Paris the “City of Lights” and a gastronmic epicenter

I have been wanting for some time to post some of my favorite addresses and grazing grounds in Paris. This is without a doubt one of the world’s most exciting cities. I lived there for three months in 1989 (France’s Bi-centennial). It was a mind blowing experience . I experienced so much of the city in those few months. The restaurant world and mostly the crazy world that occurs after hours. I can vouch that Paris never sleeps and that a whole other world exists after midnight.

Paris is the ultimate walking city. Every time I go I wear myself out walking the city seeing what each neighborhood has to offer. I love how every neighborhood seems to have a theme. Philatelies to music, to sex shops, to restaurant equipment, to antiques, to art galleries, to gay, to comic bookstores and of course the Bookinistes on the Seine.

I have taken students across the city on many occasions (mostly at a fast walking pace that few could keep up with). I have taken countless 5:00am trips to Rungis to visit the world’s largest wholesale markets. My son Paris was conceived there (I couldn’t really name him #735 after all). I know that city better than most.

So here are a few of my favorite food & beverage places. I know that I am just scratching the surface, so feel free to contribute more cool addresses. I have included the zip codes as that should help you to locate the arrondissement they are located in. The last two digits of the zip is the arrondissement i.e. 75001 is the 1st. and so on so forth until 75020 which is the 20th and last in the inner snail that is Paris.

Restaurants:

Café des Musées 49, rue de Turenne, 75003 Paris T. 01 42 72 96 17 (never had a bad or expensive meal here)

Le Comptoir d’Yves Camdeborde (also known as the Relais de l’Odeon), 9 carrefour de l’Odeon 75006 T. 01 44 27 07 97 (this place is amazing, never had a bad meal. Problem, very small so hard to get a seat. Best bet is to arrive at 11:45am and stand in line for a moment for lunch. impossible to get a place on a weeknight as it is reserved many months ahead. Weekends are another story but be smart and show up before the rest of the dinner or lunch crowd arrives and you will have success).

La Ferrandaise, 8 rue Vaugirard, 75006, T. 01 43 26 36 36, www.laferrandaise.com I went here one night on the recommendation of the head waiter of le Comptoir when we couldn’t get in there. The place was awesome. Great value and very tasty food. It is right across the street from the Jardin de Luxembourg. Ferrandaise is a species of cattle, so that is the theme of the restaurant. Needless to say you can get good steak here.

Chez Paul, 13 rue Charonne, 75011, T. 01 47 00 34 57, This place is a classic and best of all is open 7 days a week (a rarity in Paris) This is great burgundy bouchon food and the place is always packed. I used to take my students there for their first night in Paris.

Bistrot du Sommelier, 97 Blvd Haussman, 75008, T. 01 42 65 24 85 (The master sommelier is Philippe Brac and they do specialized food and wine pairing menus and also serve Alleosse cheeses, not overly priced). The one time we went there we took our 2 month old son and I experienced the whole meal with him in a baby bjorn. This is a challenge I can tell you. They were terrified when they saw us come in, but pleasantly surprised by how well he behaved.

Chez Michel, 10 rue Belzunce, 75010, T. 01 44 53 06 20 ( this a quaint little bistrot in an unlikely place. Good inexpensive food from a top chef who used to work as Chef to President Mitterand and at the Ritz)

l’Ardoise, 28 rue du Mont-Thabor, 75001, T. 01 42 96 28 18 (great honest food and inexpensive. Located right beside Place de la Concorde)

Cheese Shops:

Alleosse, 13 rue Poncelet, 75017, T. 01 46 22 50 45, www.fromage-alleosse.com , This is without a doubt the best cheese curer in all Paris. Many of the 3 star Michelin chefs buy from him and he deals with international shipments. He is Philippe and his wife is Rachel. They have generously showed me their cheese cellars on occasions with my students and he has enlightened me about the world of cheese.

