Best of Boston

French cuisine is back, bébé, and who’d have guessed that Jamie Mammano, king of client-wowing wallet lighteners like Mistral and Ostra, would be the one to nail its kicked-back neo-bistro form. In such an unassuming South End storefront, no less, with dreamy apps that include mahogany-burnished duck confit on melted-onion-studded potatoes Lyonnaise, dragged through “broken garlic butter” puddles; reasonably priced entrées, like a magnifique bavette steak; and nary a wobble in his restaurant empire’s trademark perfectionism.