Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    
By the way, to clarify, I realize that Nouvelle Cuisine WAS French,
but it quickly became a buzz word over here with little real meaning.
  

    
All of your responses have been really, really interesting and
confirmed what I sort of suspected--there's almost no REAL French food
in the US. The only place that I found and really liked during my book
tour was Le Pichet in Seattle. The food was delicious and so French
that it could have been a few doors down from my apartment in the 9th
arrondissement. I'm still wondering why French bistro cooking never got
a real ticket to America when there's brilliant Italian and Spanish
food. I think that it might be because:

1) American produce is so different
2) American culinary schools don't really teach these recipes
anymore--the US seems to like BIG flavors and a lot of mouth feel,
which leaves coq au vin, blanquette de veau, etc. in the dust.

As food becomes more expensive, I suspect that traditional French
bistro cooking may yet have a hey day in the U.S., since it's roots are
so much in enobling simple and less expensive ingredients.
  

    
I think there's an inherent suspiciousness of "french" food as something 
that's going to be fancy, expensive, and leave you hungry. 
  

    
this discussion has been great alec, i am learning a lot!  and we have
family in seattle who lived in paris for abotu five years - we are due for a
visit and will have to try le pichet.
  

    
Wasn't there a place northwest of Chicago that was very French?
Might still be there, but istr someone here said it was gone.
I ate there many years ago.  Had its own airstrip.  Can't remember
name.

The Blue Fox in San Francisco was reputed to be pretty authentic, but
I never ate there when it was going.
  

    
aha, found it...   Le Francaise, in Wheeling, Illinois.

<http://www.lefrancaisrestaurant.com/>

Apparently, the chef from the old days is back.   Here's the menu:
<http://www.lefrancaisrestaurant.com/menu.html>
  

    
I was the one who posted about Le Francais.  They have closed and
reopened many times.  It looks like they are open now, but for how
long?
  

    

Probably no French food today. I'm heading out to the coast for a picnic
with some friends midday, and I expect I'll be barbequing burgers (my
husband's favorite) and some first-of-season corn on the cob for dinner
this evening. What with it being Memorial Day and all. Gotta break out the
bbq, right?

But we've gotten a long way from HUNGRY FOR PARIS, it seems. One of the
things I've wondered about when one writes a "best of" restaurant guide is:

Over time, the restaurant scene changes. Places that were great get less
so. Some places close down, other new ones that are wonderful open up.

Alec, do you expect you'll want to do an updated version of Hungry for Paris
after a while? 
  

    
I just want to note that there are new reviews and, in a sense, updates on 
http://www.hungryforparis.com -- not waiting for Alec because I note that 
he had not-so-much-fun at Le Meurice, which in contrast is described with 
great love in his book. Of course the blog update is about the bar, not 
the restaurant. What do you think, Alec -- have you changed your opinion?
  

    
Sorry to get back to you late--

In providence, there are several French Restaurants

Pot Au Feu <http://www.potaufeuri.com>
Rue de L'espoir <http://www.therue.com> (More American bistro)
Chez Pascal <http://www.chez-pascal.com/>

All of them have their own take, slightly, althoug Pot Au Feu is perhaps 
most traditional.
  

    
French cuisine traditionelle in San Francisco: Restaurant Jeanne d'Arc, 
in the Hotel Cornell, owned and run by actual French people, and
catering largely to French visitors to SF, including people doing
business with the consulate, which is about 2 blocks away. It's an
old-school type place, not an innovator, but it does really feel like
a little island of Paris in SF. 
  

