It was all about the lardons for us when we made our first visit last week to Court Street’s Quercy. We’d read positive things about the old-school french bistro and had been to its sister restaurant, La Luncheonette, in Manhattan years ago. Mrs. B went for the prix fixe (music to our ears), starting with a delicious onion and goat cheese pastry before moving onto a salmon dish that was a bit overcooked, the only letdown of the night. Our frisee with, you guessed it, lardons, hit the spot — light but satisfying in a way that vegetarians may never understand. We almost went for the classic cassoulet but in the end ordered the calf’s liver with onions and, yup, lardons. Delish. Like just about every dish on the menu, both our mains came accompanied by a potato gratin and string beans that even this string-bean avoider managed to eat several of. The most transcendent moment of the meal, however, came with the velvety tarte tartin that we split. It had a sensual quality verging on the pornographic, better suited, perhaps, to a first date than our several hundredth, but sublime nonetheless. With the accordion entertainment or Marni Rice still playing in the background, we polished off the last drop of our Chinon Cuvee Vieille 2004, an excellent bang for the buck.
Quercy is located at 242 Court Street, 718-243-2151.