A delightful waiter from Sri Lanka made all the difference in a French Bouillon. He was polite, helpful and responsive to our orders throughout the service despite the throng of tourists and local customers.

We started with an fabulous first impression of a long queue outside the brightly lit restaurant. The maxim of eating at restaurants with long queues has always been true in most cities I have visited.

The 30 min wait in that orderly queue allowed time to read some of the 10k Google reviews. The recent reviews were however damning! From rude waiters, bad food to hints of overcharging dampened my enthusiasm quite a bit.

When it was our turn, a petite French lady in glasses who could be the boss led us to our table. The atmosphere was electrifying! Customers were drinking, eating and chatting with a full blast of ASMR in an ornate and long dining hall. Tables are packed with different small groups sharing same table.

The atmosphere remind us of those classic Hong Kong dim sum restaurants and tea canteens.

The bearded Sri Lankan waiter (see photo) took our orders in English.....a big relief. He wrote the orders down on the paper table cloth.... presuming these got transmitted magically to the kitchen because the orders arrived shortly and correctly!

We had 6 snails, a duck confit, cow's (beef) tongue, a pork curry, a steak fries (butcher's cut) with pepper sauce and another steak fries with MDH butter. Never figure out what is MDH butter.

Portions are small, French not American sizes. So Americans please order double or go for another meal after this.

The 2 slices of tongue are well cooked, tender enough to be cut with a fork, paired with a decent potato mash and a spicy sauce that is nowhere near spicy.

The duck confit is deeply flavourful to the bone, not waxy. Paired with equally well seasoned potatoes with skin, this could be great if the meat is slightly more juicy.

The 2 steak fries with or without pepper sauce were cooked exactly to medium raw as ordered. Tender and juicy but not the better cut at that price. The size is like a small American burger patty. The fries were working class, not impressive.

The disappointment is with the rice and pork curry. From an Asian's perspective, it is a culinary crime to call that sauce a curry. It was so white and creamy, whatever tumeric and spices were supposed to be in that curry had been whitewashed.

The smiling waiter came back to take our orders for desserts and topped off our water bottle.

Again the 4 desserts magically were served shortly after he wrote down the orders on the paper table cloth.

The rum baba with whipped cream was heavily dosed with rum. The rice pudding was flavourful with well cooked rice.

The lava chocolate cake however was not overflowing with lava with a rather flat piece of pastry.

The chocolate mousse was decent, just serviceable.

The waiter returned with another bottle of water and quickly tallied up the bill. The math genius in our group counted independently as we read some reviews that had hinted at overcharging.

The bill was correctly added up, refuting any hint of overcharging in other reviews.

Definitely first time visitors should come for the experience of a public Parisian canteen or a quick fuss-free meal during off-peak hours without queue.

Doubt this is a first-date venue for Parisians. We did witness 2 waiters singing happy birthday at another table with sprinklers! So recommend for birthdays but not for wedding anniversaries.

It is an experience for sure!