Thanks to Billy the Skink for pointing out yesterday that Chez Francois is an actual fancy restaurant in Ohio. I had just assumed it was made up, because the name sounded so Batiukian. And our Ohio correspondent Rusty Shackleford even provided a review.
I don’t know what Rusty ordered when he was there, but whatever it was it cost him a pretty penny. Frankie’s House is no ten-dollar steak joint. This is the kind of place that serves Waygu and quail eggs and escargot. Where a ham on arugula salad, dressed with olive oil, will put you back 25 bucks.
Maybe Donna and Crazy will partake of the special this month. A seven course meal, paired with a wine for every course, called, “Truffles Truffles Truffles.” After eating this tour of mushrooms, you’d be full of more fungus than a musty bin of unwashed gym socks. I’m sure that Montoni’s finest
condimento per l’insalata would pair well atop any of these dishes.
First Course
Duo of Eggs & Truffles, Truffle Cappuccino
Ohio Proud Scrambled eggs cooked with truffle butter, garnished with black truffles and truffle oil, and a Cappuccino of purée of fall wild mushrooms and black “Burgundy” truffles, truffle foam.
Cremant de Bourgogne Rose “N˚ 69”, JCB, Burgundy, France, NV
Second Course
Maine Diver Sea Scallop En Croûte, Black Truffle Butter
A Maine diver sea scallop served in its natural shell, filled with sliced truffles and truffle butter, wrapped in puff pastry.
Chablis 1er “Les Sechets”, Jean & Sebastian Dauvissat, Burgundy, France, 2015
Third Course
Soufflé au Fromage, Black Truffle and Quail Egg
A blend of Ubriaco and Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, oven baked in a ramekin and topped with a poached quail egg and freshly shaved black truffles.
Condrieu “La Côte Chatillon”, Xavier Gerard, Northern Rhône Valley, France 2015
Fourth Course
Puglia Tagliatelle, “Alba” White Truffles
Freshly shaved White Truffles served over Puglia tagliatelle with truffle butter and fine herbs.
Savigny-Les-Beaune 1er “Cru Les Peuillets”, Lucien Jacob, Burgundy, France, 2013
Fifth Course
Char-Grilled Farmed Raised Coturnix Quail, Black “Burgundy” Truffle Butter Sauce
Char-grilled quail filled with a quail and truffle forcemeat, serve with a chestnut mousseline, finished with Black “Burgundy” truffle butter sauce.
Or
Seasonal Wild Mushroom, Truffles & Foie Gras, en Croûte
Wild mushroom and truffle consommé, with Foie Gras, duck confit and Black “Burgundy” Truffles topped with puff pastry.
St Joseph “Cavanos” Vielles Vignes, Cuilleron, Northern Rhône Valley, France, 2016
Sixth Course
Roast Tenderloin of Veal, Sauce Périgueux
Tenderloin of Wisconsin Veal, served over a delicata squash filled with white and black truffle risotto finished with wild mushrooms and a truffle reduction sauce.
Or
Grilled Ora King Salmon Filet, Wild Mushroom, Truffle Butter Sauce
Char-grilled New Zealand King Salmon served over baby bok choy, seasonal wild mushrooms, finished with truffle butter sauce.
Barbaresco “Riserva Cichin”, Ada Nada , Piedmont, Italy, 2013
Seventh Course
White Truffle Ice Cream, Truffle Honey & Seasonal Berries
French vanilla bean ice cream with Alba White Truffles, Truffle honey, almond tuile and seasonal berries.
Coteaux du Layon 1er “Cru Chaume”, Château Soucherie, Loire Valley, France, 2014
$200 per guest
Tax & Gratuity not included
*$75.00 per person supplemental charge for a 2.5oz. pour of the above dinner wines and 2oz. pour of the dessert wine.
Panel two is BatYam’s masterpiece of 2020. Donna’s insane enthusiasm, the look of self-satisfied bliss on Harry’s face and the confused, dismayed and slightly annoyed look on the waitresses’ face, it’s perfect. If only every Saturday blow-off strip was so on the nose.
I think Donna needs to eat more salads.
Would a waitress really look so dismayed at a moment like this? “We brought our own dressing” is not exactly an outrageous development. Okay, it’s generic schlock from a no-star eatery, but maybe Donna has allergies and can only eat salad dressing made with, say, rive vinegar. The waitress supplements her income with tips and you’re more likely to get bigger tips if you seem cheerful.
And what is with Harry’s smug look? He beams like PJ Keane would after filling his diapers.
That’s the third type of smile that exists in Westview, after the smirk and the wry grin. It’s one third “Minnesota Nice”, one third Tom Batiuk running the bases, and one third Margot Robbie in I, Tonya.
What a perfectly Funky Winkerbean plot: Montoni’s pizza, comic books, trivializing a serious life decision, shabby treatment of a woman, a medical emergency, and everyone in Westview applauding. There are “worst wedding proposals ever” stories on the Internet that are better than this. I have yet to see one proposal or ceremony in Funky Winkerbean that wouldn’t be an automatic “no” in real life.
