was paired with a nice white chardonnay that was delightful.
The first of two main courses was a white fish (she said it in French and we didn't catch the proper name) that came with peas. This dish was paired with a sauvignon blanc that was far and away the best wine of the night. The fish which was our least favorite of the meal still would easily be one of the best things we ate in a month on any other month. Perfectly cooked, amazing flavor, and a good balance with the wine.
Our second entree was veal and it was no exaggeration one of the best preparations of veal I've ever had. It was paired with an orange wine (slightly odd but nice) that did compliment the veal and the sauce really well. You would think by this point we'd be full (not to mention all the fresh bread we had been eating) but the food was so incredible that we didn't want to miss a bite.
Next up was our first of two desserts. This first one which reminded us both of a dessert we had at Ink Well in Los Angeles was a raspberry sorbet with crumbled white chocolate and chocolate chunks underneath. Next up was a chocolate mousse with chocolate cake bites inside. Both of these were paired with a nice chilled red dessert wine. Once again, mind-blowing flavors and textures.
We arrived at dinner at 8 PM and nearly closed down the place a little before midnight when I finished some cookies and an espresso. We didn't walk out of Saturne, we glided out, with our bellies full, our bodies warmed from the wine pairings, and the streets just beginning to dry after a big rain storm while we were eating. We made the thirty-minute walk back to our hotel, walking the quiet wet streets of Paris knowing that today was as close to perfect as they come.