    
My friend Naomi in Paris has been following along, and sent this email, 
which she said I could post:

So, on breakfast I can recommend Pause Ditente, formerly Sarrasin, though 
she's not open til 10 (On Ledru Rollin on the other side of the street 
from Monoprix). They have always (since my arrival in the 
neighborhood in 1988) made the best croissants & pain aux raisins. We got 
a Saint Honori for 3 there the other night, you can see a picture of it 
here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/53814179@N00/2498239165/. Neither Lia 
nor I knew what a Saint Honori was. Definitely worth discovering! But 
that's not breakfast. Other options are goughres at the red bakery next to 
the Baron Rouge, now Baron Bouge, which you can eat while having 
coffee at any of the cafis around there, though we prefer the one on the 
same sidewalk down the street from the bakery, catty or kitty corner to 
the market. This bakery used to vie with Sarrasin for the appellation 
"best croissant in the neighborhood," but they seem to have changed 
recipes. A bit later on a weekend morning, you can have oyster brunch at 
the Baron. (Note from Kay: Baron Bouge is a wine bar just up the street 
from Marche Aligre in the 12th; they serve oysters and charcuterie for 
breakfast on Sunday mornings, and have wine in barrels. Quite a 
neighborhood scene.)

Re: telling a restaurant by its wine, in my experience, this is not a 
foolproof method. Ex: our friend Patrick served barrel wine from the Baron 
as his house wine in his divine African restaurant (his wife is 
Camerounaise). He upped it the maximum 5 times the purchase price allowed 
by law and I kicked myself every time, but his bottled wine was even more 
expensive and the food was already expensive enough (early 90s, a main 
course was already 70F (most places was 50-60)), though quite copious and 
heavenly. Sadly, he closed and moved on to other things long ago. And even 
L'Ibauchoir had (or used to have) a poor wine selection compared to the 
quality of the food. Whereas the original Vieux Chene's wine quality was 
inversely proportional both to the wine's price and to the food, which was 
good but originally, dinner was leftover lunch. What made the meal great 
was the cheese platter & Chantal's mousse au chocolat, as well as the 
atmosphere created by the couple who ran the place. Alain's strength 
was/is wine--he's been running a cave since he & Chantal sold the VC.

Guess I'm gonna have to have a look at your book, Alec. I think I saw it 
last week at my friend's shop, The Red Wheelbarrow (on the rue St Paul, 
for those who need to pick up books in English while in Paris. She's much 
friendlier than the folks at the Village Voice & obviously the big stores, 
and has a really great selection). I'd like to see what you recommend in 
my neighborhood, since we never go out anymore except that short week 
every January when Kay comes to visit. Of course, we're not working at 
home anymore either, which was one reason for eating lunch out a lot. Now 
if I eat lunch out it's a lebanese sandwich near the rue Mouffetard! 
Speaking of lunch, and perhaps late breakfast (not open til 
10), I can't recommend highly enough Arlette's place, Le Petit Cafi on the 
Fb St Antoine. She gets her viennoiserie from Sarrasin (now Pause Detente, 
on Ledru Rollin) but makes her own quiches, tartes salies and pies, and a 
great cafi crhme. Lunch=tarte salie and "salad" (mixed veggies, cruditis, 
lettuce). Quite big portions, I think it's only 10 euros, but I never 
really keep track and she doesn't post the price. (Note from Kay: Le Petit 
Cafi doesn't have a sign; it's a hole in the wall across the street from 
an atelier for a designer ... Gaultier? If you're over on Fbg St Antoine, 
it's a very pleasant place for coffee or, as Naomi says, a light lunch).
  

    
(sorry about the weirdness caused by accents on some of the letters)
  

    
To clarify on the Hotel Meurice: I STILL love the restaurant, but I
don't like the bar, or the shatteringly expensive lobby restaurant. One
of the saddest things in many big cities these days is the death of
the old-fashioned hotel lobby--a place where you could sit peacefully
and wait for someone, or just watch the world go by. Now every square
foot is being merchandized and switched on as a selling space. 

In terms of updating HUNGRY FOR PARIS, I will be posting corrections
and updates regularly on my website www.hungryforparis.com. I'll also
be posting new discoveries. And since the book is selling quite
well--already in third printing and continuing to get some terrific
reviews (you can see on the website), there's no doubt that another
edition will be in the works. 
  

