Envying ladies who lunch

After an early start with breakfast meetings, and then posting the consequences, I managed to escape to lunch with a friend from Australia, her husband and another Australian. Went to Restaurant Les Ombres on the roof of the new Musée du quai Branly. It's distinguished not only by the view of its next door neighbour, the Eiffel Tower, but by an excellent chef. I had la carte, which today consisted of:

• Salade de mâche en écrin de noix de Saint-Jacques, vinaigrette tiède à l’huile de noisette
• Moules de Bouchot aux chorizo et parmesan, avec grosses frites confites à la graisse d’oie, and
• De Paris à Brest en pâte à choux, crème pralinée à l’ancienne

All accompanied by a lovely Givrey Champs Lalot Vieilles Vignes. I don't know what vegetables were in that salad. Mâche certainly, but also some sort of very crisp round stalk, cut about the size of baby peas. The scallops were raw, and very thinly sliced. The hazelnut oil and the odd toasted nut pulled it all together beautifully.

A couple of hours of good conversation and good food left me motivated to try to walk off some of the calories, and the left bank is a good place to do that, even if it's cold outside. The reports of 30 cm of snow and cold back home takes the edge off even that.

Chaumette

A list of favourite restaurants in Paris I got from a friend came with the notation that Chaumette is the author's family's favourite Paris Bistro, despite its not having a history with Hemmigway. I can see the point. It's a young crew, and chef Tanguy le Gall does an excellent job on classic bistro fare. Near the ever-expanding Radio France HQ, it has only about 30 seats, but a good menu, and the food is well cooked and well presented. One quirky feature is "pommes de mer": little ratté potatoes roasted with a sprinkling of coarse sea salt crystals. A little out of the way but well worth the walk from nearest metro stop. (Wierdly, YouTube has a video of Chaumette, credited to Philippe Noiret.)
Chaumette (16e arrondissement) 7 rue Gros, tel 01 42 88 29 27

Les Cocottes

Taking advantage of a cold, snowy-sleety night in Paris, I was successful in getting a seat at Les Cocottes de Christian Constant. There has to be some advantage to being Canadian, and braving the cold and snow to get a seat in a crowded restaurant seems to be one of them. It's a long, narrow room with a limited menu. Most of the dishes are prepared en cocotte – in small cast-iron lidded pots. Obviously not the excellent roquette salad with a poached egg and lardons coated in something like reduced balsamic vinegar. But the main of a crusty cabillaud sitting atop a bed of well roasted potatoes and carrots in jus de viande acidulée. The special of the day was rabbit in a rosemary broth. I also saw a wonderful looking roast chicken haunch on a bed of risotto. Scallops were served with endive in a bubbling mass of butter foam. As one review said: you can eat healthily here, or not. Take your pick. Well worth the effort of getting there.
133 rue St-Dominique (7th Arr) +33-1-45-50-10-31

Always befriend the bartender

A tip for the lonely traveller ;-)

Having failed for the second night to get even bar seating at the Swinging Door, I wandered further down the waterfront in SF, past La Mar, to the Waterfront Restaurant. I'd noticed it during the day's long walk. They have a lovely simple menu: several kinds of fish, grilled or roasted, with 4 kinds of sauce. Extras are extra. I started with a heritage beet salad, on a bed of arugala and frisée, then went for the Ahi Tuna, grilled, with grilled asperagus on the side. It was perfectly cooked, and the lime-cilatro mayo was a nice counterpoint. Being Sunday, I started with a martini made with a local SF gin called 209. Worth the premium price. As a wine I had a brilliant Sangiovese from Pietra Santa Winery in the heretofore unheard of Cienega Valley. It was full bodied, with a nose filled with black fruits and spice. Wish we could get those in Canada.

Oh, and the bartender... he was generous enough to top up the glass of Sangiovese and, apparently looking for conversation, offered a few complementary glasses of a Frog's Leap sauvignon blanc just to clear the bottle. As he said: "All good."

San Francisco find

A happy discovery in San Francisco: La Mar Cebicheria Peruiana. I had been trying to go to the Slanted Door for new wave Vietnamese, but it was lined out the door even though past 9 when I got there. No loss: La Mar had wonderful fresh fish, clean flavours and nice spicy aji amarillo peppers. I had half orders of a couple of kinds of cebiche (criollo and nikei) and a causa limena (crab, potatoes, aji amarillo, quail egg, and lime -- see pic.) sitting at the bar. Excellent food, and though the service was quite slow, the room is lively, and the cooks behind the bar friendly (willing to put up with painfully unpracticed Spanish) and actually from Peru!

