John Talbott's Paris

The Terroir Parisien Bourse in the 2nd: How Alleno does both classic and innovative at the same time is head-snapping.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The 2nd Terroir Parisien (Bourse) in the 2nd provided a wonderful experience a month ago or so and was on Colette's list (yes, she's back after the threat of being outed, she wishes to stand tall - after all, after I got back from Viet Nam our Anti-War activities resulted in our being stalked, tapped, threatened with kidnapping and bombs and I was put on Nixon's Enemies' List so, an "outing" threat is hardly big stuff).  Once again, as we approached the Bourse, I was convinced the joint was shuttered, but no, it was up and running on New Year's Eve lunch mind you and its tables (except the tables d'hote) full.  The menu (that is carte) is new - changed just last week said the English-speaking Queen of the Front Room who resembled Patricia Kaas, but no, cannot be.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 In any case, we looked at the carte and decided that the 1sts looked great so we ordered four of them - the first of the firsts was Colette's mushrooms and spinach which were very very good and I had the just very good warm leeks in vinaigrette with chopped hard eggs atop.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As mains, Colette had the pigeon wrapped in green cabbage with sauteed foie gras and I had two more starters - the sliced sausage of sweetbreads on top of sliced warm potatoes I had last time and so-called langoustines in jelly - well - I took one bit of the langoustines and declared this THE MOST BORING DISH OF 2013 and then dipped the cleverly provided spoon beneath the langoustines and found the green jelly, which with the langoustines suddenly became THE MOST INTERESTING DISH OF 2013 - Wow, Zow, Zap. 

For a finisher we shared their version of a Paris-Brest which was first rate.

The bill for four starters, one main, one dessert, two coffees, no bottled water, rather better bread than last time and one bottle of essentially their house wine, comes to 100 E a couple.

Les Enfants Rouges in the 3rd: 3 Wows and a Whoopee.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was at the "new" Enfants Rouges in the 3rd its opening week amost 3 months ago and as others have noted, places frequently get much better with time - and indeed this was; the bumps in the road then - waits between courses and a non-functioning credit card machine - are evened out, although the sound levels when more than 6 people are talking is awful, however the food, while completely different, was just as good if not better. We were started off with amuses of soups of potatoes with bacon cream and a very nice Gaillac (with neat eyes and a button nose).

 

 

 

 

 

 

All of chose to start out with the previously sauteed on the skin side daurade, served room temperature on great pasta with a condiment of chives, green fish eggs, shallots were they? and vinegar was it?  Terrific.  Then my long-suffering wife had scallops with cauliflower, brussel sprouts, sliced raw mushrooms and fish eggs which she declared the "best of" 2013 and the three boys had the civet of biche in a sauce of such dark richness it was almost wicked to eat.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then we went our separate ways; two having the nut cake/cookies; two the baba - both were really over the top.

With decent bread, 2 bottles of wine, 2 coffees and no bottled water the bill per couple comes to 102 E.

P.S. Even on Monday when the Marche des E R is supposed to be closed, the traiteur marocain was in business, so dinner for at least two nights is certain.

 

Lazare in the 8th: Good and bad news about Sunday lunch.

So, it's Sunday during the Bermuda triangle weekend between Christmas and New Year's and I call 2 weeks ago and snare a reservation - for 12 pile mind you not 12h30 as I requested.  OK.  We arrive on the dot and a French family of four (including two kids on scooters) are negotiating/pleading endlessly to enter without having reserved - no way.

We're finally seated - given a list of juices, wines and waters but no food - oh, oh, I forgot to ask if it was just "brunch" on weekends.  Turn to wonderful wife - "Where do we escape to?"  "Le Garnier"  "No, I hated it last year."  "You decide."  Aye yie yie.

Waiter arrives, and says "Here's the menu today - salmon, chicken and a tart [unspoken - "take it or leave it"]. Aye yie yie.  Turn to wife - she nods "OK" nod.  "D'accord, Monsieur."

 

 

 

 

 

 

The salmon was moderately strongly smoked and thickly cut (not your Murray's or Zabar's thin) and with the celery remoulade with Granny Smith bits was quite quite nice, albeit too much by half.  The chicken from the Landes had a nicely crisp skin for the most part and the thigh and leg were moist but the breat overly dry albeit nicely seasoned or marinated or brined or whatever; the mashies that came with it were deemed average by my mashed potato co-diner.  Finally the two desserts - a chocolate tart with noisettes and pineapple financier with a crunchy caramelized top - were superb, Eric Frechon at his best.

