The first of my two Michelin star meals in Paris in 24 hours. When I booked it, I didn’t intend on the wine pairing, but here I am. Oops. A delightful trio of amuse bouches, including a caesar salad in miniature and comte cheese and pepper pastry. I instantly fall in love with a sheep cheese soup, served with a single calamarata stuffed pasta of potato. An array of garden vegetables is up next, each of them pretty much the platonic ideal of their respective forms, and served with an eggplant emulsion that my waiter, doing his best with English, explained had been infused with thyme, before clarifying he meant the plant, as if he thought I thought he’d just be being poetic about time. Wild sea bass, with razor clams and broccoli, makes up the fish course, simple but effective. Absolute highlight is the duck, served in a slither of jus and lightly salted, accompanied on the same plate as a confit rose onion, and separately with a white bean cassoluet. It melts in the mouth and is so perfectly duck-flavoured. Dessert is a chestnut meringue with clementine and vanilla, and whilst I might have been hoping for something a little more… rich, I was very happy nonetheless. There was a moment I was slightly disappointed but that was entirely my fault. The “chef’s suggestion” of an extra course, an optional extra to the tasting menu. I read it as “Vosges crepes/mallard filet”. And thought ooh, yes, sounds very French, let’s have a bit of that please. It arrives, very much not what I was expecting but I roll with it. Eventually, two courses later, I read the menu properly: “Cepes”. So, mushrooms. Tracks. Not crepes with duck. Still nice! But it couldn’t bridge the gap between expectation and reality. Still. The sommelier is a weird mix of Jon Ronson and Phil Ellis, but with a typical Gallic inscrutability. They play the Twin Peaks theme twice in the space of half an hour. There are five petits fours. God I love Paris.