La Ferme St Aubin: 76 rue St. Louis-en-l’Ille, 75004, T. 01 43 54 74 54, This where I used to go for my cheese before I met Alleosse. Just strolling though the Ille St. Louis is worth the trip. Make it even more cool by visiting Notre Dame and then strolling past its left flank heading east and crossing the bridge into the Ille St. Louis. Stop turn around and take in Notre Dame’s buttresses, turn around again and go straight to Berthillion ice cream and get a scoop of the best ice cream on the planet. Then go buy some cheese at St. Aubin.

Androuet: Too many locations in Paris to list. Click on this Androuet to find a location that suits your needs. This is the original cheese curer for Paris and used to have a restaurant that featured all dishes made with cheese and of course a cheese selection.

Restaurant Supply Stores:

E. Dehillerin: 26 rue Coquilliere, 75001, Talk to Emille a man of Indian descent. This a must do for any chef. One day in 1989 I walked in an stumbled into Jean Louis Palladin and Michel Richard. I knew Jean Louis from my time as a student at l’Academie. I talked to Jean Louis for a little bit and then turned to Michel and asked do you work for Jean Louis. He turned to me and said “I own Citron in L.A.” (he had that you are cretin for asking look on his face). All you have to do is walk around the general vicinity of the area to find the rest of the restaurant supply stores in the area…. Explore. Don’t be surprised if you stumble on the sex shop & prostitute district which not far east from here on the Rue St. Denis.

Pastry Shops: Without question the best pasty shops in the world are here (in my experience). You can visit all the great outposts within a few blocks from each other in the 6th Arrondissement. Here are my favs:

Pierre Hermé: 72 rue Bonaparte, 75006, This is a shoebox of a place but once you walk through the doors you realize that you have entered a pastry art gallery. Pierre is the Channel of the pastry world. This shoe box sized Patisserie is right across the street from St. Sulpice cathedral. Made very famous in the Da Vinci code and in National Lampoon’s European Vacation. Closed Mondays

Gerard Mulot: 76 rue du Seine, 75006, T. 01 43 26 85 77 This place is awesome and I have visited the production area which is under the store. It is a rat maze and made even smaller when you take a group of 15 down with you. However what they manage to do with that limited space is amazing. Annoying is the ordering method. You ask for what you want, the server gives you a ticket and you must go to the cashier to get a paid receipt to pick up your order. They not only do pastries but a whole lot of savory items and breads.

Ladurée: 21 rue Bonaparte, 75006, T. 01 44 07 64 87, www.laduree.fr These three pasty shops compete every year for the best macaroons. Each of them produce amazing macaroons, so hard to say who would win. This Ladurée has a beautiful tea room that you can enjoy breakfast in or have afternoon tea. None of the other two places have a seating area.

High end Grocers:

Fauchon: 23 -26 Place de la Madeleine, 75008, T. 01 70 39 38 00, www.fauchon.com , This is a gastronomic landmark almost on par with Harrods in London. Everything is at peak of perfection.

Hediard: This is right across the Place de la Madeleine from Fauchon and has all the luxury canned goods you can pack into your Louis Vitton suitcase. Also right beside them you will find Petrossian Caviar and if you start heading back toward the Seine you will stumble onto the former restaurant Lucas Carton and a little further you will see another outpost of Ladurée.

Wine Stores:

Lavinia: 3 Boulevard de la Madeleine, 75008, www.lavinia.fr I believe that this is the largest wine store on the planet.  I love to go into the exclusive wine room and see the legendary bottles of Yquem, Latour, LRC etc. You are only a few blocks away when you are at Place de la Madeleine that you shouldn’t pass up the opportunity. They have a wine bar there as well with many wines by the glass if you get thirsty.

If you were ever given million dollars to spend in one hour the 8th might be the neighborhood to do it in.

I will update this post soon with outdoor ambulatory markets and indoor stationary ones that I have enjoyed throughout the years.