Our bill was 125 E with day-old bread, which when toasted was OK, a bottle and glass of wine, no bottled water and decent coffees, was 125 E.

Go on a Sunday?  Well the good news is that's it's not a dreaded American imitated brunch but the bad news is it's much like one gets in New York during Restaurant Week, OK but nothing to write home about.

Le Parc (Ballet) at the Garnier: Warning.

My wonderful wife put an article from the NYT in front of me a few days ago with the note "This sounds wonderful" about a new ballet - Le Parc at the Garnier. Now even though I met her in standing room at the "old" Met for an opera (Walkure), I trust her judgement on ballet.  And so, for the first time since I went to the Jerome Robbins' tribute here, when as loyal readers will recall, I rubbed ah, ah, ah, derrieres with Madame Chirac, I found myself at the last minute trying to get "rush" seats for a ballet, since their website said no tickets were left.

After paying a scalper the equivalent of a ransom for my oldest born son (easy cuz I don't have one) we entered this great shrine.  Frisons!  Wonderful; good view, settle in for a treat - not!

After 10 minutes of jerks banging chairs on the parquet, jerks dragging ladies back and forth and jerks making some militaristic motions toward other jerks, I was ready to leave - screw the Euros wasted. But I know my beloved wife wanted to stay and since I didn't have a car parked nearby, I could bus home.  So I waited 15, then 20, then 25 minutes and finally exited the plush box out onto the street and up to the Galeries for some foie gras, chorizo, herring, white beans, caviar and spicy olives for the Reveillon.

I've read and followed the recs of the NYT's critics for 60 years; been devoted to Craig Claiborne, Frank Rich and John Martin and Anna Kisselgoff not to mention Brooks Atkinson, but this "new" (since 2005 yet) ballet critic lady, one Roslyn Sulcas, sure had this one wrong.  Or maybe it was the fault of the choreographer - one Angelin Preljocaj - in any case I ain't goin' again 'til they bring back Robbins or Nureyev's stuff.  It was dumb, boring and involved too many jerks.

Pirouette in the 1st: the front and back of the house were ripping.

Pirouette in the 1st is one of those really feel good and eat good places where you feel equally well-treated by the front room guys and chefs in back.  The menu always seems interesting and doesn't repeat much, so everytime is like the first time for us.

We started with a grilled leek topped with chips of dried grison beef, faiselle cheese and nasturtium oil.  It was truly astonishing; light, flavorful and unexpected.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For mains, my wife for half a century ordered what she's been having much of that time - scallops - but this time with grapefruit of all things - and I had chevreuil with sauteed foie gras with a rich dark sauce - that was almost like a lievre royale, scrumptious.

To top this off, she had a rice pudding with just enough caramel sauce to make it come alive in a really tasty manner.

Our bill, with a bottle and glass of wine, OK bread for a weekend and two coffees, was 93 E.  a bargain and a half give the quality of the food.

David Toutain in the 7th: If you liked Agape Substance, you'll love the eponymous R.D.T.; if you didn't...........

 

 

8.4 Restaurant David Toutain, 29, rue Surcouf in the 7th, 01.45.50.11.10, (Buses: 28, 69 and 80), closed weekends, opened Monday (that is, 5 days ago) and already is hopping - chock-a-block full, noisy (85.7 dB) and full of energy and warmth from the chef on down.  Y'all know the chef, David Toutain, if not from L’Arpege, then from his time with the black-hatted Marc Veyrat or at the wonderful Mugaritz in Spain or even more recently at Agapé Substance.  When I ate at the last, I gave it an 8.0/10 and thought it was one of the best of 2011.  Well, things have gotten more even and mo-bettah.  But to that later.

The "menus" are 68 (117 paired with wines) and 98 (158 E with wines) - pricy for a young chef but cheap for the American visitors in the 7th and students at the U. a few doors away.  It's a forced-choice deal, so sit back and, like at Spring, enjoy!  It's a trip - 14 or maybe 15 courses, and that's for the less expensive menu, Lord knows how many are on the degustatation one.  Rather than describe each let me throw them out -

 

 

 

 

1 parsnips disguised as pickles
2 pork rinds and smoked potato puree
3 a "croque monsieur" (well sort of)
4 ice and fennel
5 smoked ham and cauliflower
6 egg and corn
7 oysters, brussel sprout hearts and foie gras
8 encornets and yucca
9 great bread and butter
10 scallops and carrots and beets
11 black sesame mousse with smoked fish
12 duck with crustaceans - HEAVENLY
13 cauliflower andwhite chocolate
14 Jerusalem artichoke and pineapple, chestnuts and celery root
15 coffee - superb!

