It felt a little funny heading over to Porchetta for lunch. I mean, I live right next to Italy and had amazing porchetta there just recently. So why am I taking a lengthy subway trip down to the East Village for lunch? And I was tempted even further when I was on the way to meet my friend Shira (who I met on a boat…
{UPDATE: Al Taglio is now closed.] For quite some time, whenever I’d go out to eat in Paris with a visiting friend, their gaze would invariably land on something Italian on the menu. And they’d want to order something like risotto or salad Caprese, which I’d warn them away from. Or pizza, which might come to the table with some unexpected topping, like canned corn…
I was having drinks at a friend’s house last night, who is a cuistot, the French slang for a cook. I don’t think you’d say cuistat for a woman, but whatever you want to call us, the conversation pretty much stayed on one topic: Food. We talked literally for hours while we drank brisk sauvignon blanc and picked apart an amazing wedge of 30 month-old…
I noticed something weird this week: just about everything I ate tasted odd. No matter what it was, from bland rice cakes to strong, dark coffee, a few minutes after I ate or drank it, there was an odd, bitter flavor lingering in my mouth. Being me, naturally, I assumed the worst: That they were going to have to remove my mouth, or something.
It’s easy to make your own cheese at home. All you need is a bottle of milk, a scoop of yogurt, a touch of vinegar, and a few minutes over the heat. Don’t believe me?
The pastry department is always the most popular part of the kitchen amongst the rest of the staff in a restaurant. For one thing, anytime there is a staff birthday, you’re called into service to make the cake for the party. And since everyone has a birthday, everyone has to be nice to you the other 364 days of the year. Another thing is that regular…
This week, Grom opens a branch of their famous Italian shop in Paris. Originally from Torino, Grom uses all-natural flavorings, which include growing some of the organic fruit they use in their sorbets and graniti, grinding up vivid-green Sicilian pistachios for pistachio gelato, and melding the exquisite hazelnuts from Piedmont with Venezuelan chocolate for their ultimate, silky-smooth version of Gianduja. I first tasted their exquisite…
During the next week, I’m going to do a series: Five Great Places in Paris That You Might Not Know About. In a city that hasn’t been overrun by chain stores and restaurants, it’s nice to be able to profile some of the smaller places around town that I frequent. When I’ve had friends come to visit and suggested we go out for pizza, they…
I don’t like to make promises I can’t keep, and last week I promised myself that I’m going to eat pesto every day for the rest of my life. So far, I’ve made good on that promise. The only thing that might thwart me is a lack of big, copious bunches of fresh basil, which are a bit of a rarity in Paris. (Most of…
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