Philippe is a French gem owned and run by celebrity chef Philippe Mouchel. It was a no brainer for La Chaine des Rotisseurs, Victoria to choose this wonderful French restaurant to hold their AGM and dinner.
Having trained with Paul Bocuse, Philippe worked for him in Japan and Melbourne running his operations. Then he set up Brasserie Philippe Mouchel at Crown and thereafter his signature restaurant simply titled ‘Philippe.’
Daman Shrivastav, Vice Conceille de Gastronomique and Phillipe created a beautiful menu and Robert Hook, Bailli worked with Daman on the wine pairing. The result was a very rich menu with beautifully married wines through to the dessert wine and the magnificent dessert.
To start we enjoyed Pate en croute containing pistachios, foie grams and meats, delicately sliced but it was a very beautiful rich slice of heaven we enjoyed, paired with a delicious Anjou.
Then came a light pan seared gold band snapper with fennel, shellfish ragout and saffron rouille. This was paired with a Sancerre.
Phillipe’s signature rotisserie duck ‘Canard aux figures’ was our third course. Mon dieu that is a lot of duck! With two generous pieces of perfectly cooked pink duck accompanied by poached figs and leg sausage with jus, it was a delight to behold. The poached figs brought the dish together beautifully with the honey flavours that melted in your mouth and this balanced the fatty but delicious other elements. This was paired with a Servin Bourgogne Pinot Noir.
The menu came to a natural conclusion with a light Vanilla Blanc-manger with passion jelly, berries compote and sorbet. The dust on top was spectacular. This was paired with a Muscat de Baumes de Venise – this sticky is rich in Vanilla and the amber liquid slipped beautifully down.
Phillippe was generous with his time chatting to us about his cooking methods and his favoured rotisserie which he had flown in from France. During the evening one thing I thought was an interesting take-away was the care and attention this praised chef took in ensuring all the plates were finished with care and on the whole by him.
Hold the Prosecco 
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