Holy Cow

I was checking out this blog by Laurent Gras called L20 and got to this picture of a Wagyu rib eye imported from Japan. It is like no meat I have ever seen. The great thing about his blog is he often features products and provides detailed explanations about them. Click on this L2O Blog: April 2008 , scroll down to the Wagyu post and tell me you don’t want eat a slice of that meat once it has been perfectly cooked.

“The revolution will not be pasteurized: Inside the raw-milk underground” by Nathanael Johnson Harpers Magazine

This article is great and very succinctly argues the belief that I have had for some time that we have sanitized our world to such an extreme that we have created our own health nightmare of allergies and various other modern day maladies. I found this article on another food blog called “Chez Pim.”

I hate that we don’t have access to raw milk cheeses in this country.  Put a warning label on it, but don’t tell me I can’t eat it. There are certain food ingredients that I am willing to take risks with.

On the several occasions when I have visited the cellars of the famous cheese curer Alleosse in Paris, he has mentioned how none of his employees who work in the cheese curing cellars ever get sick. Philippe feels it is because they are breathing beneficial bacteria each day.

I find it amazing that we go out of our way to protect industrial agriculture by sanitizing their sloppily made products so that we can consume them.  Wouldn’t it be great if our food was so wholesome that the consumer or chef wouldn’t be forced to take measures to protect themselves?  Wouldn’t it be great if the industrial food complex was forced to provide us the most wholesome food?

Good food pics from April 08 class

I was looking through the pictures of dishes I have taken from this class and decided that I should include a few for the blog. The students will get a compilation of these and all the others when they graduate. This should satiate some of you who were so used to the daily postings that I made from the last class.

Madonna had us design a bread bra for her upcoming “hard candy” tour this summer and this is what we came up with. We call this the yeasty bustier or the Princess Leah.

Here is a view of some of the crew working on pastry stuff. To the left you have “ish”, then “Pat”, followed by “quenelle” and on the right you have “thumbs”.

This is a beautiful shot of Chef Lexie’s espresso granite on top of super duper orange ice cream. This is good stuff. You know you gotta finish this with Grappa and another shot of espresso.

One day “LBMI” decided to put together a nice Amuse Bouche “Insalata Caprese” and this is what that looked like. Tasty!

On the same day GM made a consommé with julienne vegetables. Here are the vegetables before and …………………..

After. Love the clarity and the flavor was sublime.

This is my favorite shot of the past few months. Seafood risotto al onda. We reheated the mussels in beurre fondue (notice the bling). Yo and what is up with that fine Frico (that is off the hook!!). What a tasty dish. My crew was just starting to jibe.

Now, I had issues with Chef Lexie not using apricot glaze on this dessert, but since it was consumed so quickly, it was irrelevant. Still I think it is important for pastry students to apply glaze correctly, so that they can get used to what pasty shops do all the time to increase shelf life and add bling. Just go to Gerard Mulot in Paris to see what I am talking about.

Great article in the New Yorker about Grant Achatz

Read this article “A man of taste” about the Mozart turned Beethoven of the food world. Great article and shows the commitment necessary to become a culinary icon. Now I have to get his book coming out this fall. I’ll put my order in soon.

Honey tequila salmon four days later

As promised here are the shots of the Honey tequila cured salmon that I will be slicing Thursday night for the honey presentation. It gave up a lot of liquid and smelled amazing. Fruity and floral. I can hardly wait to slice into it tomorrow to taste the magic. I totally created this recipe with honey in mind and if it rocks, it will become a staple.

Today, I also took the duck breast out of their 24 hour cure of honey, soy sauce, rice wine vinegar, chili sauce for chicken (this is good on almost anything) and fresh ginger. Exact recipe to come. I baked them in the combi @ 375º and 10% humidity for 9 minutes. I then (after much fiddling with the awesome smoker they have at the school) smoked them for 45 minutes. The result a beautiful mahogany colored duck breast that had tons of flavor and juiciness. I slathered them with a last coat of knapweed honey from Montana/soy mix (OK, and a little more chili sauce for chicken) and let them set in the walk-in until the gig on Thursday.

