Monmartre Brasserie in Haringey

Such an amazing experience, well done! I craved for a good stew today( probably the weather) and found this lovely little place on google with pretty good reviews about meaty dishes so went to try. Unexpectedly good service and the stew was just like my grandma used to make it, rich and flavourful. After my 1st visit it seems like this place going to be where I treat myself with something made for my heart and soul

Kaan is a gem. Wonderful, attentive service and plates piled high with gorgeous food. Very tasty. Honoured my Tastecard discount even though they have withdrawn from the programme.

Thanks to scriptwriters Julius and Philip Epstein, the movie 'Casablanca' is chock full with many outstanding lines of dialogue, the best of which, below, does not just raise a laugh, it manages to sum up the human experience, in a superbly understated way: CAPTAIN RENAULT: "And what in Heaven's name brought you to Casablanca?" RICK: "My health. I came to Casablanca for the waters," RENAULT: "Waters? What waters? We are in the desert" RICK: "I was misinformed" And there we have it. Over time, little by little, parents, schools, governments, employers, and life itself does not overtly lie to us: we just become misinformed, and the acts of misinformation affect our optimisms and cause us to readjust ourselves, again, little by little, to a more cynical world view. 'Casablanca' flashes back to Paris and a time when Rick and indeed the world was less cynical and less knowing, in much the same way I was prior to eating dinner at Montmartre Brasserie. Consider the name. It's great isn't it? Few word pairings could conjure up visions of Parisian restaurants so well. It looks great too. Nice art on the walls, brasserie style menu featuring l'escargots and steak frites, French wine on the menu. 130 Crouch Hill is a top location; a corner plot slightly up the hill leading out from Crouch End and directly opposite the music studios. Remember 'Knockin' On Dave's Door', the story of Bob Dylan's visit to Crouch End? Well the shot of Dylan standing on front of the church like building could have been taken from the front of Montmartre Brasserie. There is a huge glass area which allows one to look out to an antiques shop as well. All good, and I should add that the location has always been popular for brunches: 'Montmartre' does a roaring trade during the day, as did its predecessor 'The Blue Legume'. However the evening menu is different, I was here for my snails and steak frites with friends, and being a little early I asked for 'une pression'. The member of staff didn't quite get what I was saying, but was really amiable and explained that they had citron presse, but no beer on tap. Never mind. No small scale French beers either, which sort of brought things down a bit, but they had Stella Artois, San Miguel and two versions of Efes. I chose the bottled draught version, which with it's metallic twang was sort of authentic, but not great. No bread was on the table. Friends arrived and we ordered: mains of steak frites for two of us, a salmon affair for another, beouf bourguignon for a fourth, we wanted to go French although there wasn't a particularly French theme to the food on the evening menu. No sides of vegetables were mentioned on the menu but we were told that they had spinach but no french beans. Service was good: as I mentioned, I liked our server, but my growing doubts about the authenticity were magnified when they told me that l'escargots, with or without garlic parsley butter, were unavailable. This to me was like the Monty Python cheese shop declaring that they were all out of Cheddar, or any other cheeses. To be fair they did have frogs' legs on the menu but I didn't fancy them in Calvados and cream as advertised. I do wonder if they had them at all because, I was offered a meze as an alternative and, how can I put this, I don't think that the current management or staff were in tune with the French manuscript. I don't mean cheap cliches either: Crouch End has two brilliant French restaurants, 'Bistro Aix' and 'Les Associes' since you (don't) ask, both of which do what they do well without having to try. 'Montmartre Brasserie', despite that great name, was starting to resemble a generic mediterranean place, and not a good one at that. The music was a sickly, tacky light '80's / '90's selection and did nothing for the ambience, and also it must be said that it was really cold inside. I mean, I can't stand stuffiness and overheated restaurants, but this was 'keep your coats on' cold, which did not aid relaxation. Never mind eh? From a limited and unvintaged wine list we had chosen a drinkable Rhone that at 28 pounds was in line with industry standard 300% mark up, and the starters were not too bad. I have no idea why my tower of roasted vegetables contained haloumi, and if olive oil was involved it was of the lowest grade, but the balsamic dressing was good and there was a lovely mound of fresh rocket to accompany. Whitebait was perfectly fine, as was the accompanying tartar sauce, although the small salad with it was somewhat limp, and the one mussel I sampled tasted far from fresh and was overcooked. Stuffed mushrooms were declared "fine, neither good nor bad". Would the steaks salvage things? Well, they were cooked as requested and were ribeye for sure. They had most probably been frozen, and they had been either sliced thinly or flattened, which with ribeye is quite a good idea because it helps the fat to render. The chips were sadly nothing like classic frites, but like most of our food could be described as 'OK'. Nothing was adequately seasoned. What wasn't OK was the fact that not one of our four plates was heated. Yes, the Diane sauce was hot, and steak should be rested, but the cold restaurant conspired with the cold plates to render a lot of the food tepid. The atmosphere, such as it was, also turned down a notch when my favoured staff member left, to be replaced by someone else, possibly a manager. This was at 9pm and we were the only diners in the place. My fellow diners are polite non-foodies, but when said person asked how our meals were, it was murmurs all around. Still, time for desserts. A Tarte Tatin? Maybe a nice flan? How about a creme brulee? Nope, just an uninspiring, daytime range of cakes, on a badly spelled menu. Non, merci. Similarly the coffees didn't convince. One was described as a 'Late', which perhaps was a message to us that as far as they were concerned, things were getting that way. And there's the rub: the initial vision of 'Montmartre Brasserie' may well have been a Parisian dinner venue, but it just doesn't cut it. It's a great location, and despite the too small tables I shall continue to go during the day. Maybe they didn't have the first choice chef, maybe it will improve during the summer, but they should note that Crouch End already has a very good generic mediterranean venue down the road, called Melange. Good points? The decently sized spinach was good, but underseasoned like everything else, and if fact all the portions were not mean. We requested a dessert wine but the server didn't really have anything on offer, but perhaps sensing the growing disappointment offered us a free after dinner drink. Brandy? Cognac? Absinthe? Grand Marnier? No, Ameretto with cube of ice just in case we needed to cool down further. So, and with regret, as I rate 'Monmartre Brasserie', I have to say that underlying everything is a distinct lack of personality, of direction. No signature dish, no knowledge, no backstory, no living up to that great name. Please remember that I am reviewing the evening experience: I'm sure that many dishes and those cakes work well before 4pm even if the ghastly music doesn't. But for dinner, as a restaurant no. I was misinformed.