Le Pré Lenôtre (Beijing, CHINA) ★★☆☆☆

First of all, my apologies for the low quality of the pictures here. I forgot to bring along my camera and had to settle with my iPhoto instead.

Right before my Beijing trip, I have done a lot of online research on fine dining restaurants and came up with Le Pré Lenôtre due to their fame and history back home in Paris. Le Pré Lenôtre, located in the relatively new Hotel Sofitel Wanda Beijing, is touted as a restaurant serving high-end modern French cuisine.

Between 2001 and 2004, I used to be a frequent flyer to Beijing, mostly on business and I must admit that they have come a long way when it comes to fine dining but still they are at least a decade behind other major cities.  




An amuse bouche of razor clams got us started on this night.

Then a pan seared foie gras that did enough to hold its own.



After that, things started to fall apart with a trio of meat dishes including duck breast, lamb loin and veal tenderloin. There was nothing wrong with the presentation but the taste as well as the quality of the ingredients really left something to be desired.

When a name as big as Le Pré Lenôtre puts themselves on the line to open a fine dining restaurant in the capital city of a country, you expect them to deliver. In this case, they did not.



Food Rating: 4.8/10
Price: ￥￥￥
Address: 6/F Sofitel Hotel, Sofitel Wanda Plaza, 93 Jianguo Lu, Beijing, China
Closest Metro Station:
Website: http://www.sofitel.com/gb/hotel-6215-sofitel-wanda-beijing/restaurant.shtml