Provençal perfect
Monrovia’s Café Massilia treats diners to classic French countryside comfort
By Andrea Edmonds 10/23/2008
While Monrovia may not be the epicurean epicenter of the San Gabriel Valley just yet, old town M-town is fast becoming a likely place for foodies of all tastes and palates to discover a veritable smorgasbord of authentic international cuisine. Case in point: French diamond-in-the-rough Café Massilia on Lemon Avenue.
Nestled on a little street in villagey downtown Monrovia, this quaint café recently celebrated its grand opening with all the hand-shaking, wine-clinking and ribbon-cutting you’d expect in a rural township in Provençal France. Owners Chris Giovannelli and Philippe Laurentz, from small villages outside of Marseilles, seem to pride themselves on this old-town culture, where food is served to every diner as if he or she were an old friend.
“Old town Monrovia reminds us of our home,” said Chris through a heavy French accent. “We aren’t city people. That’s why we love it here. Everybody knows everybody.”
While this is certainly true of Monrovia—everybody really does seem to know everybody—I’ll admit I was still a little nervous about trying a new French restaurant at first. I tend to panic when ordering, fearing that the mispronunciation of even one menu item might bring instant expulsion from the restaurant forever. But that fear was quickly squelched the first time my fiancé and friends walked into the café and were greeted by Chris, whose warm bonsoir and eclectic tattoos signaled little in the way of pretension. By the time we were all seated to fresh hot bread and a bottle of their 2006 Côtes du Rhône, Domaine Les Aulières ($24), I forgot about my poor French language skills altogether.
We started with traditionally prepared escargots in garlic butter ($12) and were pleasantly surprised by its succulence, with the nutty taste of toasted butter and lightly cooked garlic. Who knew snails could be so delectable? I had been trying my best to resist an un-ladylike urge to pick up the rest of that garlic butter and drink it when (thankfully) the boys came to my rescue by sopping up its remains with a few swipes of bread.
And what of the entrées? No artfully diminutive portions here. Just honest-to-goodness, high-quality Provençal café food sure to satisfy even the hungriest no-nonsense meat-and-potato eaters. While I kept it light by ordering their popular black mussels in white wine and shallot sauce as an entrée ($12), the boys dove into sautéed duck breast with raspberry sauce ($20), New York steak in Roquefort sauce with pommes frites ($20), and chicken breast stuffed with goat cheese and spinach topped with a light mustard sauce ($18). While my black mussels were perfectly tender, the white wine and shallot sauce, like its predecessor the escargot garlic butter, was nothing short of addictive. My pals and fiancé were kind enough to let me pick at their plates and I made sure to build a small version of their dishes on my fork—a balancing act of sauce, filling and meat.
My tour around the table revealed that Café Massilia has a real knack for sauces. The mustard sauce was surprisingly mellow and creamy, giving the already savory stuffed chicken just enough tang without being overpowering. Likewise for the Roquefort sauce, a perfectly piquant and smoky compliment to the steak and even to the stray mussel I managed to roll around in it. While I’m normally not too crazy about duck, one taste of the (not at all oily) dark meat, dripping in a mildly sweet and savory reduction of raspberry, had me singing a different tune.
A few rounds of bread later, we wiped our plates clean and still managed to save room for a little dessert.
We shared an order of profiteroles ($6) prepared in-house, paired with glasses of Muscat ($8). Yet again, more points for the dessert sauce: a decadent warm chocolate drizzle atop the ice-cream filled choux pastries.
Café Massilia boasts an intimate 32-seat dining room warmly dressed in rich red walls, candlelit tables, and vintage French movie posters hung in matted frames. I looked around and saw many couples on dates sporting blazers and snazzy dresses and a few casual folks like us, passersby from Monrovia’s Friday night street fair looking to spend their evenings relaxing with an espresso on the café’s sidewalk patio.
The restaurant serves exclusively French wine and beer along with European classics like Orangina and Limonade. With the arrival of their newest chef Tony Mollom, just recently flown in from Marseilles, they are now open every day for lunch and dinner, plus breakfast on weekends.
I asked Chris what was up with the café’s name. “Café Massilia is named for Marseilles in Roman times . . . It’s easier to pronounce for people than Marseilles too,” he laughed. It’s clear that Chris wants you to feel comfortable in his restaurant. I know I did — enough to want to come back and eat very soon.
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