Country French food at The Pleasant Peasant

For some reason, decent casual French bistros/cafes where are hard to find in Orange County, which is especially frustrating for me, because: 1) I like to eat good sandwiches, and a decent French bistro is always a good choice to find such things, and 2) I like my variety. Fortunately, there is a decent French bistro in Newport Beach, the Pleasant Peasant, hooray! =)

(Just a note for anyone out there, the only other good French bistro I could find in the OC was French 75, also in Newport Beach, at Fashion Island. A bit more expensive, but I think the food is better there. No photos though...not yet, at least. Another place that used to be reasonable was Vie de France in South Coast Plaza...but after they moved to their new larger location two years ago, the quality went down a lot, unfortunately.)

A simple, but warm and satisfying soup - the classic French Onion Gratine.

The soup du jour - a carrot puree. Smooth and flavorful, without being chunky, like other carrot soups. Very tasty.

A pate sandwich. I would have liked the french baguette to be warm and toasty, but the texture was nice and chewy at least. They served it with chips...I must say, I think it would have been better with shoestring french fries.

Jen ordered a goat cheese salad - the goat cheese was too strong for me to eat =P.

And lastly, of course, dessert: a Poire Belle-Héléne, a dessert which I haven't seen elsewhere. There is a scoop of French vanilla ice cream, topped with a poached pear, warm semi-sweet chocolate sauce and sliced almonds. Yum.