Could the aphrodisiac of oysters lend musical inspiration to The Raveonettes? Perhaps, considering it was their first selection off the menu at New York City restaurant Bistro Papillon, where psychoPEDIA invited the harmonious Danish duo - Sharin Foo and Sune Rose Wagner - to dine. 

Fresh off a small East Coast club tour from Washington D.C. to Boston, The Ravonettes are now getting revved up for fresh material on a forthcoming third album. And they’re hoping that fans who loved their freshman and sophomore creations, Chain Gang of Love and Pretty in Black, will love what lies ahead. 

Since everyone needs a break from work, who better to review escargot than a band that’s performed worldwide and dined all over Paris - the muse for the bi-level Bistro Papillon’s menu selection? To boot, The Ravonettes’ Parisian chic all-black ensembles topped off the scene -- the two sipping their Cote-du-Rhone in the dimly-lit bistro -- perfectly. (To note, the restaurant’s namesake, Henri Charriere – aka Papillon – was a notorious underworld and society figure before he passed away in 1973.) 

Here, the review, from the pair of self-proclaimed food snobs: 

Sune Rose Wagner - “I think our waitress is already a little like the psychoPEDIA type.” 

Sharin Foo - “I think what we really need to do is to talk to her, because it’d make for a more interesting interview!”

SW - “The most interesting part of whole evening was our waitress!”

SF - “I love the fact that she’s not selling us food or wine at all – she wasn’t pushing anything on us.” 

SW - “It’s a different approach and you don’t come across it very often, where a waitress is honest with you [about] their food. She’s painfully honest. She even told me, when I first was going to select a wine... ‘You know, that wine is going to be a little funky with your chicken.’ Then she offered me another wine instead.” 

SF – “It seems to be a traditional French Bistro type of place but they’re also trying to be a little innovative and different with items like the lamb and how it has a fusion of a mojito wine glaze.”

SW – “My chicken had a Cajun infusion flavor.”

SF – “It’s experimental, but not really. I feel like the experiments don’t work. The mojito glaze on the lamb chops made the meat taste awful. So I feel like they should stick to a menu that’s really traditional. In this restaurant, you should order the steak and fries – traditional bistro-inspired food. Obviously oysters are a favorite French dish, and we love oysters. It’s always so interesting to try different oysters at different restaurants.”

SW – “They were really great! Well served, fresh, with a nice little sauce that went with them.” 

SF- “Well also, the fact they’re an aphrodisiac, we’ll have to deal with that later on too…”

SW – “What do you mean by that? I don’t feel the aphrodisiac is working right now. Perhaps after a couple more glasses of wine, I’ll start to feel that aphrodisiac thing going on. I also had the snails to start off.”

SW – “They were very, very tasty, it almost could’ve been a dish unto itself, because I was almost full by the time I finished it!”’

SF – “Let’s talk about the wine too. I had a Sancerre with my appetizers, which sometimes people think of as more of a dessert wine, but it was nice and dry and fruity, which sounds like a contradiction. But it was really good and fresh.”

SW – “I had chardonnay, which was great with the oysters, which is what I wanted. It was really good with snails as well. I was very happy about that choice.”

SF- “I think the best thing about this restaurant though is our waitress and the waitstaff.” 

SW – “Yeah! I’d say so too!”

SF – “It’s not because they’re professional, it’s because they’re the opposite. They’re real and that’s really rare in New York City.

SW – “Really rare. I would even come by myself to have a drink at the bar and a bite to eat if she was going to wait on me or who I came with.”

~Jessica McMenamin