Trout meuniere

​ Le P'tit Paris, a new French bistro a few blocks from Brooklyn's Prospect Park, is resolutely unfashionable. The menu is full of stodgy but beloved classics like escargots with maitre d'hotel butter, onion soup, steak tartare, and coq au vin. At lunch today, several diners were speaking French to the waiter, who was appropriately slow.

"A la meuniere" means "in the fashion of the miller's wife," referring to the fact that the protein (often sole, or some other delicate fish like trout) should be lightly dusted in flour before being sauteed in brown butter. That way, the very thin layer of flour gets a bit caramelized in the butter, and slightly thickens the sauce. The dish is finished with lemon and parsley.

Oddly, Le P'tit Paris' version of trout meuniere leaves out the flour entirely. But if it's not a proper meuniere, it's still a very nice fish--de-boned, but with head and skin intact. The moist, mild white flesh picks up the browned butter deliciously, and you get the entire small trout, plus potatoes and an odd saute of onions, apples, peppers, and raisins, for $12.

256 Prospect Park West, Brooklyn
718-369-3590