Restaurant Review: PAUL

Good breakfast places in Qatar are a rare find. On Saturday, we decided to head to PAUL for breakfast. This pretty looking Parisian café is situated at the Villagio Mall right across the River Island store. It looks enticing from outside and we couldn’t wait to see what this place had to offer. Their menu has a variety of breakfast options but we decided to settle for an Omelette Marseillaise (with bell peppers, tomatoes, onions and mushrooms) and a Corbeille de viennoiseries (1 croissant + 1 pain au chocolat + 1 pain aux raisins).

If you don't understand French, the menu could be a little difficult to comprehend. The starter breads (six cereal and brown) that came with some classic PAUL butter were a bummer. They were cold and did not taste too fresh. If they were a little warmer, it might have tasted a lot better.

The omelette looked delicious and was packed with the vegetables promised on the menu. However, the sides were not what we were expecting. The accompanying salad felt out of place on the breakfast plate and the hash browns were undercooked. The omelette was prepared without any salt. Despite adding salt to the eggs, it ended up tasting a little too bland.

Our favorite item on the menu was the freshly prepared croissant. The French café definitely gets its croissants right. This beautiful crunchy piece of bread melted in our mouth as soon as we took a bite.  The chocolate bread and the raisin bread were well prepared without being too sweet but we still wanted more of the croissants.

Their fresh orange juice is refreshing and just what we needed to kickstart our day. We had ordered for the mango juice thinking it was fresh as well and when we double checked, they told us that the Mango Juice was the only one out of the menu that was not fresh, and was made of juice concentrate. So people hoping for fresh mango juice, take note! Special mention to the staff who were courteous and ensured that service was good.

Would we haul to PAUL again?

Maybe. But the next time we do, we are sticking to croissants and coffee!  

Rating

PAUL is located at Villagio and Landmark