La Cigogne
“Haven't tried brunch, but I hear it's wonderful, and owners Damien and Jeremy couldn't be nicer or more hospitable.”
“The steak tartar is phenomenal, as well as tartes flambees, the one with wild mushrooms was out of this world.”
“I returned with my family, three selective eaters and fell in love with Jeremy and Damien.”
La Cigogne
Takes Reservations: Yes
Delivery: Yes
Take-out: Yes
Accepts Credit Cards: Yes
Bike Parking: Yes
Good for Kids: Yes
Good for Groups: Yes
Happy Hour: Yes
Outdoor Seating: Yes
Has TV: Yes
Waiter Service: Yes
Caters: Yes
Price range.
$$ Price range $11-30
8 reviews
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This restaurant had been on my "to try" list for some time after I saw all the glowing reviews. Since we visited Brooklyn over Valentine's Day weekend, I was very excited to come here to celebrate. However, there were a couple of things that were a little off about our experience.
My first disappointment was that their special $65 Valentine's Day prix-fixe menu consisted of 3 courses of mostly anything but Alsatian food: 1) sesame-crusted seared tuna or burrata caprese, 2) beef wellington or vegetarian beet spatzle, and 3) upside down apple tarte or chocolate coulant (gluten-free molten chocolate "cake"). Holistically, it was an Asian-fusion-Italian-British-modified Alsatian-French meal. I have traveled to about 20 countries, and this was probably the most incoherent meal I've ever had. In the world.
In addition, for the price point, all of the dishes oddly exhibited noticeable lack of thought and attention to detail. I am not sure why a menu for a day celebrating love would be so devoid of love. The sesame-crusted tuna tasted fresh, but for the price and portion, the dish was heavily deficient in flavor and texture. A bit of citrus might have gone a long way. The burrata caprese tasted similar to typical tomato-mozzarella caprese, but with less visual appeal than typically presented in a restaurant of this price point. The burrata slices looked sloppily cut and hastily stacked with a few basil leaves and unripened, pastel-colored tomato slices. The soggy-crusted beef wellington was also flavorless and cooked well-done despite our medium temperature selection. It came with some thin stems of asparagus and flavorless mashed potatoes, along with a thin film of sour red wine sauce, which did not help offset the dryness of the meat.
Perhaps the least visually appealing items of the night were the desserts – both seemingly popped right out of their respective baking pans, right onto the plate. Desserts with simple embellishments sometimes make up for their appearance through deep, complex taste and texture, but these did not. The coulant was rubbery and could have used some more chocolate, while the up-side down apple tart was just some molded baked apples loosely placed over a disk of pie crust.
The lackluster food was complemented by peculiar service. There were several servers on the shift, but only one seemed alert. It's too bad he was not our server. Though we were one of the first tables to arrive, many tables that arrived later were checked-on first and given bread and butter immediately, while the staff walked by us many times without checking in or giving us bread. From a perception standpoint, it didn't help that those tables were all occupied by Caucasians while ours wasn't. We were finally given bread and butter half an hour later, after I specifically flagged down a busser/runner and asked for it, but the bread turned out to be stale and dry. The champagne glass that came with the meal was okay, but the only thing that truly washed away some of our sorrow due to the food and service was the draft beer tasting that came with our Yelp check-ins. Those were actually pretty decent.
It's totally possible that the food and service are typically better than this, but given the plethora of dining options in the NYC area, I can't say I'll be rushing back to find out. Also, when I initially called to ask for available reservations, they stated the only time was 9:30. Since I knew they stay open between lunch and dinner shifts, I asked if they had anything earlier – to which they responded 5:30, so I assumed they were booked between 5:30 and 9:30. I went ahead and reserved the 5:30 slot, until I happened to be on OpenTable and saw they had availability at 6:00, 6:30, 7:00, 7:30, etc… Obviously, they wanted me to avoid the potential 7PM rush, but OpenTable has a feature for restaurants to block time slots or control the number of parties/tables reserved at any given time, and they could easily have used that feature instead of saying something that wasn't true. It was altogether a very strange experience.
Came here w my bestfriends for a night out to catchup. Found this cute and cozy spot on Yelp. It is pretty dim inside, small but spaced out tables, full on bar, music (well i dont rem hearin anythin i kno.. Lol) and the bathroom was very nice!
We had the mussels w french fries, pan seared scallops w asparagus, apple and walnut salad (all yummy!) their mussels portion was a lot! I also liked the fact that their cheese on the salad was fried into a ball and u jus break it up. Super cool idea and def tasty!
