L’Oubli

Why are all the best spots closed?! This review is way past due. I celebrated my birthday here two years ago and it was fantastic. It was a December Friday evening and we pretty much had the place to ourselves.
L’oubli offered a good selection of French tapas and wine. We also got a free round of shots when we showed the Unilocal check in offer. The staff was friendly and accommodating. I love the décor and atmosphere. What a cute place! I will miss L’Oubli!

French tapas? They seem to be channeling Ibiza vibes. The dance music was blasting at 5pm on Sunday and half of the patrons there were not exactly sober. This ain’t bad, people are enjoying themselves right? It just depends on how well is your mood matching this place.
The DJ was pretty good, I must say.
The bartender was great, very sweet and attentive. I sampled two wine and did not like them at all so I went with the fool proof beer. The kitchen was kind of slow that day and the staff apologized for it. The food was alright, I wouldn’t go there for it.
Would I go back? Probably, to get lose with a couple of drinks and perhaps go wild?
p. s. The bathroom is lit with red light, so ladies, I wouldn’t recommend you to try refresh your makeup here while being inebriated.

Sure, I’ve blacked out here before.
I think it was an aged whiskey that the owner recommended that threw me over the edge. But I was definitely having a good time before that.
It’s a small place with a few tables and a very interesting bar selection. There’s always a beer I haven’t tried before and they’ll pretty much mix you anything you ask for.
The staff is nice and will sit down and talk to you if it’s not too busy (which it rarely ever is).
I’ve never eaten here, but I’m definitely intrigued by the menu.

The blue potatoes are solid! Also try the Pâté.
There is always a heady bottled beer selection. Plus you can’t go wrong with an endless brown liquor selection and a thoughtful cocktail list.

L’Oubli has the potential to be really popular– it has a few things going for it, including laid back vibe, cute interior, and great LES location. But the food is lacking. We ordered:
— Watermelon + goat cheese– this wasn’t bad, but was a little strange– a bowl of watermelon cubes with chunks of goat cheese
— Crab + avocado– the crab was really fishy; we barely ate this one
— Ratatouille– ok, but bland!
The place was completely empty on a Monday night. Service was really friendly. I would return for drinks but def. not for food.

We were looking for a small place with reasonable prices for food and wine and boy did L’oubli deliver!
It was 8 on a Saturday night and we were the only people in the place, so I admit it was a little off putting– but the bartender (who turned out to be the owner) was so friendly it quickly didn’t matter! I also was really happy to be able to get a bottle of wine in the $ 30 price range– all the while listening to James Brown.
For dinner my boyfriend and I shared steak tartare, chorizo and chocolate on crostini, mac & cheese, croque madame, and goat cheese to finish. The tartare and mac & cheese were my favorites, but everything was very tasty.
The décor was nice, location was good, and the great service from a owner who genuinely cared made for a really great start to our evening.

A hip French tapas bar in the Lower East Side[1]? Yes, please.
The only thing ruining the Gallic vibe? A Knicks game playing. Luckily service was on-​point, so it was forgivable. A chilled glass of white[2] certainly didn’t hurt matters.
L’Oubli is cool as a cucumber, and just as understated — perfect for secrets.
[1] Plus easily-​accessible, a plus in the LES.
[2] Credit cards accepted.

I come here three or four times a week. Sometimes more than that just to say hi. I adore everyone who works here — show up on a Saturday night and you’ll probably find the bartenders keeping themselves entertained with some combination of the running man, the water sprinkler, and other ridiculous moves.
I don’t always eat here, but when I do, I usually go with the $ 8 prix-​fixe with the ratatouille or bruschetta (not the welsh rarebit) and a glass of bordeaux plus the $ 12 baked camembert. It’s probably not good for my health that I eat 2 wheels of camembert a week now thanks to L’oubli, but I don’t care. It’s worth it. Also noteworthy: endive apple & roquefort salad, steak tartare and cold truffled potato salad.
Love that it’s rarely overcrowded, and when it is, it’s usually filled with neighbors.

Bar tucked away in the cusp of the LES to help you forget all your troubles and have a few snacks complimented with a few classy cocktails.
Good vibe and friendly ppl :)

Walking aimlessly on a Tuesday night in search of a dinner deal, we happened upon L’Oubli. It was close to empty which typically I avoid but for some reason we agreed to give it a go. The menu had a good number of small plates. We opted for octopus carpaccio, bruschetta, avocado and crab salad, country pâté, chicken skewers, foie crostini and a number of other items. The food didn’t exactly blow me away but if you’re curious, try the crab with avocado tomato salad and bruschetta. Those were pretty decent. The foie crostini were disappointing and the chicken skewer was overwhelmed with pepper.
I’d come here again for drinks. The vibe was cool and the service was friendly.

