The Secret Garden is definitely a secret. The Sunday brunch was amazing. Great price for the delicious food and the ambiance is super. I recommend it to anyone that lives an intimate and delightful brunch. Their selection is great and all the deserts to melt for. Good job Chef Michel!

Not much of a lunch crowd (we ate alone), but table and cooking service from the owner was delightful. The guy clearly knows how to cook and for transitioning from working with a contractor to waiting the table he gets a big thumbs up from me. This seems to be a great place for dinner. Too bad I'm only ever in the area for lunch...

I had to do some errands in the Somis area such as going to Underwood Farms and Somis Nut house & also going to friends later on in Simi Valley so I called up Secret Garden at about 1:30pm to see if I could make it to lunch since lunch hour ended at 2:30 pm. However, Michel the chef/owner told me that kitchen stopped serving at 2 pm. There was no way I could make it to Moorpark by 2pm since it takes about 45 minutes from La Crescenta so I told him that I would have to come at another time. Michel told me that it would be all right for me to come by 2:30 pm so I pre-ordered my Quail Stuffed with Sausage & Mushrooms on a Bed of Crispy Potatoes and Chives in order to not linger at his restaurant too long after closing time. The interior of the restaurant is genteel with pinkish floral curtains wrapped with thick gold cords. A small tapestry hangs on the wall as well as prints framed. The chairs are mismatched but not to distraction. I personally like eclectic interior design so that not all things have to match. There only has to be a sensibiity that reflects the owner's tastes and personality. There are chandeliers here and there with a painted white faux tin ceiling. The decor in some ways reflects an old fashioned Victorian parlor or dining room in the fin de dix-neuvieme siècle. The Quail came on time, & it was plump & golden colored with its tiny drum stick & wings protruding. I ate the mini drumstick first, & it had a well modulated saltiness & a nuanced sage-like flavour. I used my knife to cut into the body of the quail, & to my surprise, it was totally deboned. Deboning takes time, effort, & finesse so I appreciate the care so that I didn't have to do any surgical proceedures to get to the sausage & mushroom mixture. The sausage itself was slightly rough ground & had a sage/fennel seed perfume. The quail sat on a bed of "shoe string" pommes frites & a demi-glace sauce with an addition of a bit of red wine that added a gastric to enliven the oily, heavier quality of the quail. The quail itself was moist & flavoured by the sausage so that this quail was a joy to eat. Good deal at $13 considering the labor involved. A Robert Hall Cabernet Sauvignon from Paso Robles 2009 was slightly jammy but modulated by a light tanin & acid while giving out a bouquet of black plum, black cherry, little cigar. The fruity flavors with a touch of dark chocolate & slight smokiness was a good enhancer to the herb intensive infused meats. A bit pricey at $9. I ordered the Apricot Bread Pudding with a Cream Vanilla sauce, & asked Michel the chef if there were any cognac baked into the bread pudding. He said no, but offered to add Grand Marnier to the Cream Vanilla sauce since it is actually cognac infused with bitter Sevilla oranges. The bread pudding was slightly crusty on top & more souffle-like moist & soft as you work down. The petit pichet of the Cream Vanilla/Grand Marnier Sauce could be poured at will whenever the need arose. $8 Neige, which means snow, was like drinking a rich concentrated apple cider that has buttery, spicy undertones with a touch of apple cider sourness modulating the sweet honey Mead-like quality. Butteriness in the bread pudding & the Neige complemented each other, & the sweet sourness kept the bread pudding/Neige combination from becoming too cloyingly sweet. I've had Calvados from Normandy, France which is more like an Eau de Vie or unaged Cognac, but Neige was my first in experiencing an exotic Apple Eiswein. Although I didn't ask for the price when I ok'ed Neige, $20 for a small glass was the price of admission to educate myself Oenologically speaking.` Since I arrived at the end of lunch hour, there were only two guests so I found out that Michel is from Lyon which is regarded by most French to be the culinary capital of France. I talked about going to Collonges au Mont d'Or which is near Lyon to go to Paul Bocuse's eponymous restaurant, which is a Guide Michelin 3-Star restaurant, back in the mid 90's & having the famous Poulet de Bresse there. Also asked if he had ever gone to Ferdnand Point's restaurant, Le Pyramid, where Paul Bocuse worked, but realized that Chef Michel was probably too young to have ever gone there. If you know French cuisine in particular, Chef Michel goes out of his way to make your stay at his restaurant more fine tuned & thoughtful since he knows that these guests will appreciate his extra attention and consideration. This restaurant is a place where you must take your time to savor & enjoy the nuances. This is not a place for impatient people who want to gulp their food & run off with a cell phone in one ear. Also definitely not for people who are accustomed to $2 specials at Denny's.....Then you will be disappointed. Chef Michel has cool wine bottles with a picture of the Beach Boys (1963) at the bar, but we both realize the wine is plonk & by now has undergone Maderisé.