1 /5
Note moyenne
★
The good news is the location of this restaurant – and the bad news is the terrible food put on our plates on a recent visit, plus the owners' polite but fairly indifferent response to our complaints. We were very disappointed at this as Olargues is a lovely medieval town that needs a few good restaurants in addition to the excellent Fleurs d'Olargues. Based on our experience, however, we recommend people to avoid L'Auberge du Chat Noir.The menu was very limited and I chose a 'veggie burger'. It consisted of fairly dry and tasteless baps, predictable salad stuff, some tinned sweetcorn and - unbelievably - a layer of melted industrial plastic posing as cheese slices. I could hardly believe that a restaurant in France, a country that boasts hundreds of cheeses including plenty with which to cook, could offer vile pinky-yellow 'easi-slice' cheese which tasted even worse than I'd feared. My husband chose the brochette. It was supposed to be barbecued but the meat was bland and cooked evenly instead of having that delicious charred effect on the outside that comes from high temperature cooking, combined with reddish-pink meat on the inside. A further culinary insult came in the form of frozen chips that tasted more of cardboard than of potatoes.Our table was outside with a lovely view of the medieval bridge of Olargues but we left once we realised how little we could eat. On our way out, we complained politely and in some detail. The male owner explained rather defensively that they'd only opened recently and didn't have enough preparation space yet, to which our response was that they should have delayed their opening until they could prepare and cook food properly. He said he was sorry to hear we weren't happy, but that's as far as his regrets went and our overall impression was, well, oh dear, can't please everyone, it's not easy running a restaurant, you win some you lose some...Our meal at L'Auberge du Chat Noir was easily the worst we've had in a long time. This isn't a fast food takeaway or cheapo cafe, it's claiming to be a restaurant, in which it's usual to expect basic fresh ingredients. We also notice that two of four favourable reviews on Tripadvisor are by people who visited but didn't actually eat there!Service was okay and indeed the waiter seemed embarrassed at what he was putting on the table. We don't make a habit of complaining and had really looked forward to our meal. But unless a new chef is found who ditches the industrial plastic cheese and the frozen chips, we can only urge people to eat elsewhere.