Unadulterated French Cuisine : The Upstairs Cafe a Step Toward Authenticity

Dining in La Jolla became a touch more complicated recently with the opening of The Upstairs Cafe at the Cove, which is just a few blocks from the venerable Top ‘O the Cove and the well-regarded George’s at the Cove.

The Upstairs Cafe occupies the multilevel premises that formerly housed Le Papillon and, during daylight hours, offers as good a view of the cove as any of its competitors. More to the point, it offers an attractive menu of French dishes prepared the French way. For the moment, the dishes reflect the true French taste, unadulterated by American preferences in seasoning.

The fact that Upstairs prepares dishes the French way is an important one. Although a rose may be a rose, duck a l’orange, generally speaking, is not duck a l’orange ; the dish will taste different in Paris, Tijuana and San Diego (not to mention Beijing) because cooks in each locale usually modify the seasonings to suit the local flavor range.

For example, when a French recipe specifies lemon, a Mexican chef often will substitute lime, and may add a dash or two of pepper sauce to give his clients the expected zip. In the same vein, cooks newly arrived from the Eastern Seaboard often express amazement at the amount of garlic San Diegans expect in such dishes as the locally beloved “shrimp scampi.”

A Sunny Menu

A pair of French-born couples operate Upstairs and share in the cooking and serving duties. One of the partners, Christian Moreau, enjoys primary responsibility for a menu that might best be described as sunny .

Moreau previously owned three restaurants in Guadeloupe, the pair of Caribbean islands that are a French overseas department. The sunshine of Guadeloupe expresses itself in the bright flavors found in Upstairs’ cooking; many dishes rely on garlic, lemon and an abundance of the herbs favored in Provence, another area celebrated for the strength of the local sun. That these flavors should be translated to sunny San Diego seems appropriate.

The differences show less in the selection of dishes than in the preparation. The appetizer list, for example, consists primarily of salads, and the menu also nods to contemporary American bistro practices by offering numerous pastas and pizzas. The brief entree list includes the expected lamb, duck, beef, chicken and fish.

Each dish includes its own little surprise, though. The appetizer of snails baked in puff pastry may sound familiar, but it features a tarragon sauce, certainly a novelty with snails in these parts. And that sauce includes plenty of tarragon--as in Provence, fresh herbs are used by the handful, and the result is utterly delicious. Slices of marinated fresh salmon are paired with avocado and sweet onions; shallots and walnuts decorate a salad of spinach and Roquefort cheese, and a lively, much-herbed dressing of chopped fresh tomatoes finishes a tartare of pounded raw tuna and salmon.

A particularly nice, simple starter is the saute of eggplant topped with Gruyere cheese and fresh tomato sauce. This is similar to the Italian eggplant parmigiana, but by no means identical.

Lobster Bisque Hailed

Only the French would sauce a soup. Upstairs offers an outstanding version of lobster bisque, which has become a tired cliche of modern menus and generally is made from a commercial base. Moreau makes this soup the old-fashioned way (he actually uses lobster), and serves a remarkably well-textured and deeply flavored bisque, which the diner can enhance by first dipping his spoon in garlic mayonnaise and grated Parmesan. Without these additions, the soup is merely delicious, but with them, a bit of Provencal sun seems to glow within the bowl. It’s a neat trick, altogether.

The menu might do better to use the French term pates (literally “pastes,” and not the same as pate, which is “pasty”) rather than pasta, because these dishes take a decidedly French approach. The one that comes closest to the Italian style is the fettuccine with basil cream; the others consist of well-sauced sautes sided with fettuccine in a bit of the same sauce. Choices include shark in green peppercorn sauce and sliced veal tenderloin with leeks; the braised sweetbreads in a creamy sauce flavored with a wealth of herbs and garlic is quite delicious, and in this case the relatively bland pasta serves to tone down the highly seasoned meat.

The pizzas begin with a wonderfully thin, crisp crust and range in toppings from shellfish with mozzarella cheese to mixed vegetables and a pseudo-Neapolitan version that includes olives, anchovies and eggplant. The “pizza Provence” is especially attractive thanks to a subtly tangy topping of creamy goat cheese seasoned with thyme, garlic and onions. Just as Upstairs sauces soups, it sauces pizza, in the form of pili-pili , or olive oil infused with Provencal herbs and pink peppercorns. One pours as much or as little as one likes over a portion of pizza, and it really does bring the flavors alive. It is instructive and amusing to perform a before-and-after test by first tasting the pizza plain, and then anointed with pili-pili .

Another Bright Preparation

The entree that most precisely reflects Moreau’s sojourn in Guadeloupe is the vivanneau sauce Creole, or poached red snapper buried beneath a lemony saute of fresh tomatoes, onions and chives. (The term Creole, in French culinary parlance, reflects a style somewhat related to the Creole cooking that developed in New Orleans. The differences are major, though, and don’t expect this dish to taste as if it were born on Bourbon Street.) This is another preparation that seems to bring bright sunshine into the room.

The sauteed filet of beef in Roquefort sauce takes a more quiet and restrained tone than the overall menu, and is a good dish for those who like steak; Moreau uses a good grade of beef, cuts it generously and cooks it well.

The dish mentioned by several servers as the specialty of the house is the boned, sauteed duck breast served with lightly caramelized apples in a teasingly sharp cider sauce. The dish combines tradition with contemporary French cooking precepts, and works quite well. Among other entree choices are salmon in red caviar sauce; lobster medallions in saffron sauce, and lamb noisettes, stuffed with herbs and garlic and finished with a mustard sauce.

Upstairs does a good job with plate garnishes. All entrees include a wreath of fresh, gently cooked vegetables arranged around a square of creamy potatoes baked in the gratin dauphinoise style.

The dessert list shows little imagination. The profiteroles au chocolat , or pastry puffs stuffed with vanilla ice cream and doused with chocolate sauce, are familiar but good, a comment that applies equally to the lemon Bavarian cream. Skip the chocolate mousse.

Upstairs fits the modern pattern with its price schedule; like many restaurants, guests have a great deal of control over how much they spend. A couple that orders a pasta dish and a glass of wine each will spend about $30, including tax and tip; a pair of entrees with a shared appetizer, dessert and a bottle of wine can boost the bill closer to $90. Given the casual ambiance, this last figure may seem high to those who expect a certain degree of formality and old-fashioned restaurant grandeur when dining out.

THE UPSTAIRS CAFE AT THE COVE

8008 Girard Ave., La Jolla

454-8884

Lunch and dinner daily.

Credit cards accepted.