Chez Jean-Pierre/Palm Beach
October 15, 2004
By John Tanasychuk
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Jean-Pierre Leverrier left France at the age of 19. But in many ways, he operates his Palm Beach restaurant, Chez Jean-Pierre, as if he were still back in Normandy.Chez Jean-Pierre is open for dinner only six nights a week. Jean-Pierre works in the kitchen with son Guillaume. Wife Nicole and their eldest son David work the front of the house.
This year's best restaurant in Palm Beach County combines French charm, American friendliness and Palm Beach sophistication. The food is mostly French, but Leverrier includes many dishes designed to appeal to the American palate. Short ribs, for instance, are only occasionally prepared in the fine restaurants of France. But Leverrier offers them every day. His are served with bourguignon sauce and very American mashed potatoes.
The appetizer menu includes escargots (with shiitakes and garlic cream sauce in puff pastry) and house-made foie gras terrine. But there's also smoked salmon and a perfect Caesar salad, which along with croutons and anchovies, gets tossed with pine nuts.
Leverrier began his restaurant career the old-fashioned French way with an apprenticeship that started when he was 16. Now 49, Leverrier figured he'd forever be a front-of-the-house professional. In the 1970s, he moved to Montreal to a French restaurant in one of the city's most fashionable streets. One summer, he was asked if he'd come down to Palm Beach, since it was slow in Quebec.
Leverrier realized he could offer something that Palm Beach didn't have. So he approached one of the then owners about buying the restaurant. A deal was struck that allowed Leverrier to buy out the place over time.
When his chef left 3 1/2 years after buying the restaurant, Leverrier moved to the kitchen. "I loved cooking. All of my friends were chefs," he says.
Luckily, his early apprenticeship gave him plenty of experience. "I spend four days in the dining room and two days in the kitchen. Even if you wanted to spend your whole life in the dining room, you needed to be quite comfortable in the kitchen n order to be comfortable with the customer's requests. You needed to be aware of what could and could not be done."
And since moving to the back of the house, Leverrier feels much more creatively challenged.
The dining room, which suffered some minor ceiling damage because of this year's hurricanes, is elegant and comfortable at the same time. Men are not required to wear jackets, though many do. One room is decorated with surrealist-style paintings. There are trompe l'oeil effects in other areas. The wait staff is professional and perhaps just a little distant. But maybe that's the perfect temperament for Chez Jean-Pierre's moneyed clientele. Leverrier says many of his in-season clients don't even bother to open the menu. Those of us who aren't regulars will feel just as welcome.
Consistency is a hallmark of Chez Jean-Pierre, which is now 13 years old. You can count on the osso bucco, the roasted duck with thyme and honey sauce, the Dover sole meuniere arriving at the your table the same way day after day, year after year. There is always an exquisite bottle of wine -- heavy on French, naturally -- waiting to be opened. There will be chocolate cake, a lemon tart and, of course, crème brulee.
Over the years, Leverrier has thought about expanding. Maybe a small bakery or takeout shop? "My wife was not too hot with that," he says. "I don't want you having a heart attack when you turn 45."
So there's no bakery. No takeout. Just a very fine restaurant where you can sense that family is always looking on.
Chez Jean-Pierre, 132 N. County Road, Palm Beach: 561-833-1171
Please phone in advance to confirm information on hours, prices, menu items and facilities. For review consideration, please fax a current menu that includes name and address of restaurant to 954-356-4386 or send to Sun-Sentinel, 200 E. Las Olas Blvd., Fort Lauderdale, FL 33301-2293.
John Tanasychuk can be reached at jtanasychuk@sun-sentinel.com or 954-356-4632 or by writing to him at the Sun-Sentinel.