So the pictures of cured salmon:

I dumped off about two cups of liquid from the hotel pan. After, I had LBMI clean them, they looked liked this:

The aroma was amazing and too bad that I can’t send a scratch and sniff version over the blog, but I can hardly wait to dig into it tomorrow. More to come……………………………

Honey, I shrunk the salmon

So I am working on this honey presentation for the Belmar Lab a sort of funky but cool art gallery in Lakewood. They have put together a series of 4 presentations on taste.  The topics: pork, salt, mushrooms and honey.  Chef Michael came up to me one day and said “hey how do you feel about doing a presentation on honey?” and I said sure.  What do I know about honey?  Not much, but I am always up for a challenge and especially if I learn something in the process.

2 weeks ago, I went to the presentation on Salt, which featured a paleontologist and one of the founding chefs for Cook Street Shelley Qark (might have misspelled her last name, so sorry).  The science guy was awesome and Shelley was quite entertaining as well.  At the end we spent a good amount of time waiting for chef Bijou’s dish which was basically seared tuna with various juiced vegetables (including beets, spinach and carrot). None of them were seasoned with salt which was the idea.  Individuals could season their own with the salt samples provided for the tasting.  This was great experiment for people to go through.  Salt makes a huge difference.  Every chef knows this.

Well the wait for the plates was excruciating and turned into a how do you get the audience to ask questions about salt.  Science guy answered most them but the presenters were pushing for every angle possible.

So I vowed to not fall into the same trap.  Not that I am afraid about answering questions about honey, but dead air is mighty uncomfortable for all.

My presentation is on honey.  So I have been thinking about honey for the past three weeks.  I met with the marketing person responsible for the gallery and she recruited me for producing the food as well.

Well at least I will have control over that too.  I had our marketing group put out an email out to all of our alumni to see if any would be willing to help.  Good response and I am already thanking the ones that are donating their time.  One alumnus even sent me knapweed honey from Montana.

One of the dishes that I am doing is honey tequila salmon gravlax.

The recipe is:

1 whole salmon H&G, skin on and PBO (in industry speak that means head off gutted, skin on and pin bones out)

3 cups kosher salt

1 cup honey

1 cup tequila (I used 1921 Gran Reserva, some of the best sipping tequila I have tasted)

1/2 cup cracked black pepper

2 Tblsp. Whole coriander seeds

1/4 lb. fresh cilantro

On Friday, I was prepping the salmon that arrived late from Shamrock and one of my present students walked in to give her friend Jessie a tour of the kitchen.  It turned out that she was amateur photographer.  So, I had her take pictures of the dish as it was being made.  Here are the highlights:

Initial mise en place,

Gotta to have the honey shot,

The elements of the cure all ready to be mixed together,

Applying the cure,

It’s a wrap,

Weigh it down

Let it sit for 4 days in the walk-in, being careful to turn it every day.

Next post will be what it looks like when it has shrunk or cured.

Week 3: It’s getting weird

Alright so I have been slacking on the posts as of late, but like I said I don’t want to repeat the same stuff every session.  If we make something a little differently or a new dish then I will include it on a post but otherwise I want to focus on other stuff for now.

Week 2 was difficult because several of our students got sick and since we have a small group we are more easily affected.  We had one student whose 2 1/2 year old daughter got strep throat, another who got diagnosed with  walking pneumonia, another who cut herself several times during the first week and then had to go in for stitches on one of her cuts and another who had to leave early several times to take care of her 3 1/2 yr. old.

On Wednesday of last week it appeared I was going to be putting together our part of the meal with only one student.  Then suddenly Luis appeared. They managed to enroll another student a week and a half into the program. Luis is originally from Juarez and speaks very good english.  To be bilingual in the American food industry is ideal.  Plenty of opportunity for latinos that can become managers of less fluent latinos.

Of course Luis came to the program after missing tons of crucial information.  What Luis does have going for him is several years of kitchen prep work (this is also a hindrance because one can develop  a lot of bad habits in that time).

