Afaria in the 15th: Under a New Team, Not as Exciting as the First Time Around.

5.2 Afaria, 15, rue Desnouettes in the 15th, 01.48.42.95.90 (Metro: Convention) was turned over by Julien Duboue of Comme Dans Les Landes, mais a Paris to chef Ludivine Merlin and front-room director Frederique Alonzo a while ago and sincde it's been eons since I've been this seemed as good an excuse as any to revisit.  The outside, inside and menu is pretty unchanged and the tapas only served at the common table rule still rigidly adhered to.

My friend, the second-hand high-end cooking store lady and I ordered three of the tapas and they were quite filling.  First we had the cromesquis which had a strange almost shredded wheat type exterior and were not juicy inside like those at Crom'Exquis but came with a nice salad with a tart dressing; then the chipirons served as before in a sabot but not at all crisp; and finally samoussas of shrimp which were way over-salted with a taragon cream sauce.

We had all we could do to share a dessert, in this case a tarte tatin with creme fraiche and a nice caramel beurre sale drizzle which was the highlight of the meal.

With a very nice red Loire (I thought the wines in this level place were way overpriced), no bottled water and one coffee our bill came to 68.50 E - that's after a lot of waving and calling to get the attention of the staff busily folding napkins.  In fairness our Asian waitress was supernice and superattentive at the start speaking English to us as soon as she heard us us it with each other.

Go?  Sadly I must say no; there were too many not-quite-right elements and I really think it's lost its mojo from what it was when it first opened.

Bonus: on the way home, as I exited the subway, two troops of bagpipers and drummers were coming up the street and played all the way to my doorstep.  A St Patrick's Day treat.