La Flotte - Ile de Ré, France

So, as promised some more piccies and recommendations from our little trip to beautiful  Ile de Ré.  Next up was a trip to La Flotte.

A quaint harbour village, much smaller and quieter than St Martin but with all the charm (and another branch of La Martiniere if you're craving another hit of their delicious ice cream).


After a couple of drinks by the harbour (amazing people watching), we headed to Le Richelieu for dinner.  We'd booked a table in advance and were extremely pleased to get a front row seat, with fabulous panoramic sea views.


It's quite an old fashioned venue, with dark red carpets and waiters in dicky bows.  We went for the 'menu gastronomique' - six courses, including lobster and cheese for 65 euros. 


An amuse bouche of refreshing cucumber gazpacho was perfect for a warm summer evening.  Sauteed seafood in broth was extremely tasty but not particularly imaginative.  The lobster course was much more interesting: lobster three ways - in filo pastry (a sort of lobster spring roll!), tartare and consomme.  This was thoroughly enjoyable.  Unfortunately, the main course was decidedly average and even less enjoyable as we ended up waiting an inordinately long time for it to arrive.  


Cheese and puds were definitely the highlights of the meal.  We were spoilt for choice with the cheese selection and thoroughly enjoyed our choices (afraid I don't know what they were called though!).  


Desserts were pretty as a picture.  We particularly enjoyed the lemon meringue pie, which came with a little pipette of raspberry coulis - a fun touch.  


Petit fours were fantastic, although the staff were clearly ready to get rid of us at this point as they arrived as  our desserts were cleared.  With the bill.


It's hard to say if I would go back to Le Richelieu on another visit.  Whilst the view and some of the courses were exceptional, the service and some of the food detracted from the overall experience.  I'd probably have to try some more of the island's offerings before I could make a judgement... oh what a hardship that would be!

La Flotte

I think I would like to live here

There are beautiful wild flowers all over the island

Le Richelieu restaurant

Lobster three ways

d.i.y pud - love it

Beautiful petit fours

Saint Martin de Ré - Ile de Ré, France

I just spent a fab few days with my sis on the Ile de Ré in France.  Needless to say we ate and drank extremely well and thought I'd share some of my foodie finds with you.

 Ile de Ré has a number of small towns and villages on it, including the main town of Saint Martin.  The favoured way to get around the island is by bike but, as the weather was a bit dodgy, we took the bus.

We soon came across the La Martiniere ice cream stand on the harbour front.  They sell over 50 flavours of ice cream and sorbet, with flavours ranging from the pedestrian to the downright bizarre.  We were actually brave enough to try the oyster and caviar flavour, which was surprisingly good - creamy and salty.

Whilst wandering the narrow shop-lined streets that lead up from the harbour we came across L'Atelier, which it turned out also belonged to La Martiniere.  L'Atelier sold some of the most beautiful little cakes I've ever seen - including the sushi cake below.  We sampled some of the macaron glaces (ice cream filled macarons).  The caramel fleur de sel, was particularly outstanding.

As far as I can tell, the only other La Martiniere outlet is in La Flotte, a smaller town on the island.  I want to go back to Ile de Re for a number of reasons, not least of which is those ice cream macarons!

The harbour

Over 50 flavours... where to start?!

Puts Greggs to shame...

One of each please

Ice cream filled macarons

The sushi cakes were my fave