Beaubourg Review - Financial District - New York - The Infatuation
"We considered having this review simply be a video of me trying to pronounce the name of this restaurant. The struggle has become a daily source of comedic relief around the Infatuation offices. As far as I'm concerned, it's Boo-borg. Sorry, I took Spanish in high school, not French. And I struggled with that language too. But on to the restaurant. Le District, the new marketplace at Brookfield Place in the Financial District, was billed as "French Eataly." Strong words, as Eataly is the gold standard by which all other indoor marketplaces will be judged. Eataly is impressive. In size, in quality, and in variety. There are so many different food and booze activities and experiences in there, you can spend an entire day there competing with your friends in some kind of hedonistic EEEEEATS Olympics. Le District is the complete opposite. It's small, it's about as compelling as the new Duane Reade "fresh produce" sections, and overall, it's remarkably unimpressive. Likewise, so is the French bistro that opened inside of it, Beaubourg. Let it be known, my inability to pronounce the name of this restaurant had zero effect on the actual review. Beaubourg did this to itself - with suspect food and horrible service. It doesn't help that the room also feels like a bad hotel restaurant. Our server at Beaubourg was one of the worst we've ever encountered: he rolled up, and the first thing he said, in a non-sarcastic, totally serious tone, was: "OK, I'm going to run through this menu, but I'm only doing it once, so pay attention." Since the menu is stupidly written in French, apparently he'd grown annoyed with people asking tons of questions. Nice goatee, by the way. He was not pleased when we asked him a couple questions about the wine, and he also didn't take well to additional questions about the menu. His response to "what's good here" was, obviously, "everything." How's the pasta? "About as good as pasta can get." Cool. Very helpful. And it wasn't just his arrogance that irked us. The whole evening was a comedy of service errors: forgotten beverages, neglected small plate and silverware requests, promised bread that never showed. The only thing he seemed to be paying attention to was the hostess, whose pants he was trying to enter all night long. The food didn't help out the situation, either. You can get better French-inspired eats at pretty much any French-inspired restaurant in NYC. Even with good service, Boo-borg would have still been pretty bad. Don't go out of your way to eat here, although we won't hate on you for coming to get drinks outside. They have a pretty excellent outdoor/patio situation with views of the Hudson. Maybe you'll have better luck than we did. Food Rundown Leeks En Vinaigrette An inedible pile of mushy leeks, which had the texture and taste of adult baby food. Not the best way to start off a meal. Duo Of Salmon and Haddock Probably our favorite dish that was placed on our table all night. A well-composed mix of flavors. Very nice. Crozet Aux Petits Lègumes AKA small French pasta nuggets with seasonal vegetables. Once again, baby food. Overly creamy, overly rich, all kinds of mushy baby food. SKIP. Frog Legs Fricassèe Frog legs are one of those foods that come out either absolutely incredible, or easily forgettable. These were the latter. They had zero flavor other than an initial char on the outside, and the globs of spaetzle they were served over was not exactly appetizing. Daurade Tagine A really, really, really bad fish entree. A watered down piece of tasteless white fish arrived in a fancy pot in a thin broth with some vegetables and zero flavor. Really disappointing. Whole Rotisserie Chicken For Two The entree meat dishes saved this review from complete Wasting Your Time & Money status. This chicken can't compete at the level of which many chicken for twos are now performing around town, but this is definitely good bird. Tournedos Rossini AKA filet mignon topped with seared foie gras. This was great, as pretty much any filet topped with foie has to be. We went big, and we were rewarded. Profiterole Legitimately the worst dessert we've ever eaten at a restaurant. The profiterole was stale and required a steak knife to cut into, while the chocolate sauce was most likely Hershey's from the bottle. It takes a lot to make us turn my back on ice cream, but that's what happened here. A bad end to a bad meal. See you never." - Andrew Steinthal