Kickstarting the Montreal economy

Spent the weekend in Montreal with friends from Singapore, Mexico and Washington helping to keep the local economy healthy in these tough times. The restaurant industry in particular benefited. The outstanding place was Laloux. The meal there was great! For openers there was albacore tuna just seared, zucchini and cress salad, with a spicy lemon purée. A couple of mains were outstanding: arctic char, du Puy lentils, caramelized salsify, crispy lardoons for one, and seared scallops from Côte-Nord, white beet, black trumpet mushrooms, chiogga beet salad with lemon confit. Lots of words, but wonderful. Dessert, which I usually don't bother with, was just too tempting. Ever heard of anything like a ''Candy Cap'' mushroom panna cotta, ''Paula Red'' apple sorbet, topped with pecans and rosemary? Completely amazing. And for wine, a lovely 2004 Marsannay, Les Champs Salomon, Domaine Bart.

Also good, though not quite the same standard was Leméac, on the Plateau. I had some lovely

grilled calamari and zucchini, lemon and balsamic vinaigrette to start, and a main of roasted black cod with fennel and potato purée. Others had the salmon tartare and duck confit, and thought they were pretty good.

Finally we managed to fit in a visit to l'Express for lunch. Don't try to resist the duck confit en salade, but the house made ravioli are pretty good too!

The Cheese-off

I got a challenge: present enough cheese to show off the current Quebec cheese revolution to 36 people and have them face the competition from best of artisanal Wisconsin. What to do? A visit to the local cheese monger produced the following:

• Riopelle de l'Îsle
  
• Peau Rouge
• Magie de Madawaska
• Le Sieur de Duplessis
• Le Ciel de Charlevoix (a blue)
• Le Cendré
• La Sauvagine

A bunch of brilliant, mostly raw milk cheeses, perhaps a little heavy on the Tomme style (which was fine with me). See descriptions on this site.

And the result? I'd recommend all of the above -- the winner among the fans of the more odorous, softer, Euro-style entries above was hands down La Sauvagine. But surprise! While some people liked the more European style Quebec cheeses, some preferred the harder, largely saltier Wisconsin entries. Go figure. You don't lose much trying 8 or 16 excellent cheeses.

A side trip into political philosophy

I ran across this gem on the way to something else recently. It says a lot about the current state of politics, I think:

"I never meant to say that the Conservatives are generally stupid people. I meant to say that stupid people are generally Conservative. I believe that is so obviously and universally admitted a principle that I hardly think any gentleman will deny it."

-- John Stuart Mill, "Letter to the Conservative MP, Sir John Pakington" (March 1866)

On the trail of the perfect restaurant… South of France 2008

LE POÊT LAVAL

Les Hospitaliers
Le Poêt Laval 26160
04 75 46 22 32
If you are staying in la Drôme (and there are lots of wonderful places to rent by the week), this is a little self-indulgence. This is classic French well done. We had a filet d’omble with a wonderful “crumble de citron et crème d’ail doux” and a filet de lotte with bouillon des crustaces as part of a brilliant prix fixe. Go for lunch: it’s the same menu but less busy. The hotel itself is a delight, if you’re looking for a place in le Poêt Laval…

GRIGNAN
Restaurant "Le Clair De La Plume"
+33 (0)4 75 91 81 30
http://www.clairplume.com/
This is a charming tea-room with a good lunch in a tree-shaded outdoor courtyard and part of what looked like a perfectly charming little hotel in Grignan. This is a most pleasant place to stop while waiting for the château to open after the mandatory 3-hour lunch break (a curse to late risers). The château, to and from which Mme. de Sévigné wrote to her daughter in the famous 17th century collection of her letters, is worth the visit. There is also a nice gallery of prints and antique books called Dit Elle in the town, as well as a museum of typography!

DIEULEFIT
ART-HOME @ Restaurant
51, rue du Bourg 26220
+33 04 75 46 86 16
art-home@live.fr
A quirky little spot with a nice terrace on the main street of Dieulefit. Reservations advised, especially if you are planning to go on market day. The young staff are producing lovely food, focusing on regional but sometimes with an Asian flare. Fresh fish are good, as were the sampler plates the day we visited. There are a few tables on the street but these may be a challenge, depending on the quality of the street musicians.

