Hôtel-Restaurant L'Aquarelle

With six friends, all dedicated foodies, we were eager to try this Michelin starred restaurant. We are all well-traveled with a love of France. We expected the expense, the time spent sitting at the table, and even the slightly snobbish reverence of haute cuisine. We hoped to be surprised by the foods and wines and to have fun eating well while celebrating a birthday. The location is beautiful and pastoral, and a lovely table awaited us. We were seated, handed menus, and I told the serveuse that my husband could not eat wheat gluten. However, he is very flexible, and this has never been a problem. The woman was taken aback and rudely reprimanded me for not having told them when making our reservations. We were all stunned at her rudeness, especially since there were few items on the menu with any gluten issues. She said she'd see what she could do but that we were creating problems for the kitchen. We should have gotten up and left then. The service got more unfriendly and brusque from that moment on. Half of the people at our table spoke almost no French. Neither of the two servers made any attempt to convey information about the food or wine in English. We were surprised to hear at the end of dinner that our waitress was fluent in English. If you don't speak French fluently, give this place a pass. We had the Menu Dégustation and the Sommeliers wine pairing. The inventive and tasty amuse bouches were served slowly one after the other, but we weren't served a glass of wine until the fourth one arrived, and I finally asked for a glass. The veal roast was nearly inedible, tough and impossible to cut or chew. The lotte (monkfish) was nearly raw, but surprisingly tough, though the delicate green beans and succulent eggplant were wonderful. The wines were uneven, and even accounting for varying tastes, we all agreed that only two of the six were very interesting. Dessert was a different story - stunningly presented and tasty but absolute overkill. These were the only items where gluten could have been an issue, but none of us needed or wanted three dessert courses Overall, it was an unbalanced meal served with undeserved disdain. After all the rave reviews we'd read, maybe we set our expectations too high, but all six of us were disappointed and would not recommend L'Aquarelle. It does not merit it’s Michelin star.

Eight of us visited after being highly recommended by friends so expectations high. (Maybe too high). On arrival very friendly greeting by young lady who I think owned the restaurant. Table well placed with lovely view over the Poitou Charentes countryside. All very impressive so far. One of our party choose a white wine and a red Chinon wine. The white was fine but after tasting the red he said it tasted awful and got four others to give their view. All said it was terrible. On the wine list it was advertised as a 2012 but was in fact a 2014. When queried with the wine waiter he said what did we expect with such a young wine and the 2012 date on the wine list was a typo. He was incredibly rude and made us feel we did not know what we were talking about. We choose another bottle which at €50 was very mediocre.|The meal itself was well presented and creative and certainly not something one would prepare at home. Personally the meal was so so but others in our group liked it.||When presented with the bill, there was no apology over the wine and they charged us €40 for it despite us sending it back.||One of the couples who are extremely well travelled and eat in Michelin restaurants around the world would have taken the Michelin star back for such an unfriendly attitude.||What a shame a special occasion ruined by this attitude and the wine should never have been listed with so many great wines in France.||||||||||||||||||||

The small modern bedrooms are very well equipped with modern fittings, an excellent shower and plenty of hot water, warm towels and a good practical lay-out. The rooms are in very close proximity to both the car parking and the restaurant, the latter has a spectacular view over the Charente countryside and the service is excellent and attentive. Non-French speakers will find plenty of explanations available in English from the staff. The food is spectacular, original, beautifully presented and extremely well cooked. The flavours of the dishes we chose could not be bettered - Lotte Rotie and Carre d'Agneau, each enhanced with out of the ordinary sauces - the lamb dish||heightened with grindings of a special pepper.

This was our third visit to this wonderful restaurant. As always the hostess Aurélie was a delight and made us feel very welcome in spite of our very limited French. All of the staff were attentive, friendly and polite and not in the least bit stuffy - and even apologised for their poor English when it should be us apologising for the lack of French speaking ability!||||The restaurant is stylish, modern and crisp with stunning views from the floor to ceiling windows.||||Now onto the main event - the food. As before we had the degustation menu, where Xavier Taffart shows just how he earned his Michelin star. It was only a couple of months since our last visit and fully expected a repeat of the previous meal, which we thoroughly enjoyed and would have happily eaten again, but no this was a brand new menu designed for us! ||||I am not going to go through each course as this would spoil your surprise, but there were 6 courses, plus pre deserts, amuse bouche, and petit fours and at 75 euros this is an absolute bargain for the quality and variety of food provided. Each course was perfectly presented and I have run out of adjectives to describe how good the food is. I have said before that I do not understand the michelin ratings as this place deserves much more than one star. We used to travel to ||Christopher Coutanceau in La Rochelle - we don't anymore!||||If you want a fantastic meal - please don't miss L'Aquarelle.

I met an old friend who was staying at the hotel for dinner. I had a high expectation. It was very good food and pleasant surroundings. For me the experience lacked the wow factor.

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Perfect !

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