The variety of beautifully designed plates and bowls enhanced each presentation.  We also enjoined talking with Thai, David's wife, who was assisting in the kitchen and the dining room,

Any problems John? Well now that you mention it - The noise level from a table of 4,  in the area where we were seated, (at the back, down one step), made it difficult for us to hear one another. The rigidity of having only one person take food and wine orders. The sameness of the dishes - protein things with vegetable things with bouillons on top - which repetitiveness, my old Psychiatry Professor would declare was consistent rather than recurrent as did dining companion who was well known to the house.

Any striking pluses? The wonderful warmth of the newly gathered staff (quite astonishing). The innovative, consistent, explosive food. The presence of the chef's charming SF-born wife whose photos opposite the toilettes are dazzling (see below). The ability of DT to be on top of it all but not micromanaging.

Our bill, after a trip upstairs to see Madame's photos, with their bottled water (4E), 1.5 bottles of wine and three coffees, was 174.66 E per couple.

Go?  As Francois Simon would say - "One must."

Paris Pix: Merry (garish) Christmas

American(type)s in Paris.

November 27^th in the New York Times, Pamela Drukerman wrote about Americans in Paris and while the article was somewhat amusing, it didn’t/doesn’t match my encounters with my fellow Yankees over the past three decades.  She describes three groups: fantasists, denialists and anthropologists.  To grossly over-simplify, she says the fantasists are looking for the Hemingway/etc. experience, the denialists are largely the dragooned spouses of men assigned here and anthropologists are like her, those folks looking for a genuine experience.

I’ve heard about the second group from my wife, who after we’d actually bought a piece of Paris property, joined a couple of women’s groups that were replete with the wives of Masters of the Universe – and for them France could have been Chad or Bangladesh, they were dragged here and forced to live in dreadful Paris.

And yes, I’ve run into some visitors who want to eat where F. Scott did, drink where Hemingway did and smoke where Sartre did.  But none of them were here for long.

No, my ex-pat contacts, albeit skewed because I do a lot of restaurant reporting, tended to do well in French in school, had an obsessive interest in food (the preparation and devouring thereof) and often moved to Paris with no job but an intense desire to make enough money to eat well.  And they’ve done remarkably well; sure, those doing piece work sometimes struggle between assignments; sure, some have to have day jobs to have fun at night, and sure, some have changed jobs to get to the right balance.  And almost all have hooked up with a French-person of the same or opposite sex.

So, my point.  While Ms. Druckerman may be correct about the world of her contacts, I suspect the other 30,000 or so US ex-pats here would each describe their fellow ex-pats in quite different groupings according to their lives and interest.

Reviews of reviews: The week of December 16th, 2013.

Monday-Tuesday, in A Nous Paris, they featured holiday items and announced the opening of a Brie Bar in the Hotel Renaissance Paris-Arc de Triomphe, 39, ave de Wagram in the 17th, 01.55.37.55.57, open 7/7 costing about 10 E per person tasting.

Tuesday, in Le Fooding, Yves Nespoulous reviewed Caluc, 11, rue des Petits-Ecuries in the 10th, 01.42.47.17.29, closed weekends for take-out calucs, a sort of Aveyronnaise wrap.

In Wednesday’s Figaroscope, Emmanuel Rubin did his traditional end of the year (2013) “Best 15 Restaurants” that included:
Lazare
Caillebotte
Buvette
Bistrot Belhara
Enfants Rouges
Frenchie to go
Fish Club
Roca
Okuda
Encore
Richer
Clamato
Ito
Le Meurice
BAT

In a listing of the best “vins chauds” Alice Bosio and Colette Monsat gave:
Le Kremlin
Mini-Palais
Le Stube Verdeau
Chez Georges
Le BarOurcq

And in the 5 best fondu-raclette places they listed
Le Chalet Savoyard
Pain, vin, fromages
Les Fondus de la raclette
Heureux comme Alexandre
Chalet de Neuilly

And Francois Simon devoted his Hache Menu to the aforementioned Paradis.

Thursday, in L’Express, Ulla Majoube had a piece on the aforementioned Le 68 of Guy Martin. And in a year-end summary, François-Régis Gaudry, Charles Patin O'Coohoon and Mina Soundiram listed their top restos of the year:
La Scène
Le Lancaster
Frenchie to go
Lazare
Septime
La Pointe du Groin
Richer
Caillebotte
Gourmandises
Les Balètis
La Boite a Sardine (the latter three outside Paris)

Paris Pix: It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas everywhere I go....