Cucina Testa Rossa

La Fete des Amoureux ~ Valentine's Day

Love is nothing short of a national sport here in France and the French claim to celebrate it every day of the year, not just on February 14th. It is more beloved than soccer or philosophical debate, though love plays heavily into both. All store fronts are bedecked with Valentine's decorations but regardless of the time of year, people are always kissing.

Sometimes it's charming, like a couple I spotted smooching after a long lunch at the Palais Royal; other times you want to hurl, like when the couple in line in front of you at the post office are slobbering on each other so much so you feel like you are in the front row of the dolphin show at Marine World. Anyways, back to Valentine's Day... This year I got a tad carried away with the heart-red-love theme. Click here for more on this celebration of love...

La Vue de Ma Fenêtre ~ Par La Fenêtre de Michel Cluizel

I met a friend today for lunch at a small sushi place off Rue St. Honore called Foujita (7 rue de 29 juillet, 75001, 01 49 26 07 70). The sushi was fabulous, the place was packed, and the service was about as rude as it gets. So rude it became funny. And on the way back to the metro I walked past Michel Cluizel's chocolaterie. It took every ounce not to run in and roll around in this a la Alfred Molina in Chocolat. Enjoy....!

La Vue de Ma Fenêtre ~ Police on Rollerblades

Policemen on Rollerblades in front of l'Opera, Paris ~ February 2007

Can't outmaneuver these guys! And given the traffic jams and transportation strikes in Paris, this is probably faster than the metro. Maybe it's time to dust off my big purple pair that I used for all of a week back in 1994 when I was determined to make those Friday Night Rides across San Francisco that were so hugely popular back then. Determined that is, until I fell directly on my tailbone (less padding than now) right in front of the Chestnut Street morning express bus headed downtown filled with handsome men in double-breasted suits and wingtips. The searing pain was outmatched only by the sheer embarassment made doubly so because I fell trying to do a fancy little jump turn onto the sidewalk in front of above mentioned bus. That'll teach me to try to show off!

Cocktails and Art at enviedart

I flew in last Thursday afternoon - with a few hours of deep REMs thanks to Ambien under my belt to get me through the night - headed home, showered, changed, and was in a cab within an hour careening to a cocktail party at enviedart, a tres chic, hip, hyper (pronounced: ee-per) cool art gallery in the 8th. Featuring all young and upcoming artists, it was a great place to have a reception rather than the staid, and now Michelin-spanked, George V. A local restaurant and favorite of the fashion houses, Lemoni Cafe, catered all natural, organic brightly colored combinations of sweet and savory in cute little plastic cups for an almost Pierre Herme-ish effect. I was waiting for someone to set their cocktail on the small table top canvases or knock over a statue but nary a spill... Here are some pics...

Bonne Année 2007 de Paris!

pork loin stuffed with dried apricots and cranberries in Sauterne and tied (not very well) with dental floss...

No culinary disasters to speak of occurred this holiday however it was not without its hair-raising, stress-inducing, blood-vessel-bursting, screaming-for-wine moments. Bare with me here....

Freak-out #1: 4:30pm Start cooking for 11 people who are arriving at 8:00pm. Yes, start. Luckily, we had already shopped...well sort of. Two more people joined the festivities at the last minute so that morning I ran to the market for more veggies, to Pascal the baker for the baguettes and brioche, and to my blue-eyed butcher Serge for another pork loin. We were all tres jetlagged so an afternoon nap was a must to get through the night. I re-woke up around 4:15pm, and began chopping and blanching and peeling and melting and whisking and grating like a mad woman.

Pierre arrived back around 6pm and I immediately started barking orders. "Toast the brioche, juice and zest the lemon, mix the blue cheese, assemble the endive, help me tie up the pork, turn off the carrots, make the potatoes, oh and by the way we are out of olive oil, butter and Roquefort and it’s Sunday night and no stores are open. AAAAAK!" Click here to read how we ate our way into the in the new year....

Epiphany & Gallettes des Rois

Epiphany is tomorrow but tomorrow is my day to post at KQED's Bay Area Bites so I thought I'd post this a day early. It is actually a repeat from two years ago. Sorry, I'm still jetlagged :) Click here to have a delicious epiphany...

A Perfect Day for a Fire

Cold, rainy, blustery outside. Warm, cozy, crackling fire inside. A perfectly lazy day.

Happy New Year! Bonne Année!

12 bottles of Champagne + 8 bottles of Bordeaux + 2 bottles Sauterne = 1 Happy New Year :)

Joyeux Noel! Buon Natale! A Christmas Menu...

No dinner party of mine is complete without at least one culinary disaster. I was still reeling from my 36 hour flight back to Paris peppered with 4 stops, rain delays, circling over Wisconsin, a refueling stop in Rockford Illinois, 2 missed connections, lost luggage, stolen items, no water and cranky flight attendants and still recovering from my Diner des Femmes Phenomenales the weekend before but I was leaving for the US for the holidays so it was this weekend or never so I broke out the whisks and got cooking. Click here to commiserate in my culinary disasters...

Marrons Grillés ~ Roasted Chestnuts

Roasted Chestnut stand at the entrance to Luxembourg Gardens ~ November 2006