So I was able to put together the dish by giving him a crash course in the station.  Eventually Elle (short for Gabrielle) came back from getting stitches and was able to help us out.  We got the food out but I took a more accelerated  approach to plating than was intended.

Friday of last week was amusing as the students went to the wine room for the  organoleptic wine evaluation with our sommelier Debbie Gray.  Elle who has a low body mass index took in a little too much wine during the tasting and had to be picked up by her boyfriend (literally and figuratively).  I am now calling her LBMI, other nicknames have been bandied about.  The rest of he students came back flush from the tasting and considerably louder than when they left.  They of course went to the bars after.

On Monday of this week we had a new menu that I had yet to teach.  Salad of blood oranges and olives,  Seared swordfish on a bed of gnocchi with a fennel tomato broth and for dessert melon balls wrapped in prosciutto and handmade mozzarella pesto roulade as well handmade ricotta.

Here is the blood orange salad with olives. Very refreshing salad.

It had been  along time since any of the instructors had had a nice piece of swordfish and this one was truly exceptional.

The gnocchi were nice though a little gummy from  too much flour.  The broth was outstanding and the swordfish was very fresh.

I did my cheese lecture in the morning and we decided to add the mozzarella and ricotta demo after the lecture.   Along with the  prosciutto and melon ball  they formed the dessert platter for  our day.

On Wednesday DJ (no he is not a cast member for Hustle and Flow) cut himself badly on the thumb while in Pastry.  He spent a good part of the day with his thumb elevated to stop the bleeding.  He eventually got it to stop and then at the end of the day he cut his other thumb.  Today he came to school with both thumbs bandaged up.  Obviously he is “thumbs” from now on.

This is the last week that we see the previous group of students before they head off for France at the beginning of May.  They casually stroll in everyday slightly buzzed from their tasting and like to loiter around the kitchen.  It is clear that they miss being there and kind of feel like there are aliens in their place.

When I went to culinary school, during the second year of the program we used to come back once a week to the school to take classes or watch demos, but we rarely ever saw the present students.  And boy did we have big heads, as we knew what was in store for them as they entered their apprenticeships.  Those days were special and once a month Jean Louis Palladin used to come in and do a cooking demo for us.  He was an inspiration.

The students in this group seem to be finally coming out of their shell and the weirdness of week 2 seems to be calming down.  Maybe we will able to get into a groove now………..or maybe it will get weirder.

Piedmont wine dinner

Yesterday, I was hired to cook a meal for a bunch of cork dorks at my brother in law’s house. By cork dorks , I mean people that have been in the retail end wine and liquor sales for many years. Enough time to acquire vast portfolios in their personal wine cellars.

A few week back, my Bro-in-law gave me the theme and I started to build the menu. Over a group email these guys start to write about the wines they were planning to bring and I quickly realized this was not going to be your typical wine gathering.

My menu was:

Spinach and ricotta filled agnolottis with a pistachio brown butter sauce

Cream of Asparagus soup

Osso Bucco with risotto

Panna Cotta with a raspberry ginger compote

The wines were mainly focused on Northern Italy. Superlative wines and some very old Barolos including a 1967.

Here is the line-up.

After all this and the party was starting to dwindle down. Gary from Total Beverage in Westminster pulled a Reciotto from the Veneto which is not included in this picture.

It was a great gathering and it proved the old axiom: if it grows together, it goes together. Hopefully I will get to do more of these in the future.

Week 1: Educational tsunami

The fighting geoducks are probably wondering why I have been so remiss in my blogging. They were used to my daily bleetings on their dishes.  So why have taken the foot off the accelerator?

Two reasons: 1, the first week of culinary instruction was really busy and kind of tiring and 2 I felt that I accomplished the daily log of all the dishes we did during the course of the last class (with the exception of the first week) and feel that I want to take a different angle with this group. Still trying to figure out what that angle will be (ideas are welcome).

My role at the school is quickly evolving and it is clear that I will be in charge of more stuff soon. I welcome the challenge and look forward to contributing my ideas to making Cook Street the best Culinary School possible.

