TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums St. Maarten - St. Martin LaVilla Review

Always one of our favorites that we almost always celebrate our anniversary here.
We were greeted with hugs and kisses from Florence and shown to our usual table overlooking the street. John Carlos has developed into an excellent server with a warm, inviting smile and a guarantee that you will enjoy all his recommendations. He quickly delivered a couple glasses of complimentary celebratory champagne. My wife started with a special of wahoo ceviche and it was the best raw fish of the week so far.
My foie gras was better tasting than the previous one I enjoyed at L'Auberge, but I now have to say that at L'Auberge the portion was an unusual almost double size portion. My pour of sauterne was large enough that I was able to save some to compliment my dessert. There is nice spacing between courses. I will say after some drink and food the humidity was starting to warm up as it does on many SXM nights.
Entrees included a special of a trio of fish for my wife including tuna, mahi-mahi, grouper. Although the slices of fish were thin, they remained moist. A small side dish of asparagus risotto disappeared very quickly .I went out of the norm and thoroughly enjoyed a perfectly cooked medium breast of duck with a wonderful cranberry sauce. Both dishes were garnished with petite broccoli florets and light whipped sweet potatoes, while the fish also had braised fennel.
Desserts were my wife's favorite "pick me up", an iced coffee drink with ice cream, Kahlua and whipped cream. My favorite, tiramisu was perfect for my almost satisfied appetite. Some more champagne was delivered compliments from some friends we met on the plane earlier in the week and had enjoyed their meal at LaVilla that we had recommended for them to try. We moved to a cooler table in the rear of the restaurant near the air conditioner to enjoy the two types of complimentary rum placed on the table. The coconut cream was preferred over the stronger vanilla-banana. LaVilla has always offered 1-1 and their 3 course prix-fixe is very reasonable at $49. LaVilla remains
one of the best for food and service.

Wonderful review. The food and service sound great. Haven't been there for a few years, will have to plan to return!

Thanks so much for posting your reviews of the various restaurants!! <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/Clapping.gif" alt="" /> I suppose it is too much to ask, but any pictures??

I am always amazed how LaVilla gets little attention here on this board. We rediscovered it last year...and ended up there THREE times in three weeks. The 49 dollar price fix is one of the BEST deals on the island!!! Always have had GREAT service with GREAT food there. In fact, one night last week took three other couples there, and each and everyone had a super meal that everyone talked about for the rest of the week!!! As I have said many times over the last few months.....Piazza Pascal and La Villa are our favorites in Grand Case.

While my wife is the computer person, I will have to give it a try as pictures certainly make the food taste better. All of our pictures have not been transferred to the computer yet. If you would be kind enough, and I know I'm not the first, review how to attach pictures.

Love LaVilla. First time we tried it was upon a 5pm arrival staying at Grand Case Beach Club.

Usually, we eat late in evening but we hadn't eaten since a light breakfast and we were famished. Found LaVilla and an early bird special before 6pm. It more than fit the bill. We've returned every visit since and haven't been disappointed.

The first thing is that the pictures have to be online somewhere. Once they are online, you can just post a link. Having the picture actually appear in the post is better, but a bit more complicated. Check out this thread in the FAQ section regarding inserting pictures in general.

If you decide to use Photobucket to post your pictures, check out Beerman's photobucket instructions.

Thanks again for the posting.

We've preferred La Villa to L'Auberge Gourmande since it opened, I guess since Christophe and Florence, originally of L'Auberge Gourmande, own and operate La Villa.

That said, we didn't even get to Grand Case once during our entire three week stay last year. There are just so many great places closer to "home" that it's hard to make that long drive in the evening.

We loved La Villa, and hope to return. But, we have the same "problem" - we have too many places that we mean to revisit. If we went back to all of them, we'd be there for months, not weeks, and would never try any new ones. <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/dine.gif" alt="" />