On the trail of the perfect restaurant… Nice 2008

Sadly, I couldn’t find a source of a really brilliant Provençal soupe de poisson, so no recommendations there. But we did find one gem…

11e Art Restaurant
11, rue Meyerbeer 0600
04 93 87 57 15
A small trendy restaurant with big ambition and a chef up to the challenge. The food is a little inclined to the molecular, but still focuses on quality ingredients well prepared. Lots of interesting textures and flavours. Some surprising and delightful things appeared – avocado ice cream, for example, in a trio of avocado appetizers. Even when pressed, the wait staff decline to reveal secrets. Despite being a little out of the way this is worth the visit.

On the trail of the perfect restaurant… Marseille 2008

Marseille surpassed all expectations – a fascinating town, improving rapidly, and with fabulous food. A few highlights…

Une Table au Sud
2, Quai du port 13002
04 91 90 63 53
www.unetableausud.com
Starting with the most expensive: a Michelin 1-star. Beautiful setting on second floor with excellent view of the sun setting over the harbour. The food was good, but the service lagged its quality – timid 16-year-olds are not a good choice for the role. The wine steward knew her stuff, and could answer questions reasonably. We went for the prix fixe with wine, which was interesting, but the food did not highlight the quality of its ingredients, opting instead for visual or textural effect. Not my style: I don’t think I should be saying “that was wonderful, I wonder what it was.”

Les Arcenaulx
25, Cours d’Estienne d’Orves 13001
04 91 59 80 30
This is a lovely place on a large pedestrian court in old Marseille. Incorporating a bookstore, antiquarian bookstore and dining accessories store (napkins, rings, etc.) it is worth the visit just to see the premises, but you should definitely include a meal. They have a charming dining room and a good sized terrace (watch the evening Mistral and pedestrian traffic on the Place). Food was superbly cooked, the service first rate and friendly. Really good.

Le jardin d’á coté
Place Julien
Place Julien is worth exploring, as is the surrounding area full of small shops, emerging artists, designers (check out Madame Zaza de Marseille), and locals playing hacky sack or ghetto blasters. We stopped for lunch at this small restaurant on the square, taking advantage of its shady terrace. I ordered le plat marseillais – a selection of 6 or 8 local specialties – and couldn’t have been happier. If you’re in the neighbourhood around noon, I’d recommend it.

On the trail of the perfect restaurant… Paris 2008

Millésimes 62
13/15, place de Catalogne 75014
01 43 35 34 35
www.millesimes62.com
This place is a little out of the way unless you are staying near Montparnasse Station, but it’s very good. The atmosphere is pleasant, and service is good. In late June, the food was seasonal and fresh. Excellent fish.

Vin & Marée
276, Boulevard Voltaire 75011
01 46 47 91 39
www.vin-et-maree.com
Specializes in seafood, and it is fresh. Not to mention limited – on a Sunday evening they were out of quite a few things, but what arrived at table was well prepared. Décor and accompaniments were a bit stodgy, but overall reasonable value for money.

Bistro de Breteuil
3, place de Breteuil 75007
01 45 67 07 27
www.bistrocie.fr
In the mood for a classic neighbourhood bistro, this is a good choice. Evening prix fixe includes a very respectable choice of wines. Full in evenings, best to reserve.

Le Dôme du Marais
53 bis, rue des Francs Bourgeois 75004
01 42 75 54 17
Listed in Time Out Paris, this place is a treat. Under a beautiful glass dome with wonderful paneled walls, the ambience is fine. The food matches. Though we managed to get a badly placed table without reservation, I’d recommend booking ahead. The food and overall experience top its more famous namesake, at least in my books.

Café des Musées
49, rue de Turenne 75003
01 42 72 96 17
Another neighbourhood bistro: small, plain, open kitchen, great food. A good selection of house wines from a series of DOCs in the Rhône I wasn’t familiar with.

404
69, rue des Gravilliers 75003
01 42 74 57 81
Again from Time Out Paris, a Moroccan restaurant worth the visit if you’re tired of French cooking. The food seemed fairly authentic to me based on a week in Marrakech, reasonably priced, and good. You sit at long tables family style, and I noticed we were placed at la table des anglaise, despite our refusal to speak anything but French. Must have been the checked shirt…