Let them eat meat! La Vie En Rose raises French flag over KL restaurants

Tournedos Rossini, or classic beef tenderloin topped with pan-seared foie gras and served with a red wine and truffle sauce.

Authentic cuisine and uncompromising standards are a hallmark of this modern French restaurant in the heart of Kuala Lumpur.

You know, I could never make a ratatouille as good as my mum’s,” says Frenchman Jean-Michel Fraisse. “I knew the same recipe, I had the same ingredients, but no matter how many times I tried, it never turned out right.’’

Not one to fly the white flag, Fraisse vowed to outdo his maman Paulette. And one day, he succeeded. “I managed to make a ratatouille that she said was even better!”

Achieving the perfect ratatouille, it seems, was not as straightforward as one might expect. “You need to respect the finer points of cooking, like the type of vegetables and pot you use, the browning of the vegetables, and the temperature,” says Fraisse. “Anyone can make ratatouille but it takes heart and soul to make a good one.”

If this humble vegetable stew could bug the hell out of Fraisse, a wise-cracking, chain-smoking, empire-building 51-year-old with a smattering of businesses around KL, then one cannot help but wonder how many sleepless nights he had to endure with his restaurant La Vie En Rose.

Started by Fraisse with chef Mickael Cornutrait back in 2011, this elegant French eatery, with its airy, understated dining area, is perched on the precipice of a small hill overlooking a row of derelict art deco-style buildings and the KL Tower.

Tea smoked Petuna trout fillet, leek and saffron fondue, beetroot sauce.

House-smoked salmon-trout Petuna, lemon and chive cream, Parmesan crackers and aragula salad.

Cornutrait, the prodigiously talented 26-year-old chef from Macon, who first set foot in KL in 2010 as an intern in Fraisse’s previous restaurant Cuisine Studio, presides over the kitchen. Cornutrait, who like many French chefs picked up the love for cooking from his grandmother, impressed Fraisse with his pedigree and passion.

What’s more, the two shared a similar appreciation for honestly-prepared, great-tasting food that didn’t rely on bells and whistles to dazzle diners. As Fraisse puts it, “You can focus a lot on the aesthetics of the food but believe me, the thing people will remember when they leave your restaurant is the taste.”

Given Fraisse’s constant preoccupation with perfection, it’s no surprise that everything is made in-house as far as possible – breads, soups and stocks, and even sausages and air-dried duck. The restaurant even grows some of the herbs they need in the tiny plot of land out back – a recent landslide has destroyed the garden, but Fraisse is hoping to revive it once the slope reconstruction has been completed.

With the dashing Till Gagne as head sommelier and manager, service is as smooth as béarnaise, with staff persuasively suggesting exotic French wines, offering another bite from the lovely bread basket, and deconstructing the menu’s signature dishes.

Since Fraisse also happens to be an oenophile, the wine list, with its hundred labels sourced mainly from small, independent producers, many of whom own estates near his home in the Southwest. (Top picks include La Petite Sibérie, an award-winning vin rouge, as well as Louis De Sacy, a Champagne that once did better than Dom Pérignon in a blind taste test but is more affordably priced).

For fortified wine lovers, La Vie En Rose has one of the widest selections of Delord Armagnacs in the East, going as far back as a 1941 vintage.

Set in a house built in the 1950s, the no-frills elegance of La Vie En Rose, named after one of the greatest love songs, has made it a favourite venue for romantic proposals.

(L-R) Chef Mickael Conutrait, owner Jean-Michel Fraisse, and head sommelier and manager TIll Gagne.

Equally enchanting is the menu, which is littered with unapologetically meaty (sorry, vegetarians!) and smartly executed French classics. Vegetables are more of an afterthought here; instead, expect foie gras in all its controversial glory, from the universally-loved flame-licked foie gras to the more unusual foie gras terrine (“Stuffing a duck is no more cruel than chicken farming or the treatment of Bangladeshi workers in Malaysia,” Fraisse quips).

The latter, raw foie gras that’s cured with salt collected off the coast off Brittany, is a decadent disc of rich, buttery liver crowned with sour-sweet poached pears. The result? Pure, unadulterated bliss.

There’s also the foie gras crème brulee. This quivering mound of appetiser is topped with a crisp, lightly sugared shell that shatters satisfyingly under a spoon. Devoured with the fluffy house-made brioche, it’s light, decadent, with just a hint of foie – perfect for newbies who might find the terrine too intimidating.

The smoked salmon and Petuna trout, arranged daintily atop Parmesan wafers, makes a cracking snack, when devoured with a dab of sour cream flavoured with chives and lemon.

Next, potato-crisp slivers of Jerusalem artichokes – a traditional wartime snack in Europe – bobbed cheerfully in a glidingly smooth velouté, resulting in a crave-worthy soup that’s almost revelatory in its simplicity.

Surprisingly, portions – especially the main dishes, which came with a side of truffled mashed potatoes and petit pois – are quite generous. The duck leg confit in white beans stew sadly lacked that extra dimension of flavour, but the tea-smoked Petuna trout required only a smear of leek and saffron fondue and tangy beetroot sauce to delight.

Profiteroles with chocolate & caramel sauce, chantilly cream.

Cold strawberry soup, basil sorbet, and almond crisp.

The Tournedos Rossini, an achingly tender slab of beef that’s anointed with a slice of hot foie gras and a fragrant waterfall of sauce that’s reduced from truffles, red wine and meat, is La Vie En Rose’s indisputable showpiece.

Purportedly created for Italian composer Gioachino Rossini by the top French chefs some time in the 19th century, the dish is part of a lost generation of classics, now restyled by Cornutrait for the Malaysian hoi polloi who may or may not fully appreciate it for the simple yet sybaritic dish it is. And Fraisse has a piece of advice for them: “You don’t come here to be seen. You come here to eat.”

For traditionalists, there’s no better way to end a meal than profiteroles, traditional French pastry puffs stuffed with cream and smothered in an avalanche of hot chocolate. On the other hand, the chilled strawberry soup with its basil sorbet sparkles with unconventionality and is especially refreshing on a warm summer’s evening.

Food is a siren song of memories. And the food at La Vie En Rose contains a little bit of everything: grandeur, poignancy, spunk and pride. Even if it is just a darn ratatouille.

¦ La Vie En Rose is at 39 Jalan Raja Chulan, KL. Phone [phone].

¦ This article was originally published in Life Inspired, out every second and fourth Sunday of the month, and distributed exclusively with The Sunday Star to selected areas in the Klang Valley. The next issue will be out on April 26.