Breizh is Bretagne for Brittany

One of the reasons we are in Brittany is because of our experience at Breizh Cafe in Paris a few years back. We ate buckwheat crepes and fell in love with them. Since the restaurant has outposts in Paris, Tokyo and Cancale, we decided to pay them a visit on this trip in the homeland.

Bretagne has its own culture and language. At one point it was culturally a close to England. It's French name, Grand Bretagne, makes this clear. The Arthurian legends come from Bretagne lays or poems. So Breizh--roughly pronounced "brights"--is how you say the region's name in its own language.

First off the bat, we drove close to Mont St. Michel. Neither Ira nor I wanted to visit as there's just too many people there, but we wanted to eyeball it and that we did, both from the main parking area and from the road as we drove to Cancale. It's wonderful just as shape and sculpture.

We drove the small roads to our lunch spot, with Ira navigating, through lush countryside filed with small villages and cows and crops. There was some type of cabbage or kale that was planted in great quantities. 

We missed the first turnoff for the Port de Cancale, which is what we wanted, and drive through the center of town, typically Breton with narrow streets and winding routes. We quickly reoriented and made our way down to the bay's edge. It was low tide, so the first surprise was to see all of the boats sitting in mud. At high tide, they all rise with the seawater, a cycle that repeats itself every six hours or so.

We found Breizh Cafe more by luch than anything else, it was raining at the time and Ira and I only brought one umbrella, so to come unawares into our destination was a pleasant surprise.

Our waiter was a mutt. We chatted with him once the lunch rush wound down (and he dealt with an emergency call to their telecommunications register system, which was down). His mother was Irish, his father half French from Indochina and half black from Africa. He spoke both English and French at home and had an accent in both. He was charming... But we're not here to talk about people...

We started with a round dozen of local oysters, full of their salty liquor, and so tender in hue he tongue.

The buckwheat crepe or galette (ble de noir) is savory and altogether amazing. It's edges crisp and almost trellised, the center soaking up the contents, in my case onions and ham and egg and for Ira, ham, egg and mushrooms. I must learn how to make these. It'll be a winter project.

Ira and I split the chocolate crepe for dessert, a decision that Ira regretted and brought up over the course of the afternoon as we wended our way back home, along the Emerald Coast. We stopped at Pointe du Grouin, where the color of the water was so amazingly green. Not in the photos of course, as the sun hid whenever I got out of the car! Trust me it was magnificent, and we'll be along the coast a bit further west tomorrow, so maybe I'll catch it in pixels then.

Driving through St. Malo, both Ira and I loved the industrial port area. It looked designed and chic in great and yellow with futuristic cranes and groupings of building that had their own mass and symmetry.

Then, we plunged in country and drove along the western edge of the Rance, capturing views of boats, cornfields, cows and lush looking villages. There's plenty if money in Breizh!

Dinner was in Lanvallay, at l'Atelier Gourmand, a quaint little restaurant in a timbered old building right next to the water. Our welcome was warm and to room cozy. We sat next to Italians, and French people filled the tiny room. We shared an appetizer after our big lunch, a baked Camembert topped with pepper and sesame seeds. We also shared a small bottle of muscadet, though I drank most of it. Ira had the moules marinieres with frites. They were plump and tender and numerous. (I helped.) I had brochettes de lotte, that wonderful monkfish I had yesterday, this time on a bed of spinach and leeks. Lot is my new favorite fish. 

We didn't share desert this time. Ira had a pave de chocolate, which is a big slab of chocolate cake, dense and dark and rich. He loved the small bunch of groseilles blanches that came as counterpoint to the richness of the chocolate. These are grapes somewhere between gooseberries and currents, tart and flavorful.

My dessert was a croquant gourmand au caramel au beurre sale de Madison, which turned out to be a tower of alternating shortbread and vanilla ice cream swimming in the most luxurious pool of caramel you can imagine. The hot, sharp espresso I had to end my meal was like a necessary medicine to all that deep sugar. We strolled home almost at a toddle, even a totter, after all that food, all those tastes!