The Place
Take a stroll along the Pearl River on Ersha Island and you will come across Le oui, a French cuisine newcomer to Guangzhou’s fine-dining scene. Before going in, stop and look. The restaurant’s front lawn, which sits beside the Guangdong Museum of Art, greets diners with a tableau of creative art installations.
Inside, it’s classic haute cuisine. French imperial chairs, crisp white tablecloths and glittering tableware all contribute to a sense of elegance. Glass-walled and boasting a river view, this refined bistro seems to bring the outside in, with an abundance of green leafy houseplants that add life to the dining room. There’s also a bar and wine cellar that boast an impressive list of vintages.
The Food
Here at Le oui, a la carte is not an option and visitors should expect to pay dearly for the premium chic. Customers receive a neatly printed wine list and menu detailing the four set meals on offer. Prices for the multi-course arrangements range from RMB398-998, rivaling those of luxury hotel restaurants. On the day of our visit, a half-off promotion caught us by surprise. But how was the food?
From the two sets we sampled, it was clear that the ingredients Le oui chooses are faultless in both freshness and taste. This much was evident in dishes like the scallop with caviar, an efficiently refreshing appetizer presented like an exotic floral bloom, and the shrimp salad with orange, which delivers a marvelously edgy flavor, arriving frosted with a topping of tiny orange locules (the minute sacs that make up the fruit’s juicy flesh). In an added treat for the eyes, the two dishes come with a side of mystique, flirting with diners through a haze of dry ice.
Another standout is the chowder with bread, a creamy soup flavored with bits of bacon, ham and nuts, and coupled with a crispy cuttlefish biscuit.
As for mains, the sous-vide short ribs with foie gras sauce as well as the lamb chop with black pepper sauce, were both precisely cooked and lushly seasoned. The fried octopus with prickly ash, however, is a run-of-the-mill extra. Nonetheless, we found the colorful dessert, jujube mousse and ice cream, to make for a playfully satisfying finish.
The Vibe
Le oui strikes us as a romantic, sophisticated venue. With Xinghai Concert Hall and the city’s premier art museum in its immediate vicinity, the place is a seamless addition to a neighborhood where ritz, prestige and high culture are already calling cards. And yes, the dining room is elegant and the food is top-notch, but whether it is worth your hard-earned money is a question worth considering.
Price: RMB400-1,000
Who’s going: affluent ‘islanders’, curious concert-goers
Good for: expensive dates
Nearest metro: Wuyangcun, 30-40 minutes; so take a taxi.
Open daily, 10am-10pm; see listing for Le oui.
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