Yes, it probably was too soon. We’ve always preferred to give restaurants some time to settle into a routine before we review them. But once in a while, rules are made to be broken and about three weeks after it opened, we visited Franco.
Just across the street from the north side of Soulard Market, Franco is situated in the old baby carriage factory which has been turned into apartments. Its high ceiling is partly concealed with blonde wood that resembled pieces of a giant woven basket, the color a particularly good idea in what was, inevitably, a dark and previously cavernous space. With the ceiling lowered and the room divided by the bar, whose handsome reverse side turns out to be wine storage, things become cozier.
The chef leading things in a French-American direction (thus the name Franco, and no jokes, please, about Spaghetti-o’s) is Justin Keimon, a guy who has proven at several St. Louis restaurants that he knows his way around the stove. The menu changes daily, depending on what he’s been working on lately. That means that while pommes frites are a staple, yesterday’s chicken and dumplings may well have morphed into chicken etoufee—which is served over basmati rice, by the way.
The menu isn’t quite the usual arrangement. Small plates, salads and soups start things off. Then there are large bowls, entrees and extras, as well as desserts. Don’t sweat the difference between large bowls and entrees, but if you’re planning on stopping in the bar or having a pre-dinner drink at the table, consider the category marked extras. At this writing, they include marinated olives, white anchovies and pickled vegetables. The pickles are house-made, and include beside the expected cucumbers, mellow mushrooms and some extremely zingy pickled radishes that almost reach the level of kimchee, the fiery fermented pickles of Korea. We loved them.
Like us, Keimon likes sweetbreads. We tried them breaded and deep-fried over toast with a drizzle of a balsamic reduction, and were glad we did. Amazingly, the frying process didn’t overwhelm their delicacy. We’ve gotten several questions about frog legs over the past few months, and here’s another restaurant serving them. Keimon sautes them with plenty of garlic and shallots, a few capers and maybe just a whisper of Pernod. They arrive almost too tender; thank goodness they’re considered finger food. Pulled pork shoulder isn’t barbecued, just braised to fall-apart-ness and spooned with its juices over a biscuit, sort of a piggy shortcake, very tasty. Speaking of biscuits, they appear in the bread basket along with a house-made French-ish country loaf.
It was hard to pass up a seafood stew, given the chef’s ability at the now-defunct R. L. Steamer’s, and there was walleye and swordfish, among other fish choices. But we headed for red meat. A wood-grilled bistro steak was tenderloin, the "lager mop" on the outside of the meat having some Asian spicing. The steak was juicy and tender, and it surely must have been happy with its garnish of a kebab of grilled vegetables, a handsome touch. The frites that came alongside left Keimon muttering about an aberrant batch of potatoes that hadn’t aged enough; from an eater’s standpoint, they seemed slightly sweet and not quite as crisp as their deep golden color might lead us to believe. (We won’t go into the chemistry of the changes in carbohydrates, but he’s not imagining things.) A lamb shank lolled atop a mound of creamy risotto flavored with shallots. Sauced with rosemary-laced pan juices, the lamb didn’t require a knife at all. Some might argue with the doneness of the risotto, since it was the classical al dente, rather than the perfectly- soft-all-the-way-through that some prefer, but it certainly rose above just rice with a sauce that we still encounter too often. The bonus was the vegetable side, small chunks of carrot and turnip, roasted until toasty at the edges, the natural sugar caramelizing happily. We’ve become more and more enamored of the old workhorse vegetables and how they can be reintroduced in tasty new ways, and this was a good example.
This may be the only restaurant in town that offers both a wine list and root beer floats. Yup, there it is, topping the dessert list. There are some fairly traditional offerings, like ice cream or a housemade assortment of cookies, but a few choices off the beaten track lure the adventurous. We tried the caramel apple, which was slices of roasted apple topped with a scoop of green apple sorbet with that real Granny Smith taste, and cajeta, which is caramel made with goats’ milk, slightly tangier than the cows’ milk version and a worthwhile choice. And a pecan-bourbon pie was certainly made for adults, the warm little tart with lots of bourbon, an excellent crust and some first-rate caramel ice cream. Next visit, we’ll investigate what the house terms molten coco, which we’re told is very thick hot chocolate, served with cinnamon-sugar donuts, obviously a take on the fabled Hispanic treat of chocolate and churros.
Service has the glitches we expect with a new restaurant, a little uncoordinated even on a relatively quiet night, but with the patience to guide a couple of rookies at a nearby table through the wine list, which apparently had many things they had not experienced before. The selections are geographically wide-ranging, and the prices are mostly modest. Two sparklers, one Italian and one American, are offered as one-glass aperitifs, and there are still wines from North and South America, Europe and Australia, allowing for some interesting taste comparisons. And among the dessert wines is the framboise from Bonny Doon, a sweet raspberry dessert wine that is one of the most unctuous pleasures we’ve ever found in a glass.
Franco
1535 S. Eighth St.
314-436-2500
Lunch & Dinner daily (light food in between)
Credit cards: All major
Wheelchair access: Very poor
Smoking: In the bar
Entrees: $15-$22
