You’ll find hidden gems aplenty in and around Newcastle when you least expect it, and today I’ll be exploring The French Quarter. Only a 2 minute walk from Central Station, what jewels of France does it have to offer?
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00 Self-proclaiming to offer French dining without the fuss, the French Quarter is said to be born
00:04 from nostalgia, bringing an alternative to a chain-dominated high street. Founded by Cedric
00:09 and Catherine Bocault, the restaurant opened in 2017 and has only thrived ever since.
00:15 Whether it be a cosy night with some friends in a glass of wine, or a romantic evening for you
00:21 and your partner, what does the French Quarter have to offer?
00:26 It was just literally a big project of mine that's been going in our head for a long, long,
00:33 long time. And my wife, Catherine, we moved to Newcastle eight years ago with the project in mind.
00:44 Yeah, there's definitely been some core structures that have remained in place,
00:48 like the core ethos of wanting to be sort of a neighbourhood bistro, friendly, welcoming,
00:54 but a lot has changed around that, not just because of obviously the pandemic and stuff,
00:59 but the world, you know, we're a little bit tucked away, which is great because so many people,
01:04 you know, the amount of people we've had come through our door and still, even now after five,
01:09 six years, people say, "Oh, I didn't know you were here."
01:12 We like to represent sort of every sort of region of France and take on the best of every part of
01:18 France. We've got some classics that, you know, they'll never go out of the menu, like a Beef
01:23 Bourguignon or Comfida or Gratin de Finoir. Our team is fantastic. We have got no problem at all.
01:29 And we welcome any customer coming to French Quarter because we want you to come back again
01:34 and again and again. And we try to deliver very good food, you know, it's very important
01:40 because if somebody come in and go back and coming back again, that's mean the team is good,
01:47 atmosphere is fine, you know, we make a lot of good food so that make people to come into us
01:54 and we welcome anyone who want to come here. We love it to have like such a big family here and
02:01 that's how we behave and try to treat everyone. And people do describe us a lot as hidden gem.
02:07 Absolutely. Yeah. I'm going to try to keep my team like that, to be happy, try to do my best
02:14 to make everyone happy, everyone work hard. So to satisfy the customer, to make the customer happy
02:21 too, because we can't be happy without the customer. So we have to make them happy first.
02:28 With us you can expect definitely more of a family, homely feel. You know, we don't want
02:34 anyone to walk in and feel that they have to be dressed up or they have to be a certain type of
02:39 person. I think it's very important that we provide a welcoming environment where you can
02:43 just be you and feel comfortable. If you want to make it a really romantic evening, it's very easy
02:48 to do so. If you want to keep it casual and just pop in for a glass of wine and a little bit of
02:53 Roquefort cheese, then that's very easy to do. A hidden gem in a street you may never have
02:57 came across. It might just be worth you taking the extra look.
03:01 [BLANK_AUDIO]