Madeleine Bistro
$$$ - expensive
American
Upscale-style dining in the valley
Madeleine Bistro adds an upscale organic vegan menu to Los Angeles' offerings. Proprietors David and Molly Anderson hail from Real Food Daily, where David was an executive chef, but this is an entirely personal offering, featuring a menu that changes with the current fresh ingredients.
Lunch and dinner served, with take-out available.
See website for current hours.
Exit 101 at Reseda and turn West on Ventura; restaurant is on north side of street, kinda hard to find. Look for an awning.
Added by ananimalfriendlylife.com on Jul 2 05 (updated Feb 12 07)
Reviews
Hands-down my favourite place in LA. My only complaint is that it's a bit pricey (so I can't go as often as I'd like, which would pretty much be every day), but it is worth every penny. I could live on the creme bruleé alone. Long live Madeleine Bistro!!
Madeleine Bistro is the classiest vegan act in town -but so welcoming that you will regularly see people enjoying their brunch in fitness wear.
I recently reviewed M Cafe (in Hollywood) and described it as 'imaginative,' but vegan chicken and waffles? You cannot get more imaginative than that! -And that is just one unique dish of many at Madeleine Bistro. (Plus, that particular dish is my omnivorous' mum's favorite. Being able to more than 'pass off' their Belgian waffles and seitan 'chicken' says a lot about the restaurant's quality.)
Brunch here is truly a highlight of any week. French toast, the aforementioned dish, wheat-free pancakes, tofu scramble, fresh juices and sinful beignets make a visit an experience over a mere meal.
A personal favorite is the 'Portophilly'- a baguette loaded with juicy portobello 'bacon,' peppers, and their own, incredible farmer's 'cheese.'
The food is beyond good and presented with acute care and attention. Give yourself a treat and make a trip to Madeleine Bistro.
We did not think we would ever again find a vegan restaurant as incredible as Millenium in SF. We were wrong. This place is absolutely divine!
So many dishes sounded so delicious that we had to sample several. The first was one that we did not have our eye on - the red beet tartar. The waiter sold us on it anyway though, and we're so glad he did! It blew us away, WOW! We also tried the chicken fried seitan with mashed potatoes and gravy (yummm), and the asian tacos (quite unique). For dessert, we couldn't decide between three items. We asked the waiter which one we should choose, and he dutifully let us know that we had to get both the flourless chocolate cake AND the cinnamon creme brulee. We weren't disappointed. Food scores a 10.....a truly remarkable dining experience.
Our waiter (I regrettably cannot recall his name) was incredibly helpful and amicable; fully deserving of his 30% tip. Service scores a 10.
Like the previous reviewer, I am docking one point solely based on location. I, however, am not saying they should open up a location in Hollywood or LA, like every other vegetarian restaurant. They have enough, for God's sake. There are many wealthy people in the Newport Beach area who like to be healthy, and Madeleine's would no doubt thrive in such a location. While I am a vegan, I recognize that the "v" word unfortunately sometimes carries a negative connotation to the unenlightened, so Madeleine's marketing of healthy, organic, gourmet would work perfectly in Orange County. PLEASE OPEN UP A LOCATION IN OC!!!
I just finished eating one of the finest vegan meals of my life at Madeleine Bistro in Tarzana (of all places). While there are many delicious animal-friendly restaurants, there haven't been any on par with Manhattan's many fine veg restaurants, or even San Francisco's Millennium. I haven't been to many of those, since I'm not that well-traveled or well-heeled, but I certainly have rued that L.A. was lacking in an establishment that could at least be the peer of those restaurants.
Proprietors David and Molly Anderson opened the Bistro with an eye toward letting the ingredients dictate the menu, rather than getting locked into some sort of box. David's experience as an executive chef at Real Food Daily has clearly served him well (you have taste what he can do with seitan), but being out on his own has allowed him to draw on influences like Wolfgang Puck, whose various restaurants serve disparate cuisine unified by adventure, quality, and attention to detail, and have been host to many a fine chef. This is the start of what I hope will become a trend in L.A., particularly as veganism finds its way out of its niche.
It's nice to finally have an animal-friendly restaurant of this ilk in L.A. For those that can afford its relatively high (but by no means Juliano-style outrageous) prices, it is well worth the trek to find this nearly invisible restaurant on Ventura Blvd. The tacky neon strips seem a holdover from a previous tenant, and many of them don't work. They certainly do not hint at the warm, tasteful, but not ostentatious interior makeover you'll find after parking on the street nearby and heading in. No valet parking - at least, not yet - saves you about $5 over dining out for a similarly upscale experience, which is good news for my humble means. I found a spot on the street right out front, and used the valet money at dessert time to splurge on cannoli, which I haven't had since well before going vegan over five years ago. The cannoli was served with a sprinkling of berries, which were organic, as is I believe everything they serve, making their prices seem all the more reasonable.
While I had a $2 green tea, a variety of wines were also available by the glass from around $8. Two entrees - including their most expensive, a $16 portobella mushroom filet mignon - along with two teas and the cannoli ran only $42. While this firmly establishes Madeleine Bistro as a special occasion restaurant on my budget, it easily supplants all my previous choices for anniversaries and the like, and makes me excited about dining out at a vegan restaurant again.
And don't get the idea that this place is posh or pretentious. David and Molly are as nice and personal as can be, and the overall dining experience tonight was made very comfortable by their presence in the dining room. Our server, Hop, was attentive and helpful, certainly a far cry from the burn 'em and turn 'em atmosphere of RFD. Hop, if I remember correctly, was vegetarian 20 years, and has been vegan for 6, so it's nice to have him there to attend the needs of guests, especially people who might be less familiar with vegan cuisine and what veganism is all about. For us vegans, it's nice to go to a restaurant where the menu and the service is all oriented to your philosophy, and that is yet another great reason to pay a visit.
To explain my 9 rating, I only docked it a notch due to location, which may not be distant for everyone, obviously, and for the lack of finish on the exterior, the interior ceiling, etc. Some of this is clearly fixable. Also, the portobella mushroom filet mignon was somewhat short of superlative, especially as the most expensive item on the menu, though it wasn't bad. Everything else about my experience was near-rhapsodic.
I dined with 2 others today (for lunch) and we shared the Madeleine Club, the BBQ Tempeh, and the Cajun Caesar sandwiches. All 3 were mouth watering.
Definitely save room for dessert when you're here.