I Am Not A Foodie

I went to Napa a couple of weekends ago, with some friends to pick up my future Syrah that I bought during Barrel Tasting Weekend. The release party for the wine wasn’t until 5:30. So we decided that we would do lunch up there, and then do a few wine tasting before heading over to the release party at Mill Creek Winery.

We decided to have lunch at Bistro Jeanty. It wasn’t a huge place, with the main dinning room probably seating 50 people at most. They also had a nice patio dinning area, but that got booked up much faster. The walls were decorated with old fashioned French advertisement posters. It was a cute place.

We all got ambitious and each got an appetizer and an entree. I had the Tomato soup in puff pastry. It came sitting in a nice white bowl, with the puff pastry perfectly cooked on top. The soup was creamy and rich, with a very strong tomato flavor. It was very hot too, all that steam trapped inside by the pastry. I really did enjoy soup, except for one small thing. I thought the soup was a bit over salted, by the end, it was almost too salty to keep eating. I drank a lot of water.


The other appetizers were: Escargots, duck foie gras, and pig feet. I didn’t get to try the escargots, but the comments I got was that they were really buttery, and there was some mysterious seasoning beside the garlic, that gave it an interesting kick. The foie gras pate was pretty good. I thought it was really rich. It was almost too much on such small pieces of toast. The poached pear on the bottom was really good, very strong port flavor, and just the right amount of sweetness. I know the pig’s feet doesn’t look all that impressive. It was actually quite good. I enjoyed it much more than the pickled pig’s feet I had at Alfred’s. The dish had a nice light, and herbal vinaigrette on it. It was mostly gelatin, with some meat disbursed in it. It might not look much, but that was a huge serving of pig’s feet, pretty much an entree serving size.




I had pork chop as my entree. It was the best pork chop I’ve had in a long time. I admit, I normally don’t order pork chops, so I don’t have much to compare this to. But it was really good! The skin was seared nicely, very crispy. I think it’s been brined, so the inside was juicy and tender. It had a great onion, red wine sauce that complemented the meat really well. I was pretty full from the appetizer, so I finished the pork chop but just barely tasted the mashed potato and spinach that were on the side. The mashed potato was creamy, nothing too special. Spinach was a little too salty, I couldn’t eat a lot of it even if I wanted to. I’m discovering a trend with me, i’m finding a lot of things too salty. I wonder if my taste is changing.


Tammy ordered the Cassoulet, which was a classic French dish. I tried a bite of it, pretty good. I could taste the bacon, beans, duck, and a good garlicky, herbal flavor for the crust on top.

The other two entrees were rabbit leg in fresh pasta, and veal kidney. I didn’t try them, so I couldn’t really judge. They looked great though.

We also had two desserts, which I forgot to took pictures of. We had the rice pudding, with really really strong brandied cherries. The cherries might’ve been better if they were eaten really well mixed into the rice pudding. But I just took the cherry and ate it, and the alcohol flavor was overwhelming. We also ordered a berries bread pudding. It was great. The bread was nicely cubed, and still pretty crunchy, unlike most other bread pudding that was really soaked. There was a layer of different berries on the bottom, underneath the bread. Overall, a very enjoyable dessert.

I thought Bistro Jeanty was a really nice experience. The food was not outrageously expensive. It was fresh, and cooked with a great flavor. It’s definitely a nice place to stop by in you are in Napa. They also have a second location in San Francisco called Jeanty at Jack’s, serving pretty similar food.