Who knew I (or more to the point, Paris) was so ahead of the curve? Last year, when I wrote about the preponderance of purple populating Paris, a few readers pointed out that the color orchid was named The Color of the Year by tastemakers, Pantone. And recently, I made Marsala-baked pears, only to find out that, yup – this year, Marsala is the color…
Cassoulet was probably the first French dishes that really hooked me on French cuisine. I was working at Chez Panisse at the time and when the new Zinfandel wine was released, in a style similar to the annual release of Beaujolais nouveau in France, or the garlic festival on Bastille Day (called 14 juillet, in France – if you called it “Bastille Day,” no one…
Although I’m trying to make it less-so, it’s rare that I go out to lunch with friends. People tend to think that everybody in Paris sits around all day, eating dainty macarons and sipping a coffee at the corner café watching the world go by, while you’re all working away. But most of us are swamped like everybody else (including you), hurdling toward deadlines, waiting…
When I lived in San Francisco, we used to joke (lovingly) that whenever we went to Zuni Café, that there would be at least three things on the menu that you had to ask the server what they were. On the other hand, I think if you asked ten people in Paris what aillade is, ten out of ten wouldn’t know either. Unless they were…
The French often say, “There’s no need to leave France – we have everything here!” While it’s easy to brush it off as chauvinism, it’s true — for a country that could fit inside of Texas, there is a huge diversity of climates and terrains in one, single country. You can find everything in l’hexagone, from the windy shores of Brittany (where we’ve huddled around…
I had no sooner returned from Sicily, then I unpacked my suitcase, re-packed my suitcase, and headed back out, to Provence. Even though I’d just returned from a ten-day trip, my other half was doing a project in the city I went along for the ride because, 1) Who wants to be sitting in a hot apartment, alone, in the summer, when you could be…
One thing I love about traveling is that I get to read. As much as we all love to be connected, it’s nice to be somewhere – like 5000 feet up in the air, where your biggest concern is who gets the armrest – where that isn’t usually a possibility. (Although I also spend a considerable amount of time up there wondering if whoever designed…
I’ve become weary – and wary – of the American aisles in European supermarkets. And have come to the conclusion that people think we all eat badly because we live on bottled salad dressings, orange cheese in squirt bottles, and strawberry Fluff, which is something I’ve never seen in America. And I like Fluff just fine. (Just the plain, though. The red scares me. However…
At any given time, there are between two – and fourteen – nubbins of cheese in my refrigerator. Those odds and ends are the result of me getting too excited when I’m at the fromagerie, usually going with the intention of buying just one or two wedges. But after scanning the shelves, and seeing a few cheeses that also look worthy of my shopping basket,…
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