My gf had the burger, and my other friend and i had the filet mignon. It was cooked nicely, layin nicely over an onion patty (my bestfriend really liked this) and their cocktail drinks!!!
Overall definitely a nice spot!
I recently went back with a group of friends.
The 3-beer tastes if you check in on Yelp is fantastic! You get to flavor 3 different Alsatian beers for free. Do it.
Their recent addition – the black ink squid seafood spätzle – is delicious!!!
Service continues to be graceful and welcoming.
The Flambee with goat cheese and bacon was…amazing! The cheese plate was also great. Quality Riesling, fire roaring in the background, and awesome service! It was a bit out of the way for me to get there, but it's a perfect date night spot. There was a dessert that looked like a flambee that looked amazing at the table next to us…next time!
As much as I wanted to give La Cigogne 5 stars on my last visit here, a major service snafu got in the way of that. However, I knew I'd be back because despite this, the food was phenomenal. So when it was time to recently pick a place for a party of 9 when a few friends decided to get together, I promoted coming here. Well, the cold plates and appetizer-style dishes came out before the mains , there was time in between every course, AND all silverware was present throughout the meal at all times without having to remind anyone ( the service was generally amicable as well, it's not easy to work a party of 9 and she did a fantastic job), so all that was left to focus on for the review was the food. But that's the easy part here.
The food was excellent. The vibe/interior was excellent. In this regard, nothing has changed from the first visit. The restaurant was absolutely full this time around, which should not be too much of a surprise; a good restaurant will have a good turnout on a weekend. You can take a look at some of the items I noted in the last review. I don't think you can go wrong with the food here; every last person in our party had nothing but good things to say about what they had ordered. The tarte flambés were all a hit, my favorite one being the bacon, swiss and honey. I decided to go with a burger this time around (pretzel bun is an easy sell, and I half-regretted not trying it my first visit) and that was a solid choice; cooked perfectly medium. Camambert was a big hit, and the Nemrod spätzle was beloved. Dessert raised eyebrows, especially the apple tart and crème brulee.
Besides the mains, you can order a whole bunch of items and share amongst your party; that way you get to try a bit of all the deliciousness. Cocktail and beer menu are another positive point; modestly sized but impressive in quality.
Will be back, probably even a few times in the next few months.
taste and service wise everything here was quite fulfilling. You can't go wrong with the burger and fries. The Eggs Benny is a great brunch option. I like the home fries well done. Will be back to try more yum.
I was quite disappointed with our Friday breakfast at this establishment.
I Googled breakfast spots in Downtown Brooklyn and this spot came up as a suggestion. Sure enough I looked up their menu and they had a decent breakfast/brunch menu. Here's where it goes wrong. On their website the "brunch" items are lumped into the same category as everything else so it's quite unclear that during the week they do not have a brunch menu.
We found that out when our waiter brought our menus and I see it's a lunch menu. When I asked him if they have breakfast items he said no. Well, we didn't want to waste our time and have to look for another spot so we skimmed the menu and ordered.
Note it was 11am and the restaurant was empty. We waited a while before he took our order. When he did come to our table we ordered coffee, salad Nicoise, steak frites and some wine. We ordered the steak medium rare. We got a medium well steak that was chewy, hard to cut and quite bland. The fries were OK. The salad was soaked in dressing. Literally so drenched, I couldn't finish it.
I really wanted something sweet to end this rather disasterous meal so I ordered the chocolate mousse. It barely passed as good. Some things look great in writing but when it comes to the table it's nothing like you imagine.
We finally are done and ask for the bill. Lo and behold, they charge us for refills on regular coffee. That really took the cake. I'm over this place and do not suggest going either. It's a true disappointment.
Things That Are Good:
Drinking a martini at the bar or at the tables overlooking the sidewalk.
Calling martinis martunis.
The foie gras torchon. Silky and rich and perfect.
The camembert cheesy appetizer thing.
The tartes flambee. All of them.
They've nailed the laid-back, we're French and don't give a shit vibe, which makes this an amazing place to relax with drinks and appetizers when you don't have anywhere to be (or when you have to be at Lucali in four hours because the wait is insane).
Things That Are OK:
The spatzle.
Just about everything needs a touch more salt, especially the tuna tartare. But they leave salt on the table, so that's OK.
Things That Are Not OK:
I still don't know the proper way to pronounce the name of this place.
They've nailed the laid-back, we're French and don't give a shit vibe, which makes this a bad place to go if you're in any kind of hurry.
The steak frites came out overcooked, but we didn't want to send it back because we'd already waited so long for it in the first place. Life though? Still good.