By the way, the most expensive eBay sale in the category “X-Men Collectible Comics Full Runs & Sets” was $831. And this is 18 years later. If Harry took Donna to Hawaii on the proceeds from that in 2002, they checked themselves in as luggage.
I’m sorry if I’m making a lot of salty posts today, but this is one of the things I hate most about Funky Winkerbean. Everything is tacky, cheap, rude, and insulting, and is presented like it’s quirky and charming. You’re in a fancy restaurant on a special occasion with your life partner, for crying out loud! Leave the goddamn Montoni’s at home for a night!
That was supposed to be in response to billytheskink, below.
Here, Harry and Donna, let me bring you a quarter inch closer to reality:
My wife and I visited in the summer so we skipped the tasting menu—but we were tempted to try it. I had duck breast while my wife had the catch of the day. The entrees alone were over $100.
We ate in the main dining room and it is a dress up restaurant so you know it isn’t cheap. Vermilion Ohio is a cute lakefront town.
Dang, that food looks delicious, but it would definitely be a once in a blue moon splurge for me.
Due to covid, we were unable to celebrate our 25th anniversary, but once things opened up we decided to treat ourselves to a nice dinner.
The restaurant does have a lower priced cafe/bar area which offers less expensive dishes.
And no, salad dressing was not a gift we exchanged. Instead we went to our local jeweler and purchased new rings.
There is a cute Czech tavern around the corner from Chez that would be more up their alley. I’ve only had drinks there so cannot comment on the food.
https://oldprague.com/
Well now I know where I’m gonna go on my Funkyverse tour of Ohio.
*Scribbles Luigi’s off the Ohio itinerary*
Vermilion Ohio is a nice place to visit in the summer. Chez is on the Vermilion river near the inlet to Lake Erie. Very scenic.
As for Old Prague, any place with a neon sign that says “Pivo” is my kind of place!
Thank goodness this is the Saturday strip, because you know if there was one more to come it would show Harry ordering a pizza.
They do actually serve a flatbread pizza as an appetizer.
I don’t really have anything in particular to say about today’s strip, but after exhaustive research I have a couple of theories on Donna’s cold and begrudging reception to this salad dressing gift.
The first is that the dressing is from Montoni’s, which is where she and Crazy re-met as adults. It is also where Crazy intended to propose to her (all of 3 months later) by having Funky bake the ring into a pizza. Donna wound up swallowing the ring while eating the pizza and had to go to hospital to get it removed.
The second and more likely reason is that Crazy is about 3 weeks early… Donna and Crazy got married on December 13, 2002.
Wow, the one merit Batiuk used to have was that he got the dates right. I wonder what weeks of material he cut and why.
Maybe the gripping tale of adding the inadequate curb cut ramp was supposed to run longer?
Well, I said there’d be a “B.Y.O.B.” reference (I hesitate to call it a joke) of some sort today, but even I’m in awe of how Battyuk manages to have Mr. and Mrs. Crazy’s night out come off as “Ma and Pa Kettle Go to the Big City.” Plus, it seems to me that C.F. would be the type of bistro where les salades are prepared to very specific standards and with very specific homemade dressings, not a Denny’s that gives you a choice of bottled French, bottled Italian, or bottled Ranch.
Apropos of nothing…the most expensive meal I ever ate was in 2004, when Iron Chef Masaharu Morimoto opened his eponymous restaurant in Philly, and I splurged on his $150 six-course taster’s menu. It was excellent, but for me it comes in second to the $35 “Sunday Iron Chef Buffet” lunch I once had at La Rochelle, I.C. French Hiroyuki Sakai’s Tokyo eatery.
OK, Tom Batiuk, let me get this straight.
You name-dropped a real Cleveland-area restaurant — apparently an elite, well-regarded one — so your characters could show up and eat their Montoni’s salad dressing in it.
How is this in any way respectful to that restaurant?
How does this in any way reflect positively on those characters?
If I owned that restaurant, you wouldn’t be getting a free meal. You’d be getting a cease and desist order.
Je prefere un client order du beouf carbonisé rather than pour une bouteille du merde over la salade!!! Jesus OSH Christ! Je deteste Ohio!!!!
Is it anything?
I’m especially proud of my thought balloons.
Ohio Proud Scrambled eggs
I know those words, but that entree makes no sense.
Proud is an overused word these days, especially when paired with the word “unapologetically”.
But it is an Ohio dept of agriculture label. http://ohioproud.org/
Today’s strip is probably banned in California for mentioning a restaurant that serves foie gras.
“Excuse me? What’s this charge on the bill?”
“Corkage”
“But we had house wine!”
“Corkage for the salad dressing”
It would serve that cheap Crazy bastard right!
Okay, today’s strip was hilarious because of the waitress’s reaction. And Chez Francois is very clearly the type of place you dine at when you long to see something other than comic books.
So I guess that Donna must either be an oil heiress or a former crime boss who stays under the radar most days. Another Funky mystery solved!
The only thing I can think about today’s offering is that if Donna and Harry are so impressed by the Montoni’s salad dressing that they have to have it added to their salad at the expensive French restaurant, they shouldn’t waste their money dining there. The creativity and subtlety of good French cuisine will be lost on them.