Ben V.
Google
Chez Hortense is a real Cap Ferret tradition. We'd never been before yesterday, but the restaurant felt familiar from Rick Stein's visits on TV, as many reviews on Trip Advisor attest. Summertime presents difficulties getting to the venue with the single road from Bordeaux and endless queues of traffic, meaning that our roughly 50 km / 30-mile journey took nearly two hours, upping hunger pangs and anticipation. Thankfully, we had made our reservation for much later than the usual French "midi pile", and we were led to our table in among the throng of a restaurant packed by beautiful summery families with children, couples, and mostly French tourists, all noisily chatting away cheerfully while cracking open crustaceans, filleting fish, or sipping wine.
The service when we were seated was impeccable. A series of waiters bustled about our table taking orders, bringing food and drinks, but we were never rushed as tables turned around us. Our three-course meal took more than two hours to consume, especially with a starter order of langoustine requiring forensic attention to pry the meat from every bit of carapace.
My main course was the mussels that Chez Hortense is rightly famed for. Every time I have mussels, I lean toward the classic way of serving them - moules marinière - because every other way I've ordered in other restaurants leaves me regretting I hadn't ordered marinière again. Chez Hortense mussels are a different story. The flavour of this dish, made richer by Bayonne ham, was truly splendid. The mussels I had seemed never-ending, but it was no hardship to slowly work my way through them, with cracking chips to intersperse mouthfuls of mollusc. We went as a family group of four - mum, dad (me), son, and grandma. All of us chose different starters and main courses (except for my mother and I choosing the langoustine), and everyone was delighted by the choice they made. It was only my mum and I drinking alcohol, and the occasion and the meal demanded a bottle of Sancerre, the king of wines with fish, so that's what we had.
For dessert, again, there was a doubling up as both my son and I went for the tiramisu, which was good but not world-topping like our main courses had been. My mum had no dessert; my wife had raspberries and cream. My son and I both had espressos to finish up - then we got the bill. It didn't really come as a shock because the prices were on display, but Chez Hortense isn't inexpensive. If you were to visit and just have a main of the house mussels, drink water, and have no dessert, you could come away with a bill for less than €20, but we didn't do that. Our meal came to roughly €75 per person for the meal I've partially described. Nobody had the lobster at €50 per person or the turbot at €40 per person, so this is an expensive restaurant. Even so, as the special treat this was, it was unforgettable.
A couple of other points. The terrace of the restaurant is technically outdoors, even though it's covered and walled, so smokers will be delighted that you can smoke at the table. The second point is perhaps only pertinent for this Covid time we find ourselves in. There was no separation between tables for social distancing, so we were all packed in pretty tightly. I didn't hear anyone coughing or complaining about a lack of flavour, so perhaps we got away with our meal.
