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'This tiny restaurant in increasingly branché Bermondsey is an instant smash. To say it's a bit French is like saying cheese is a bit nice'
It's insanely hot, and the humidity is making my person stick to flat surfaces. A large bug has just flown into my bra and I'm not entirely convinced it isn't still there. We haven't been able to score one of the pair of outside tables, the entire blackboard menu is only nine dishes long, and the pal has ordered the dish I wanted, so I'm stuck with that old cliche, lapin à la moutarde. My mood isn't sunny.
The rabbit arrives and it's uniformly shades of beige. It's in an unlovely tangle, plonked on top of its pommes purée, looking more like pulled pork. And then I take a mouthful and the irritations of the day slip from me as easily as the rabbit slips down my neck. It is gorgeous: the meat silky and slow-cooked, still tasting quite definitely of bunny; the mash of the Robuchon school, rammed with butter, rich and luxurious. There's a light, creamy, mustardy sauce that just – just – stops short of richness overkill. I want to anoint myself in it, bathe in it, sink into it with a beatific grin. I think I may be in actual love.
This tiny restaurant in a former sandwich shop in increasingly branché Bermondsey is an instant smash. To say it's a bit French is like saying cheese is a bit nice. After our flirtations with America and south-east Asia, it seems we're rekindling our horn for trad French. Unlike the big, glittery jobs, the Balthazars and Zédels, this is a distillation of the trend, bijou and delicious. The red leather banquettes, the black-and-white-tiled floor, the paper tablecloths with booking names (and the occasional paean of customer praise) scrawled upon them: it adds up to a big, garlic-breathed, Gallic bear hug.
Owner Hervé Durochat is out front, a consonant-mangling sweetiepie who treats his customers as though they were long-lost pals. His partners are sommelier Alex Bonnefoy behind the bar, and in the kitchen, ex-Morgan M chef Sylvain Soulard. This pedigree goes some way to explaining why there are people still fighting to get in long after 10pm. Durochat polished his charm at José Pizarro's neighbouring mini-empire; between them, they're turning Bermondsey Street into a must-visit destination.
The menu changes every day. Here are some recent items: caille rôti, lentilles de Puy; suprême de volaille aux mousserons; Paris-Brest; tarte au citron. If it wasn't so heartfelt, it'd be 'Allo 'Allo comical. But it's not hackneyed: the classicism is given… well, not the dreaded full twist, but judicious tweaks. So quiche lorraine arrives as a kind of cheesecake, the trembly, savoury custard set on top of what I can't stop myself describing as a buttery biscuit base. Crisps of salty cured ham – Bayonne? – are perched on top, and dotted all around is more ham, chopped into little hummocks with wholegrain mustard. Sublime céleri rémoulade is coated with homemade mayo (more mustard), slivers of green apple and masses of peeled crevettes grises. There are cubes of an oddly granular apple jelly, too, which I'm writing off as youthful enthusiasm.
There's nothing I don't like about Casse-Croûte. I'm not fazed by its steak au poivre, a pungent, chewy bavette with an underpowered, too-creamy sauce and odd, tomato-laced sauté potatoes. And why serve this in a bowl? I don't mind the over-crisped chocolate profiteroles. The wine list may be all-French, but it features some recherché crackers: we try an almost sherry-like Jurançon vin jaune and a perky, biodynamic syrah-grenache called Poivre d'Ane. I even forgive tables so Frenchly close together that you're forced to eavesdrop (according to the enchanting chaps beside us, it doesn't matter how much you fork out on dating, it still doesn't guarantee you a, um, happy ending).
I'd come here weekly if I could. This is reasonably priced food designed to deliver pleasure from chaps who know how to have a good time. They've recreated a France viewed through rosé-filled glasses. Santé.
• Casse-Croûte, 109 Bermondsey Street, London SE1, 020-7407 2140. Open all week, 9am-10pm (5pm Sun). About £25 a head plus wine and service.
Food 8/10
Atmosphere 8/10
Value for money 9/10
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