Thank Friday it's Lunchtime, Cafe du Commerce, Forcalquier

A lot of our local restaurants have taken holidays in the post-Christmas lull, including our first choice for today's post.  Undaunted, we drove the 16km to Forcalquier in the never-ending search for lunch and settled ourselves in the sun in front of the Café du Commerce in the town's main square.

The menu du jour, for a starter, main course and dessert, was a trim €14.00 and gave us two options for our main - it's always good to have choices!  We both decided to go with the set menu and placed our orders with the waiter.  The starter was velouté du potiron (pumpkin soup), the LSH opted for the salmon for his main course and I went for the faux-filet de bouef - (faux-filet is the same cut as sirloin).

I have to confess here that I forgot to take a photo of the soup, but it looked pretty much like the soup we had at Nice Airport the day we left for our Christmas holidays - even the bowls were the same!

It tasted good, a little bit sweet, but that's pumpkin for you.

The salmon came with pasta and vegetables.  I liked the way this was presented, the veggies were thinly sliced and lightly cooked and then tossed up with the pasta, with no heavy sauce or anything.  All very light and healthy and it definitely didn't overpower the salmon.

The faux-filet was presented with chips and some salad.  Very plain, but very tasty.  I wasn't asked how I wanted my steak cooked - fortunately "rare" is what I would have said, but I know that wouldn't be to everyone's taste.

There was a good range of desserts on offer.  The LSH ordered Isles Flottant - light, fluffy meringue sitting in a pool of custard with a caramel sauce poured over it.  The waiter apologised when he served it - it was in the wrong sort of bowl!  Quelle dommage!

Thankfully the bowl did not affect the taste!

I went for the old reliable Creme caramel...

...which was yum but not all of the sugar on top was caramelised

This was our first Thank Friday It's Lunchtime lunch of 2013.  The sun shone, the food was simple, French and good, the town square was delightful - where else but France will you find a gorgeous old building like this housing the local Cinéma?

I finished lunch sipping coffee and getting arty with my photographs.

Yes, it's good to be back.

Ratings :

Food – ✮✮✮

Service – ✮✮✮✮

Ambiance – ✮✮✮✮

Value – ✮✮✮✮