Diggity Restaurant

Hot Dog!

March 30, 2022By Heidi EllisonRestaurants
Diggity, a laidback restaurant located next door to Servan in the 11th arrondissement.
Diggity, a laidback restaurant located next door to Servan in the 11th arrondissement.

Diggity is distinguished from most other Paris restaurants not only by its unusual name but also by a sense of humor and a laid-back attitude. One example of the latter: dogs are allowed, so we brought our favorite Labrador, Pia, who was happy to meet Jax, the house husky. 

Set in a former garage, this “café d’amour” is furnished with flea-market finds and rough wood booths with blue cushions. The sense of humor is evident in such details as the restroom hidden behind a bookcase that opens like a door in a murder-mystery castle and the menu on a tiny QR code inside a minuscule glass.

One thing is no joke here: the food, prepared by cheffe Domitille De Cenival, a graduate of the Ferrandi cooking school. We started off the meal with an amuse-bouche of some of her tasty “pot-au-feu croquettes,” filled with tender beef and served with a sauce of saffron-flavored aioli.

Mushrooms in meurette sauce.
Mushrooms in meurette sauce.

A friend and I split two starters that couldn’t have been more different from each other. One was a luscious stew of mushrooms in a lovely rich, winy meurette sauce with lardons. 

Scallop carpaccio.
Scallop carpaccio.

The other was a wonderfully refined carpaccio of scallops with cauliflower cream, hazelnut powder, hazelnut oil and lime zest. 

Poached oysters.
Poached oysters.

Another friend enjoyed the Japanese-influenced dish of oysters poached in a bouillon of lemongrass and white miso and accompanied by daikon radish, coriander and green onions.

Veal fillet with cauliflower and clementine accompaniments.
Veal fillet with cauliflower and clementine accompaniments.

We tested two main courses, the most popular being the quasi de veau (with a punning name, Quasiment Desveaux – one of the owners is Gaspard Desveaux). The succulent, generous serving of veal fillet, cooked to a perfect pink hue, came with braised and puréed fennel, a roasted clementine, powdered clementine peel and clementine zest. We were doubtful about clementine, which looked like a fresh one just plopped down on the plate, but it melded beautifully with all the other ingredients on the plate.

Bass with Jerusalem artichoke.
Bass with Jerusalem artichoke.

The other main course – bass with purée of Jerusalem artichoke, roasted Jerusalem artichoke, fried chestnuts and sweet-and-sour sauce – was deemed interesting but did not raise much excitement.

Goat cheese with braised fennel, spiced poached pear and chocolate tart.
Spiced poached pear, goat cheese with braised fennel, and chocolate tart.

There were only three desserts on the menu, so we ordered them all and shared them. The most unusual – and the best-liked – was the goat cheese with braised fennel and caramel with miso. There were no complaints, however, about the spiced poached pear with lemon-flavored meringue or the chocolate tart on a shortbread base with salted-butter caramel. All excellent!

On top of all the other good things about Diggity, it has one huge advantage: it makes an effort to keep its prices low, especially appreciated in light of the up-creeping prices we have encountered recently, expected to go even higher because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Thanks to owners Desveaux and Hugo Messerschmitt for that. I know you were expecting me to say “Hot Diggity Dog! here, so there you go.

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