On the advice of our friends Spoons and Kathy, we took a little trip to Strasbourg today and had lunch at La Cloche à Fromage (“The Cheese Bell”), a cheese-oriented restaurant that’s only a few blocks from the gigantic cathedral in the heart of Strasbourg.
As soon as you enter, you are struck by a strong whiff of delectable fermentation, not unlike the cheese store in Saarbruecken (although considerably more pleasant). There’s a huge cheese case near the entrance, and the cheeses appeared to be in beautiful condition. The restaurant has a cozy, slightly rustic feel, and the menu is quite diverse. This is not your typical French brasserie with all the expected stuff. A number of the dishes involve various cheeses in unusual combinations with various meats. There are the expected fondues and raclettes, but they are available in more variations than one might expect. (I would seriously consider returning and getting the fondue made with Époisses de Bourgogne, one of the greatest of all cheeses!) Finally, there are also a number of cheese plates available, and frankly I have no idea what the differences were between them. Usually I can make some sense of a French menu, but the descriptions of the different cheese plates were Greek to me.
Anyway, we ended up ordering off the special 3-course fixed-price menu, which is actually a very good deal. For about 24 euros (I believe), you get an appetizer, main and dessert. (In several cases, the mains on the regular menu were roughly 24 euros, so getting the other 2 courses for free is an excellent deal!)
For appetizers, the choices included a salad, a cheese-profiterole dish of some sort (that no one ordered), and a really unusual dish consisting of Muenster (the real stuff) melted over potatoes and dusted with cumin (!), paired with a little shot glass of beet cappuccino! WTF! Strongly approving of such unorthodox fare, I of course had to order that last one, and was not disappointed. Aside from the unfortunate problem that the potatoes were only lukewarm by the time I received them, the flavor combination of Muenster and cumin was very nice, and it paired beautifully with the little beet cappuccino (which was basically like beet-flavored whipped cream). I give this dish a B+. If it had been served at the proper temperature, I would rate it A-.
For mains, there was either a cheese plate or a fondue-like dish with melted Vacherin and various things to dip in it. (There was a third option, but I forget what it was.) One of my dining companions ordered the Vacherin dish, which was quite nice, but one-note. I was very happy that I ordered the cheese plate, which came with small servings of 10 different cheeses, covering a wide range of different cheese types. While none of them was wildly outside the bounds of my cheese-eating experience, they were all great, and I was only on a first-name basis with about half of them. (Well, it’s possible I knew more of them, but the waiter explained what they were in French, and I could only parse the names of half of them.)
For dessert, the options were: roasted fresh figs with lavender honey and ice cream, a chestnut trifle, and creme brulee. My dining companion ordered the chestnut trifle, which had a lovely, subtle flavor. I ordered the figs, and was quite pleased, although it seems impossible for roasted figs and honey not to taste good.
The wine list was not huge, but seemed reasonable. We ordered a carafe of some Alsatian Pinot Gris, which was sweet but not cloyingly so. I love the golden color and texture of Pinot Gris, and it paired quite well with all the unctuous cheese.
On the downside, Rose didn’t feel like ordering a cheese extravaganza, and instead got a simple mesclun salad and some cheesy potato pancakes. The potato pancakes turned out not to be super-cheesy, but actually tasted a lot like latkes. They were fine, but nothing special. That said, the restaurant cannot be blamed for not having enough vegetarian options. A significant part of the menu was either vegetarian or could be easily made vegetarian, and my 3-course meal was entirely vegetarian.
In short, La Cloche à Fromage is definitely worth at least a day trip to Strasbourg. Be sure to call ahead earlier in the week to make a reservation. There were no empty tables at lunch, and in fact the first time we visited Strasbourg we tried to get into this place for lunch without a reservation and failed.
Price Range: Moderate (20-40 EUR)
Rating: A-