    
I was very interested by Kayo's nail-on-the-head assessment of the way
that many Americans see French food--"as something that's fancy,
expensive and will leave you hungry." I actually talk about this in
HUNGRY FOR PARIS, addressing the fact that relatively few Americans can
name four or five French dishes the way they can immediately rattle
off four or five Italian, Chinese or Mexican ones. I think this is
partly explained by the history of American immigration, and also by
the fact that France and anything French has been codified to resonate
as elite (to say nothing of pompous or prissy, etc.) in the mainstream
American mind (remember the outbreak of French-bashing at the beginning
of the war in Iraq?). 

Julia Child did educate millions of Americans to appreciate real
French homecooking in the sixties, but all it takes is a quick look at
many "Women's" magazines these days to see that the recipes suggested
are often more about time (and saving of same) and convenience, which
are often at odds with the slow-simmered glories of such great French
dishes as boeuf bourguignon or blanquette de veau. 

The great and little-known truth, however, is that French home-style
or country cooking is every bit as much of a celebration of simplicity
and quality produce as the Italian kitchen.
  

    
What was the old French line about the US - "one hundred churches and
only one cheese"
  

    
Leiderkranz! 
  

    
Four or five things I eat when I'm in France:

salads:      http://www.flickr.com/photos/jef/133758444/
             http://www.flickr.com/photos/jef/172722757/
oysters:     http://www.flickr.com/photos/jef/33437567/
tartelettes: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jef/172897433/
gazpacho:    http://www.flickr.com/photos/jef/178857213/

>celebration of simplicity and quality produce

That's my definition of French food in a nutshell.
  

    
And with the dollar in such anemic shape--the French are calling it
"Bush's peso"--I've been telling friends that they can just order a
main course and a glass of wine as a way of saving money. Also fun to
do hotel picnics--go to a good cheese store (Quatrehommes in the rue de
Sevres)and get some cheese, buy bread, a good bottle of red--wine is
still much cheaper in france than the US--and have a cosy and tasty
night in. 

The longer I live in France, and it's 23 years and counting, the more
I celebrate the essential "less is more" perspective that's at the core
of great French cooking. When you chew the fat with most Paris chefs,
they all the say the same thing, a riff on Escoffier, that their job is
to make things taste like what they are. 

And a great new address: Itineraires, rue de Pontoise, 5th. Brilliant
market cooking by young chef Sylvain Sendra. 
  

    
I don't wish to dither with my friend Betsy but we do have a few
standard French, not fusion, places in Boston/ Cambrige

L'Espalier, is perhaps the grande dame--I have not been in many years.
Maison Robert is history (but the service there was too fussy for my
taste and it was definitely French with a patrician yankee flavor.). 
We have Craigie Street Bistrot in Cambridge, the closest I can come
these days to Paris without boarding AA flight 146. 
  

    
L'Espalier counts as "super-expensive downtown." Craigie Street I had
not heard of, thanks! (but looks to be super-expensive also!)
  

    
IN DC there's Au Pied du Cochon, no? And is 1849 still going?
  

    
The restaurants that get written about and praised by critics for the
last number of years tend to be the ones with chefs doing innovative
things like Moto and Alinea in Chicago.  So that may explain why some
of the classic French restaurants have closed in recent years.  Again,
I think that this mostly a good sign because it indicates a maturing of
American cooking.  But with so many French bistros in a city like
Chicago, why can some be really wonderful?  I must admit, I'm
generalizing, because I haven't tried them all (there are so many in
Chicago) but the ones I have tried, some multiple times, just haven't
bowled me over.
  

    
I hear that the new New York City branch of Benoit, the famous luxury
bistro in Paris, is good and not that expensive. Has anyone been?
  

    
How about Robuchon in Vegas? I really want to go there. Anyone been to 
that?