There is a wonderful cognitive dissonance to Bistro Aix. It thinks it is in Paris but it is really in Crouch End, the flatter twin to Muswell Hill, a district so charismatic it had its own serial killer in Dennis Nilsen. (He killed more people in Willesden, but Willesden doesn’t receive its due: here or anywhere.)
We pick our way through the Versailles of north London, past Little Waitrose and the clock tower
I have never thrived in Paris. My sister says I always go with the wrong men, which is unfair, because it was a school trip and I had no choice about the (very small) men. I prefer the Paris of my imagination, which is quite a lot like Bistro Aix in Crouch End.
I love the grubbiness of Crouch End, which no moronic gentrification or French restaurant of any quality – and Bistro Aix has quality – can scrub out. It’s a desolate piece of north London, but everything is relative.