A quint little bar, almost like a neighborhood bar. It was loud when I was here, but that was because I was here for a celebration of sorts with a large group of people. It’s probably more quiet normally without us I can imagine.
The atmosphere is great and I had an absolutely delicious Bordeaux that I can’t remember the name of. It was juicy, chewy, and with great flavors, definitely my kind of wine. I think they have tapas, too. Would really like to try that next time I’m back. Definitely give this place a shot.
****

The L’Oubli menu offers a nice array of French tapas that are pretty good. I honestly don’t know what else to say about the place so here’s a haiku:
L’Oubli’s food is fine,
the crab and goat cheese crepes,
they were the winners.

I chanced upon this place through an invitation to a friend’s birthday party. I think the venue worked pretty well for that purpose. We were able to occupy all of the tables in the back and be largely undisturbed. For a Friday night it was decidedly calm at 7pm and became animated and noticeably loud by 9pm. So the ambiance will vary a bit depending upon when you visit. The bar is nice though, the staff is friendly, and there is generally a good vibe here.
And while the drink selection varies quite a bit offering a nice menu of choices, the food is the least desirable part of the experience. Some choices are solid, others are not. The crab and goat cheese crepes ($ 8) were decent. I loved the plentiful use of crab and the lightly made crepes, but the goat cheese was difficult to detect, so there was really only one note here. The foie gras crostini ($ 10) were really disappointing. Thin slivers of bread topped with cheap pâté. Meh. However, the macaroni and cheese ($ 7) was solid and exceptionally large for a «small plate» dish. Great crispy texture on top balanced by creaminess underneath. Good cheese choices really made this dish come together well.
Overall, great place to grab a drink or two. Avoid having dinner here though. You are better off just ordering one of the small plates to pair with your drink choice and tying you over until you have dinner somewhere else. If you do decide to have dinner here, keep in mind that two small plates is plenty, no need to order three like I did. One last tip, large groups are automatically charged a 20 percent gratuity which is labelled as «miscellaneous» on the bill. Be aware lest you double tip.

A friend who lives in the LES suggested I celebrate my birthday here, and from now on, I am trusting every suggestion she makes!!!
From the lighting to the music, having drinks here is a great experience. It takes you back in time a little bit. For example, I love that they do not serve champagne in flutes. Instead, they serve it in those wide-​mouthed glasses that remind me of fancy dinners with my dad and his friends. Such nice memories. At the beginning of the evening, they were playing Billie Holiday, as well as some other jazz. Perfect.
The service is great, but the food is only so-​so. There are some hits, but definitely some misses as well, like the Welsh Rarebit. I expected more from the goat cheese and crab meat crepes. You cannot go wrong with the baked Camembert. The cheese plate is quite good, but the tiny portion of cheese sort of belies the idea of a cheese plate.
I should mention that I was pleasantly surprised that, when I emailed the owner to ask about space and crowd situation, he offered to set aside seats for my party. I don’t usually consider bars/​lounges in the LES to be very courteous, not even with repeat guests. As for the crowd situation, it only starts to get crowded around 8 or so, which makes this place great for after-​work drinks.
L’Oubli, je t’aime. Merci pour une soirée mervelleuse!

My friends and I decided to come here for celebratory dinner/​drinks the other day. It was an awesome decision!
First, as others have mentioned, the happy hour equivalent at L’Oubli is an $ 8 prix-​fixe for a glass of wine (or beer) and something from the food menu. I had a glass of bordeaux and a croque-​monsieur, both of which were very good.
We stayed for a few hours (as evidenced by the fact that we saw the Yule log DVD get to the end twice — I love the Christmas season!) and had two or three drinks and small plates each, so we tried a pretty wide variety. The endive, apple, and roquefort salad was good, as were the smoked duck breast and macaroni and cheese. Steak tartare was amazing — fresh, spicy, and served on what I think were graham crackers! Tuesday was also their fondue night, so of course we got a pot. Plenty of cheese for all.
Our waitress for the evening told us she was new on the job, but she did a great job of serving everyone there, answering our myriad questions about the menu, and keeping glasses full.
Drinks were well-​made and pretty stiff — I had my usual Manhattan after the glass of wine and enjoyed it, even if it was missing the cherry, and then I had a Brandy Alexander for dessert.
The space is nice too; not too brightly lit, and nice décor including what looked like a pressed-​tin ceiling. Music was a good progression that started off with some light jazz around 6:30−7 and moved towards pop and hip-​hop as the evening went on, but never got loud enough to interfere with easy conversation.
All in all a fantastic way to spend an evening. I’ll be back.

L’Oubli, I like you.
If you were a guy, you’d be one of those adorably quirky geeks, fun and full of life, that a girl just can’t help but smile at.
Memorable fondues (both cheese and chocolate), loved the crème burlee, the crab/​avocado salad was good but didn’t care much for the escargot potato. And awesome service.
This place has got all the right chemistry to be simply charming. I will be back.

