Arnaud Nicolas, and Electric Scooters

I was in Paris last August, but somehow between then and now the city has been completely taken over by electric scooters. I guess maybe I wasn't noticing the onset in the early days, but now that I am here with all the young people it turns out that electric scooters-- Lime and Bird-- are a huge thing.  For those of you who are out of it like me, it's an app-based activity. The scooters are just left wherever someone has finished with them, you use the app to track one down, log in from the app, and off you go.  It was cute-- we've been here a few days by now, all museums and food and wine, and everyone was just beginning to feel a little cooped up.  It was like the old days with the kids in the city, we needed an activity, and there it was-- scooter ride! All seven of us zooming down the quai on the left bank, and then taking our lives in our hands on the streets heading home. Kind of ridiculous and god knows dangerous in the long run (I actually can't believe cities haven't banned them yet) but they have that cool tech-driven feel about them. Who can believe that there are (not quite) free scooters lying around every corner of the city? It seems too good to be true.

[I remember the first time I heard about email, maybe 1983.  A guy was sitting next to me in the computer lab and I asked him what he was doing.  Sending a message to a friend in Chicago, he said. I said wow, how much does that cost?  No, it's free! It didn't seem possible. Long distance phone calls were still expensive back then.]

Michael Jackson show at the Grand Palais this afternoon was sort of interesting, not great to tell you the truth. I would have liked more old video footage, more Michael Jackson, more music. Instead there was a lot of contemporary painting and videos of dancers using MJ as a theme. They all felt like assignments in an art school class. And, it was mobbed. What the hell.

Anyway, on to dinner at Arnaud Nicolas.  This is a relatively new place, nearby on avenue de la Bourdonnais.  Nicolas is a MOF, a meilleur ouvrier de France, which is this very French award system in which a few people can qualify for special status in some specialty, mostly but not exclusively culinary.  Nicolas is a MOF in charcuterie: cured meats, patés and that sort of thing, and has set himself the task of recovering the lost art. There is not nearly as much charcuterie in France as there used to be, even in my memory.  In the seventies and eighties a lot of the old traiteurs went out of business, or were taken over by Chinese takeout places.

Most of the first courses on the Arnaud Nicolas menu are charcuterie platters.  The waiter (who Carol and I knew from a couple of lunches, and who in good French waiter fashion recognized us and welcomed us back) suggested that we order some to share. Here are the choices, we got a selection of four, including the lobster one... hardly matters because they are all wonderful.  The kitchen divvied them up into three or four mixed plates to spread around the table.

The main courses here are straight ahead, almost very carefully prepared but simple and casual. Manning and I shared the tourte de cochon, a pie of pork (lots of pork liver) and duck foie gras wrapped and baked in a puff pastry shell, with a little dark reduction poured around it.  Amazing. I don't take pictures of food but here is one from the internet.

Several people had the magret de canard, a couple had the quenelles, which is minced fish whipped up until it is super-light, then steamed and served with a shellfish-based sauce.  Harry had the marinated salmon,m a big plate of house-made gravlax.

Baba au rhum is an old fashioned French dessert that has come back into fashion lately, I get it all the time. Warm sponge cake with a pitcher of warm rum on the side to pour over, and vanilla whipped cream to put on top.  Others had Le Mont Blanc, another old-fashioned dessert based on layers of crispy meringue with whipped cream, fruit or chocolate. This one had chestnut cream, a Carol-favorite.

The service was as-ever fun and gracious. I already mentioned the head guy, who was backed up by a young waiter who actually handled most of the business at the table. He switched back and forth between French and English for us, picked out two bottles of great and (more or less) reasonable wine.  When he was opening the first bottle he noticed Manning watching him and smiled. Manning said he had worked as a waiter back home and was always nervous opening wine. So it turned into a lesson, with yet a third waiter (this is a fairly big place) coming over to supervise the particulars.  They brought him an opener and had him open the second bottle.

Great night.

65th Birthday in France

Haven't written anything here in a long long time.  But it's a nice occasion, in Paris for my 65th birthday with Carol, all three kids, our new son-in-law Rick and Lena's boyfriend Mark, plus my lifelong (since first grade) best friend Harry.

Not sure if I plan to start blogging about life in France again, but I am motivated in the short term just by a desire to keep track of what we eat here, and that is a good piece of what we do. So unless French food is of interest to you, this blog probably won't be.

So anyway, last night we ate at an old standard for us, Bistrot Balhara, nearby in the 7eme.  It is tiny, maybe a dozen tables. The chef is Basquaise. The maitre d'hotel (and actually the only waiter) is a guy who has been there forever, with a typical jokey-French bistrot personality. He is great, but you see complaints about him on tripadvisor sometimes-- he talks a lot, and needles you a little, expecting you to joke back.  He makes a little fun of my French, but it's cool because he is always willing to actually speak French with me. What I can't take is switching into English. Harry says he is like a New York deli waiter, and that's pretty close to it. People expect French waiters to be aloof and formal, but unless you go up a price notch or two, they generally aren't. They are serious about what they do-- they can always answer a question about the food or wine-- but they see their job as putting you at ease, and joking around is part of the act.

Anyway, as soon as we sat down he suggested their four course discovery formula, which was a little more expensive than what we might have done off the menu, but with all eight of us it seemed like a good idea. This kind of menu is chef's choice, which I love, but Harry is a little less omnivore than the rest of us, which can be difficult with a no-choice menu. But the waiter was super nice about saying no problem, just let me know what you don't like and we will work around it.  Harry was willing to give it a try. Duck and shellfish, it was explained, and they seamlessly altered the dishes as necessary, though each one then came with jokes about "extra canard" pour monsieur.

OK, here goes..., the whole idea here is to get the menu down, so here goes.

Thee amuse-bouche was a spread of mixed pork and duck fat, which was just as good as it sounds. Not sure what it was called, a rillette, I guess.

Next was a velouté of lentils, with pieces of wild duck (Harry got a substitute!) and chopped toasted hazelnuts.  Really great, in some ways a highlight of the meal. 

The main course was a cocotte (a little cast iron French oven, four for the table) with confit de cochon in a dark reduction.  We each had a plate with green cabbage, pureed cauliflower, a thick slice of bacon and sunflower seeds. You spooned the pork and sauce over the top.

Then plates of shaved brebis (sheep's milk) cheese, arranged in little pyramids, with house-made black cherry jam. As usual, getting close to the edge appetite-wise. I joked that dessert was going to be rice pudding, which is what always pushes me over the edge, and I was right, except that it was rick pudding underneath a scoop of homemade chocolate ice cream. Super-dark bitter chocolate truffles came with the check. 

Two bottles of beaujolais, and the whole thing was around $60/person, tax and (small French) tip included.  Good food is cheaper in Paris than in Charlottesville these days.

There are some other things I should mention. Our arrival lunch at La Blanche Hermine, the little creperie next to our apartment. I think you can find something about that back in the blog somewhere.  Drinks before dinner at Le Petit Cler, a nice little café on rue Cler, where the kids are staying. Our usual "brunch" at home of cheese, bread and pastry.

Good Willy Ronis show at the mairie of the 20eme, though it was insanely crowded. The 20eme is great these days, lively and safe, but still unreconstructed, with many of the old tabacs and such still in their old pre-hipster state.