Café Rouge, 21 Silver Street, Durham

2:18pm Friday 11th July 2008

THE day after British summer time unofficially ended with a weekend of heavy downpours seemed to be a good time to go in search of a spot of sunshine.

Lunch at Cafe Rouge, a recent addition to the city's range of eateries, appeared the best option, given that I could not jump on the next flight out of Newcastle and head south to the Mediterranean.

As you may have guessed, Café Rouge, is a French restaurant, bar and cafe, and its Durham branch is one of 90 across the country.

Café Rouge is one of the "brands'' operated by Tragus Ltd, one of the UK's largest independent restaurant companies with a total of 260 outlets.

It occupies the former Pizza Hut premises in Silver Street, next to Framwelgate Bridge, and on a sunny day looks rather attractive with its frontage open to the street.

Monday was not the day to indulge in continental-style alfresco dining so I and my colleague were shown to a table deep inside, near a window offering views of a muddy and swollen River Wear speeding debris from Weardale towards the North Sea.

As well as the main menu, there is a fixed price menu, offering two or three courses for about £9 or £11, a children's menu and a breakfast menu that includes some rather nice sounding croissants.

We decided on this occasion to order from the main menu - incidentally, all the menus give you the chance to try to revive the French you learned at school but monoglots fear not, the dishes are described in English too.

I opted for onion soup with a gruyere crouton followed by beef bourguignon, and my companion chose to start with camembert cheese and opted for the entrecote rouge, a ribeye steak, with dauphinoise potatoes instead of French fries. To drink, we each had a large glass of white wine.

The soup was a pleasant surprise, having a thicker consistency and a sweeter taste than I imagined it would have, and the bourguignon, which came with broad beans and dauphinoise potatoes, was positively delicious and totally filling.

We finished off our meal with a creme brulée, which I just about managed to consume and hence follow the stricture laid down by our Prime Minister about not wasting anything because that is pushing up food prices.

I was content but my companion complained later that his camembert starter and his steak were over done. His dauphinoise potatoes proved a disappointment "because", as he said, "they came quite dried out with not a hint of cream, which would have moistened up the steak a bit. I found the creme brulée also had a taste of char about it.'' There was quite a lot of tempting food on the menu but some people may find it a little on the expensive side and in this time of belt tightening would not be able to countenance a regular visit to Café Rouge.

My fellow diner was blunter, saying it "fell below the mark'' in terms of value for money.

The service was good - the food certainly arrived faster than it would have in a typical French eatery and the staff were pleasant and efficient.The atmosphere was pleasant and towards the end of our meal there was even a spot of Django Rheinhardt-style jazzy music going on in the background.

If it wasn't for the grey skies and umbrella-toting passers-by outside you could, with a bit of effort, have imagined you were down in Provence.

Eating Out