La Vie Menu

La Vie Restaurant Review:

Rosemead, with its scores of Asian eateries, is not the place one would expect to find a traditional French menu, but that is exactly what La Vie offers. Tucked into a nondescript mini-mall, the modest dining room is filled with tables topped with pink linen, candles and fresh roses, and the walls are lined with reproductions of French masterpieces. The restaurant, operated by a Vietnamese family, offers familiar bistro starters such as garlicky escargots, French onion soup and prawns bathed in a silky mustard cream sauce. Entrées (all of which come with soup and salad, and coffee) include a well-prepared coq au vin, sweetbreads in Madeira sauce, crispy duck with an orange-scented glaze, salmon in sorrel sauce, braised rabbit, buttered lobster, and garlic-crusted rack of lamb. Most patrons finish up with a Grand Marnier soufflé, which rivals that of a much fancier venue. Prices here are remarkably low. There may be better French restaurants in town --- though few in the heart of the San Gabriel Valley --- but La Vie is such an unexpected discovery that one’s first visit is often fondly remembered.