The week was intense as everyone is trying to figure out the kitchen and their respective instructor’s style.  I am always amazed at how quickly a routine can be created and how quickly we can progress.

I was not at my best on the photo duties and contrary to my habit, I actually took more pictures of the pastry kitchen’s contributions.

So to summarize the week’s menus.

First day of cooking (Tuesday) we teach our students about how to set up each station and how to plan out the days cooking tasks (prioritizing our mise en place, cooking times etc.). The appetizer course from GM was a deconstructed roquefort tart on puff pastry (the custard didn’t quite set up in time, but the flavor was great). The main course was roasted pork loin. Unfortunately the only shot I took was of a boozy prune clafoutis for dessert (which also didn’t quite set up completely, but bacteria could have never survived under such high alcoholic conditions). So not our most stellar day but understandable for the first week while we get used to working with each other.

Wednesday: The focus was on everyone learning how to make and bake bread. So the menu was up to Chef Dale and myself. Chicken vegetable noodle soup: not your grandmother’s chicken n noodle soup (no offense to your granny but ours is better). Tender homemade pasta, finely diced vegetables , housemade chicken stock, perfectly cooked chicken breast and a little persillade for good measure.

Thursday: now menus already get to be little more challenging and creative.

Grilled fennel salad with beet vinaigrette and orange suprêmes

This was followed by roasted duck breast on a bed of leek confit and purée Parmentier with Fines Herbes (or PCCT: parsley, chervil, chives and tarragon) and sautéed mushrooms.

For dessert we had a pastry cream stuffed saffron poached pear with cardamom crème anglaise and a tuile cage.

I joked that it was the most expensive dessert in the world because it uses the 3 most expensive spices in the world (in order: saffron, vanilla and cardamom).

Friday: Was a particularly busy day for me as I was trying to get all the instruction for the day done as well as M.E.P. for the Taste 5 that evening.

I have been handed ownership of Taste 5s from now on and I want to make sure it runs smoothly and it accomplishes what I believe it has morphed into over the years. There have been around a 120 of these Taste 5s over the course of the school’s history and originally they were intended to give the public a view into our programs, provide education about wine and food pairing and to entice them to join in our fun.

I want the T5s to be instructional, to showcase our students to the general public and in the process entice our paying guests to spread the word about our school. It might take me awhile to accomplish these goals, but I can see glimmers of acceptance of these ideas.

The menu for the day was quite fun;

Provençale tomato and gruyere tart. This is one of my favorite dishes from Provence and always reminds me of my good friend Michel Depardon (who died about 3 years ago. Too long of a story for this post, but suffice to say this man had a lot of influence on my culinary perspective and my life).

He used to teach the students this tart when I would bring them over to Provence under the employ of CSR. It has all the elements of a great dish and of the products of Provence. Tomato , gruyère, pâte brisée, spicy Dijon mustard and basil. This version came close to honoring his memory.

For the main course. We worked on salmon wrapped in Kataifi with a Moroccan tagine based broth (saffron, coriander, cumin, preserved lemon, chicken broth and green olives.  Let’s just say that we had issues with the salmon and that what could have been an easy day turned into a more difficult one.

Of course the best thing about this dish is that I get to do my rasta albino chef imitation with the kataifi.

For dessert we had the ubiquitous molten chocolate cake with raspberry ice cream. Molten chocolate cake is essentially an unfinished chocolate cake or a cake that has been pulled out of the oven early (bakeus interruptus) so that the sides of the cake firm up but the center is still uncooked and since it came out of a 500° oven it is molten.  What is not to like?

That concludes the food we prepared for the first week.  Not bad considering the newness of its makers.

T5 (the theme was Red Hot Rio) was a big success and all the particpants were happy.  Don and Thomasino came to lend a hand as well as Alice, Lauren and Erin form this present class.

Thanks for you help.  It was great to have such a good student turnout.

I was tired from such a long week. But up for Week 2.  More adventures await.