About a 2 minute walk from the Belleville metro station, La Cantine de Belleville is definitely not your warm, fancy French restaurant. Instead, it's more of a grungy bar with an outdoor patio and a basement where live music is played. Unfortunately there wasn't live music when we ventured into the Cantine around 8pm on a Wednesday night (they said come back on Friday). But with a €14 appetizer, main dish, and dessert pre-fix menu and a happy hour for alcohol, we decided to stick around.
To be honest, the menu was quite a challenge to decipher as it was just a large chalkboard with French doodles (normal printed French on a menu is hard enough to decipher). Luckily we had a very helpful waitress who was willing to help our French-challenged group semi-decipher the menu and get some food in our bellies. I'm not quite sure of the exact names of everything I ordered but I ended up with a three course meal consisting of a duck salad, salmon tartar, and tiramisu.
The duck salad was extremely rich and gamey. Personally, once the salad greens ran out, I wasn't able to finish the rest of my duck pieces. Around the table, other appetizers ordered were an avocado dish, a pickled-fish, and and egg dish. The consensus was that the egg was the best (more of a boiled egg with salad aka egg salad) while the avocado dish was good for those whose avocados were ripe and terrible for those whose avocados weren't. The fish dish that also came with potatoes, carrots, and salad was suggested by the waiter because it was a typical French appetizer dish but it was extremely salty and had a half-raw texture that I didn't prefer.
As for the main dish, once again, I have to say I ordered poorly. The salmon tartar was extremely tasteless. The salmon had no flavor whatsoever and was just cold texture to go along with the salad. Three of us ordered the salmon tartar and all of us were pretty much dissatisfied. However, I was able to scrounge off some delicious potatoes and jambon from one dish as well as a piece of a cheeseburger from another that was pretty decent. Other's who got the beef steak dish and the cooked salmon were thoroughly pleased though I didn't get to try it myself.
As for dessert, the original plan was to get creme brulee but it had run out by the time we were ready for dessert. I "settled" for the tiramisu which was quite delicious. The cake part on the bottom was not as fluffy as it could have been, but the creme on top had a good texture that wasn't too sweet and too bland. Other dessert options included cheesecake, chocolate mousse, and creme caramel.
Overall, my personal meal wasn't too delicious but I believe that there definitely were more viable options around (I would suggest the egg salad and steak or cooked salmon). And even with this miss, coupled with the fact that we missed the live music performances, the Cantine de Belleville was quite surprisingly a very enjoyable dining experience. We had an extremely friendly and helpful waitress who really tried her best to accommodate us in the midst of an extremely busy crowd (the place was packed by 9:30pm, which also must mean that other people are definitely enjoying something on the menu). She also noticed our displeasure at certain dishes and compensated us through a free dessert and free shots of alcohol all around the table.
Our party of 9 left the Cantine 2.5 hours after we entered, some more satisfied than others with our meal, but all happy to have enjoyed a meal with friendly service and good company. And €14 is a cheap price to pay for a good time and a friendly reminder that sometimes, taste isn't everything.
La Cantine de Belleville
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108, Boulevard Belleville
Metro: Belleville
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