J’admire ce restaurant. My reaction when I stepped in was purely from the gut and instantaneous: it is so laid-​back and sexy that it actually makes me WANT to get a boyfriend just so we can have multiple romantic date nights at this fine establishment.
I got to enjoy it through many «stages» of the evening. I went there at 6:30 p.m. with my roommates and our friends to celebrate a birthday. At that time, the place was empty, the lights were dim, the candles were burning, and the music was bordering jazzy to classical. The French mulled hot red wine, complete with a cinnamon stick, immediately transported me back to Vienna, Austria; I felt like I was back standing on the streets, holding it in a paper cup. This drink elicited lovely nostalgia and just as delicious as its European counterpart! Their mac and cheese was made with lovely cheeses and pixie dust. (I’m absolutely positive about that last ingredient.) I also partook in some wild boar prosciutto… I’ve had better prosciutto in my lifetime, in general, but if some prosciutto I didn’t care for was the worst part of my evening, I really have NOTHING to complain about, do I?
Closer to 9 PM, the tables started to fill… more «date night» couples than anything, sharing wine and tapas, jazzier music now playing in the background. Closer to 11:30, the «bar crowds» started to roll in, and with that came a change in atmosphere: the energy inside changed with the newest arrivals, and jazz was replaced with Crowded House, Phoenix, and N.E.R.D. They catered to their patrons, and and energy continued to stay at a lively but not frantic pace.
The staff was beyond friendly, and even a small dispute I had on my credit card was quickly handled by (whom I assumed to be) the owner or manager of L’Oubli. I never for a minute felt like I was imposing upon his time, nor did he make me feel like he was begrudgingly fixing the mathematical error on my tab. He was genuinely kind and quick about correcting the error, and for that, I thanked him profusely.
Folks, this is simply a good place. If I wasn’t so verbose, I could have left it at just the preceding sentence. ;-)
GO!

Quaint LES French tapas bar.
Had dinner here and tried a bunch of their small plates … recommend the Steak Tartare (my favorite of the night — served up on 4 crackers with bountiful flavor), Tuna Tahitienne (2^nd place winner — brought to you in a wine glass) and Octopus Carpaccio (thinly sliced octopus topped with a mango salsa).
The glass of Bordeaux that I shared went very well with the Steak Tartare — definitely a nice pairing.
Totally friendly co-​owner /​bartender /​waiter who wasn’t shy about sharing the outlines of the family recipes.
If you want to try this place out, I have some extra vouchers which will save you $ 10 off your drinks /​tapas — just let me know.

Went to L’Oubli last week with friends.
I’d never heard of it, and considering that I frequent this neighborhood regularly, was surprised to learn of its existence. It’s pretty easy to miss, despite its proximity to Houston.
It’s cute inside – a little too cute, in my opinion, for its surroundings. Which I quite enjoyed. The lighting is soft, there are mirrors and barstools/​tables along the wall. By no means quiet, it still managed to feel like the kind of place where one could have an intimate conversation, if for no other reason than the décor itself.
It’s also fairly small, which is fine – at 11:30 on Saturday the place was busy but not overcrowded. Again, no complaints there.
Drinks were good – strong, but not knock-​you-​down ridiculous. An average wine list, but the price was right! Between $ 5 and $ 8 per glass. The cocktail specials involved brandy, bourbon, or applejack, none of which suited me so I had my typical Hendrick’s and Tonic. The service was a little slow but as I said they were busy, and the bartenders did a fine job handling the crowd. If the place got packed, they might be struggling to keep up.
All in all, a nice experience. A good place to convene with friends before venturing elsewhere in the LES. I’m not shouting from the rooftops about it, but really can’t complain about anything.

New Demarchelier joint in LES. If Balthazaar’s mimicry of Frenchness is kitsch and overdone, this place gets the French bar vibe down. It almost doesn’t even feel tried, unless you step outside and realize you’re in the Lower East Side and not the Marais.* Kind of reminds me of Le Perle — or any number of bars in Paris, really.
Details? J’ai oublie. Excusez-​moi. Except for the specials written on the huge mirror. Catering to the narcissist, much? Oh, wait, what? I’m not admiring my face, just checking out this duck salad listing, which is delicious.
We stumbled in after a complicated rooftop party nearby. A friend of a friend was waitressing and we tried out some drinks. Strong and tasty. Beware of creepy old men at the bar, who are apparently always there.
*Except for the random ugly American flag at the door, which felt like an after thought lest the décor is too effectively French.
I want to say there was the zinc bar counter top, but I didn’t really hang around the bar too much due to aforementioned creep.