Le Bistro De Paris is has been on Denman Street for quite a few years now and became famous for all the wrong reasons-the previous owner went missing one night after closing up never to be seen or heard from again, his family searched for him but ended up selling the business and it’s under the ownership of the same person who owns the Italian place at the end of the block.

The room is bright and it definitely feels like a French bistro, at night the room is very romantic and lit with candles and low lit lanterns.  I’ve heard really good things about this place so I was looking forward to trying what they had to offer.

This post is a combination of 2 visits-one weekend brunch and one weekday lunch, they offer some nice brunch specials for $12 and some nice lunch specials for $14, on my brunch visit the room was packed on the Sunday morning that I went, it was a mix of tourists and local regulars that the servers knew by name, I was seated in promptly and snagged a window seat.

I started with a coffee, for $3 you get free refills and the servers were on top of keeping your cup full.

Every table gets a complementary bread basket, it’s a classic French baguette but the butter served with the bread is fresh outta the fridge so spreading was not happening unfortunately also the bread is room temp so it doesn’t aid in the buttering of the bread-sometimes the small things stick out to me.

For my main I really wanted to have the Quiche Lorraine but I was informed when I was seated that they had everything BUT that!, I was really looking forward to trying but I decided on this:

The Omelet Du Jour, in this case it was roasted red peppers, spinach, tomato and brie cheese.

The omelet was OK, the peppers weren’t roasted but rather sautéed with the spinach and the brie melted and was a puddle around the outside of my omelet, on the plus side the omelet was fluffy.

With every brunch plate you get a side salad in a ramekin, it’s a spring greens mix and the dressing is light and tart, I have an issue with salads in dishes like this~all the dressing collects in the bottom of the dish and makes for a wilty mess if your salad sits around, I suspect that the portions of salad are proportioned-the greens didn’t look freshly washed and then the dressing is put on as needed-kind of forgettable if you ask me.

The other item every plate comes with is a fruit skewer, the fruit was fresh and it was a nice light way to finish the meal normally-but not in my case!, I think a bit of Follow Me Foodie is getting into me and I had to see the dessert menu!

The Chocolate Mousse for $9

It was  a nice presentation but it was really boozy with Grand Mariner and the mousse had the consistency that would indicate some kind of gelatin-it was a light mousse but not creamy like I’ve had and made before, for $9 I’ve had better desserts.

This is my next visit during the week for lunch, they offer a  À la carte menu with some lunch specials for $14 that are listed on the sign outside, the one that stood out to me and what I’ve heard great things about was the Steak Friets-they also had Mussels listed on the sign-the other thing that I really wanted again was the Quiche-Iasked my server and she said “NOPE it’s only on the weekend at brunch” even tho it’s listed on the websites menu-I’ve given up on the Quiche and went with the Steak and Frites that I saw on the menu board outside.  Again I was served a basket of bread and the fresh from the fridge cold butter.

I did have a starter of French Onion Soup for $9

It was a solid French Onion soup and the crouton was the same bread served in the baskets, the broth was full bodied and the Gruyere was plentiful, the table bread came in handy after I finished the crouton that it came with.  I was a great soup and something I would order again.

This was the main attraction for me, it looked great and also smelled delish so I was looking forward to chowing down.

The side vegetable was sautéed haricoverts and a piece of grilled red pepper was forgettable and the beans were over seasoned with salt and the red pepper was there more for color I think.

The frites were delicious, they had a double fried or maybe even baked taste and texture to them-crisp on the outside and light and fluffy on the inside, they were seasoned properly and I didn’t need to add salt.

The steak was cooked to my liking-medium but I will say it was on the thin side, the pepper corn sauce was nice and not to spicy.  It was an OK dish but I will say that the soup and the frites were the best part of the meal.

There was a problem though when the bill came, I noticed I was charge overcharged for my steak and not given the $14 lunch special price that is on the menu board outside, the server got SUPER defensive saying that they didn’t carry that cut of meat used in the special and now have this cut and its À la carte price of $19, when I informed her of the sign outside I was told to pay up and that’s that!-I won’t be coming back and if you’re a tourist coming to Vancouver I wouldn’t recommend this to you or anyone I know-there’s better restaurants in the area with awesome service and accurate menu pricing.