Clik here to view.
a village called paris : cave fervèré, 75011
One indication I've been doing this blog too long is that certain restaurants and wine bars I've written about have since been sold, or closed down, or been completely revamped. When I last mentioned...
View ArticleClik here to view.
planet of women : l'auberge flora, 75011
One would like to cite beauty, good taste, and pleasure as one's dining ideals. But, as in most fields, there are extra-aesthetic concerns. One has to rate establishments according to the scope of...
View ArticleClik here to view.
hot potato: roseval, 75020
The remarkable hyperactivity of Paris food-blogging is partly due to the outsize international attention paid what is essentially a medium-sized, semi-provincial city. Thirty million tourists per year...
View ArticleClik here to view.
call it a caviste: la buvette, 75011
In a break from my habit of writing about things long after they've lost all relevance, I thought I'd mention my friend Camille Fourmont's brand new caviste-slash-bar à vin, La Buvette, which opened...
View ArticleClik here to view.
small victories : septime cave, 75011
Septimele resto, its relative informality notwithstanding, is a destination restaurant. One needs to plan ahead - not to mention budget, both time and money - to enter its almost-too-well-appointed...
View ArticleClik here to view.
not dead
I'm still alive. As of now I still intend to continue the blog. I'm sort of husbanding writerly resources at the moment, sketching out drafts of what might one day (if I'm lucky) become a Not Drinking...
View ArticleClik here to view.
beyond compare : le mary celeste, 75003
Most comparisons of cities are offered as a way for the speaker - usually an inhabitant of the smaller or less lively of the two cities being compared - to make a display of worldliness and, in doing...
View ArticleClik here to view.
the great american sandwich: verjus, 75001
The other day at lunchtime my colleague R and I announced to our high-pitched and highly amusing senior colleague L that we were going out to get sandwiches. As is her wont, she asked us to pick up...
View ArticleClik here to view.
despite the name: la pointe du groin, 75010
I might as well start off by explaining that La Pointe du Groin is an alternate spelling for La Pointe du Grouin, a rocky outcropping on the bay of Mont Saint Michel in Brittany. It's also where...
View ArticleClik here to view.
another (excellent) restaurant : le six paul bert, 75011
Some time after we stopped dating, my ex F moved to a really superb apartment just next to one of Paris' most beloved bistrots and steak-frites destinations, Bistrot Paul Bert. I can be sure she did...
View ArticleClik here to view.
why ask why: la pulperia, 75011
Natural wine enthusiasts are kind of like vegetarians: we know their preferences, but their reasons why diverge wildly. A few natural wine fans are taking an ecological stand. (It stands to reason...
View ArticleClik here to view.
ma dai ! : procopio angelo, 75010
There would not, initially, seem to be much purpose in my writing anything at all about Procopio Angelo, the eponymous restaurant of a popular Tuscan chef in Paris, once based on rue Faubourg St....
View ArticleClik here to view.
good works: l'épicerie du 104, 75019
The Native Companion has lately succeeded in dragging me to more museums. Each time in the ticket line I confront my reason for usually staying home : a bedraggled queue of hat-haired tourists with...
View ArticleClik here to view.
the highest bidder : table de bruno verjus, 75012
A good way for a writer to earn money is to cultivate a reputation for authority on a subject rich people like. Wine and food are quite good. Things like polo, yachting, and racehorses are probably...
View ArticleClik here to view.
the ideal : caffè dei cioppi, 75011
In the same way that many fine-dining waiters wish to be wizards whose assistants, the busser staff, do all actual plate-clearing, many restaurateurs aspire to invent Perpetual Motion Machines. It's...
View ArticleClik here to view.
n.d.p. in florence: enoteca bonatti
Florence, owing to its peerless artistic heritage of glorious renaissance treasures, is a good place to get suckered on industrial wine. Almost no one cares, however, because almost everyone is a...
View ArticleClik here to view.
n.d.p. in florence: enoteca fuori porta
It's a travel truism that the more friends one travels with, the less one sees. Monuments, museums, and moments of local colour rush past one's eyes, as though one were seeing them through a bus...
View ArticleClik here to view.
n.d.p. in florence: 5 e cinque
Florence is the only place I've ever been pickpocketed. As a friend and I snacked on one of the support columns of the Ponte Santa Trinita one evening a decade ago, some genial-seeming locals came up...
View ArticleClik here to view.
the angevin clan, pt. 1: mai and kenji hodgson / vins hodgson, rablay-sur-layon
From L: Kenji Hodgson, Cedric Garreau, M, Mai Sato, Nicolas Bertin, J. Taken in Bertin's vineyards. After departing from La Dive Bouteille this past January, my friends J, M, and I went to visit a few...
View ArticleClik here to view.
the angevin clan, pt. 2: cédric garreau / gar'o'vins, chanzeaux
The evening before our visits with newly-installed Anjou vigneron Cédric Garreau and the rest of the Angevin clan back in January, my friends J, M, and I found ourselves at Angers natural wine bar Le...
View Article