Restaurant Le Montsorelli — Restaurant in Saumur

Ok. Not sure how to put this experience into words? Exquisite? Sublime? Unforgettable? Forget the adjectives: this was the best dinner of my entire life. As someone who has worked in fine-dining for 15 years and is a huge foodie, I do not say this lightly. Everything was cooked and seasoned to perfection. The flavours and their balance literally blow your mind and make you want the meal to last forever. The ingredients are of course fresh and very good quality, the bedrock of any great cooking. And then there is the setting and the ambience, it’s truly divine. As an Australian, I don’t know when I’ll be back but if I need to endure another 24 plane trip just to eat here one more time, I will.

Please disregard any negative reviews you read about this place. If you want your meat cooked well-done then you are in the wrong country and you are the problem, not them. Also, if you want American style service where waiters constantly faff around you looking for tips, then go to America. Here you will find polite waiters who are efficient yet also give you the time and space to enjoy your...

We’ve visited this restaurant twice in past years and had excellant experiences. Unfortunately this time with a group of 10, we left disappointed and even decided to have dessert at home as it was taking so long to find someone to take our order. On the positive side, the staff were friendly and took great care of recording all details of the reservation by phone weeks in advance (we were there for a special anniversary dinner) but when we arrived there was no greeting and we had to work quite hard to get the attention of any staff (they were very busy). There were a couple of large groups and perhaps they were not prepared for such volumes. It took ages to pay and we had to stand in a long queue as another large group paid individually. The food was fine but for the prices asked, we expected a bit of a smoother experience. The view was magnificent and we would have ordered a lot more wine and food if given the...

The steaks were all cooked very rare despite being requested from medium to well cooked and were definitely not tender! The two children’s meals of beef burgers were just very undercooked steaks which they would not eat. The chips were hot but grossly over cooked and there was nothing else with the steaks. The Caesar Salad was definitely the best meal and the fish was well cooked but vegetables were drowned in sauce and therefore very soggy. One young male waiter was very helpful and friendly but others were very surly and unwelcoming. All in all it was a very expensive , very mediocre meal and I would not...