Nüba, on the roof of Les Docks, Cité de la Mode et du Design, in the 13th, is a place where, a few weeks ago, in 80⁰ sunny weather, I had a wonderful meal, so reading that today it would be the same I dragged Colette and invited a favorite couple who live here, to come dejeune. Unfortunately, one of said pair had a crippling (literally) attack of gout; Colette and I were working away way past the hour we should have left; it was 70⁰ and cloudy; and the carte seemed much less interesting and plentiful than before.
For firsts our friend had marinated merlu (which I assumed would be microtomed/carpaccio-ed but was chunky) that I thought was fantastic especially with its citrus fruit sauce; Colette had (I'll admit) a somewhat blah confited portion of pork cheeks which to me was more like warm rillettes; and I had a huge plate of charcuterie, some of which I ziplocked home for dinner.
Colette chose to sit the main courses out but our friend had the pumpkin risotto that I judged OK (not being a big risotto lover outside of Modena) and I had a spectacular piece of entrecote of (I swear) veal not beef, which is just fine for me, the difference being but a few days and a bit of color or lack thereof. For wine we went again with some Walden (Pond) Languedoc, also very fine.
Any problems John - aside from the fact that Colette hated the meal and venue and our friend found it barely over mediocre? Yes. As the meal wore (and wore is the correct verb) on, the dum-dumb music got louder and louder (of course the perpetrator was wearing head-phones so he didn't care), the service - in both senses of the word, attention to the customers and prompt delivery of plates from the kitchen - got worse and worse, despite pleas from two tables of French folks and ourselves.
Our bill, with no bottled water, but 1 1/2 bottles of wine and two coffees amounted to 83.66 E.
Go back? I would in a (Jumping Jack) flash but I'd dine alone, alas!
