Forest Edge Road, Nomansland, Nr. Salisbury  Tel: 01794 390205

Visited August 2002

This was a very special lunch!  All 4 ladies, a reunion of sorts!  We needed an excuse to justify treating ourselves to a visit to Les Mirabelles.  It lived up to it's excellent reputation of serving traditional French Cuisine.

It is a very pretty little restaurant and as it was such a beautiful day we were able to sit outside in the shade.  (Yes, amazingly it was so hot we needed the shade!).  A lovely casual setting for lunch looking at the village green and the forest.  I felt the interior would be more suited to evening dining.  It was not busy, but sure it is at night, and booking is advisable.

We all ordered Gin & Tonics and this was the only moan of the day, a restaurant of this calibre should have served the gin over plenty of ice and with an individual Schweppes Tonic so you could decide for yourself how much tonic you wanted.  They had obviously used a "squirt" tonic, all glasses filled to the same level, and we only had about 2 cubes each!  This was not good enough for such G&T experts as ourselves.

Everything we ordered was a success!  I will list our choices in English, I didn't have time to write them down in French!  Our starters, King Prawn & Avocado salad, Tomato Tart (wonderfully light pastry), Smoked Chicken Salad, and fabulous Scallops in Pastry, yummy!  Our main courses....Veal with Mushrooms, so tender, excellent Confit de Canard, Brill with Horseradish and Cucumber Sauce and Fresh Lobster Salad.  Ashamed to say we all had puddings, Soufflé with Morello Cherries, Crème Brule, Fresh Strawberries in a Cornet served with a light Custard and my favourite, Pancake Stuffed with Mirabelles (plums), absolutely delicious!  In fact everything both tasted and looked wonderful!  My mouth is watering remembering it all.

Apart from the gins we had a bottle of Viognier and the two lucky non drivers had a glass of Laupiac with their puds.  We also had coffees.

Our waiter was very attentive, the charming Monsieur Nicolas Hawadier, I promised I would mention him, and we were amused to see the chef leave on his Harley Davidson!  The poor owner only had a push bike but I don't think he had as far to go!  You can tell that  we were the last to leave!

Definitely hope to visit again but it will be for a special occasion as the

COST    £ £ £ £ £ £ £ £

YUMMY FACTOR   Definitely 9/10 & a  

REPORT   C.J.