Cucina Testa Rossa

Dorie Greenspan ~ Live and Online in Paris

Some of my most treasured memories in Paris are of time spent over a chocolate chaud or a vin chaud or an impromptu walk around the 6th with Dorie Greenspan. She knows everyone. Really. Everyone. It's amazing. And very fun. I try to stay in her wake, hoping some of her magical fairy dust will float back onto me. She tells me stories after stories after stories of the richest, most delightful experiences, experiences with some of the industry luminaries. Over a delicious lunch at Le Comptoir this week, Dorie shared more of her fascinating life with me. I can't begin to convey them with the humor and joy that she did but I hope they at least bring a smile to your face and a warmth to your heart as they did to mine. Click here to read the whole story...

My Last Meal

Ilva of the delightful Lucullian Delights has the most breathtaking photography I've seen from a curious cat to to a dewy grape to making the most mundane celery sing. She hails from Sweden but calls Tuscany home and has tagged me for a delicious non-meme about 5 things to eat before you die or just for the joy of eating.

When I first visited COPIA, the art display was blue pencil on white paper drawings of death row prisoners' last meals. Not the most uplifting but interesting none the less and it did get us thinking and talking about what we would eat if we knew it was our last meal. So for now, right off the top of my head at noon on a Monday....

1. Bruno's smoked mozzarella-eggplant-fusilli from Pane e Vino in San Francisco

2. My grandmother's meatballs and tomato sauce with a big piece of crusty italian bread.

3. A Chateau d'Yquem Sauterne with a huge hunk of Roquefort

4. Moules and frites with Ruinart champagne

5. An oozy unctuous 3-cheese grilled cheese sandwich from Hog Island

I'm going to cheat and add a sixth...

6. my roast chicken with a Puligny-Montrachet Chardonnay :-)

I'm hungry now!

IMBB23 ~ Vive la France!

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a huge thanks to Tana for this banner!

Is my blog burning? Well as a matter of fact it was...during New Year's Eve dinner but that’s another story.... To the mission at hand...

Bonjour mes amis! Bonjour de Paris. Gros merci to Alberto for creating this fun forum. I really struggled with a topic for this IMBB for months.  Over a humm-dinger lunch with the fabulous Sam, I agonized: “WHAT am I going to do for this? I thought about choosing a French theme but that just seems so obvious and the other ideas I had are already taken.” The fabulous Sam replied, “Uh, you live in France right?” Yep. “Well then it only makes sens that you pick a French theme!”

So voila! For this IMBB23 ~ Vive la France!

Or more specifically...Vive la France Régionale avec un Verre du Vin! A fancy way of saying a regional French dish with a glass of wine. Take a traditional French recipe and do a little sleuthing (aka “google it”) to discover a bit more about it, what region it came from and why it was important to that region.


salad niçoise

For example, take Salad Niçoise. It’s from Nice, hence Niçoise, the Provençal region, but what is it about this salad that earns the Niçoise moniker or what about it is Provençal? Who invented it and why and why is it considered a traditional dish?  There's Beouf Bourguignon or Coq au Vin or Poulet Saute Chasseur or Tarte aux Poires à la Frangipane or Gratinee a l'Oignon or Croque Monsieur et Madame, etc.... Chacun à son goût, as they say here. To each his own taste.

Then....since we are in France, you can’t have a meal without a glass of wine, oh mon dieu non!, so pair a wine with your dish. If you’re near San Francisco or on the Peninsula, drop by K&L Wines, the most knowledgeable, friendly wine experts around and if you are in France, well just pop into your nearest Nicolas where they are always delighted to help you select the perfect wine for the meal at hand. If you have any questions about this, give a shout. Please post by Sunday, February 26th and drop me a note when you do.

I hope you have some fun at this as the aspect I find most interesting about cooking, especially here in France, is the regionality (is that a word?) of food. Learning where foods and recipes originate and why adds so much more excitement to a meal, like you are consuming a little piece of history along with it... If you are coming up with cookers block, I'm sure you could pick up an idea or two from la reine de la cuisine française herself, Julia Child.

I think I’m headed to the south of France for my sleuthing.... If nothing else it's warmer down there!  Bon appetite et à fin du mois, j’espère! ~ Happy eating and see you at the end of the month, I hope! Laura

PS: Here’s the technorati tag (thanks Sam!):

Tagged with: <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/IMBB23" rel="tag">IMBB23</a> + <a href="http://technorati.com/tag/French" rel="tag">French</a>

PPS: In case you are struggling with this, here are a few traditional regional French dishes that we learned in cooking school including the one above. The pics are less that stellar since I used disposable cameras that kept falling out of my pocket into the frying pan every time I leaned over.  And to be honest, the food we made the first few months was pretty scary....


navarin printanier

goujonettes de sol au sauce tartare


blanquette de veau a l'ancienne


filet de sole bonne femme

Tagged with: IMBB23 + French

Bonne Anniversaire à Mon Petit Blog!

Hard to believe it was one year ago today that I set up my little unassuming Typepad blog. It's even harder to believe all the great people I've met in this crazy blogsphere. Many thanks to you all for sticking with me, encouraging me and cheering me on. I hope 2006 brings many more delicious adventures that I can share with you. Until then, Bonne Année (Happy New Year)!  Best wishes from very cold, snowy Paris. Laura

Wine Blogging Wednesday ~ Domaine de l’Arlot

Pinot Noir grapes in a Grand Cru vineyard in Burgundy, France ~ September 2005

Thanks to La Belle Gastronomie,  we were challenged to find a small production wine, as in 250 cases small, from any region, at any price point. A bonus of an extra warm fuzzie for finding a producer who produced less than 1000 cases of total production! No small feat and not for the faint of heart. But I am happy to announce, after consuming copious amounts of wine (just doing my research!), I am the recipient of a warm fuzzie! Not sure quite what that means but having won nothing other than my 3rd grade spelling bee, I was rather elated.

St Aubin vineyards and view of the town, Burgundy, France ~ September 2005

By some small fluke of nature, perhaps the planets aligned or the stars moved into retrograde (as you can tell I have no clue about astrology – my pastor calls it ‘spooky stuff”), I happen to live in the epicenter of all things wine—as far as the French are concerned anyways. To meet this challenge and earn the above mentioned warm fuzzies (who can’t use a few now and then), I only had to look a few hours TGV (high speed train) ride away. To the south-east to be exact, to a region called Burgundy which has absolutely nothing to do with those E&J Gallo 1-gallon jugs of so called Burgundy simply because it is red in color. THANK GOD!

Burgundy (the wine region in eastern France) is the Jan Brady of French wine regions. You have big sister Bordeaux (Marsha, Marsha, Marsha!) which gets all the attention and acclaim and little sister Chateauneuf du Pape (Cindy and her golden curls) to the south set in the most charming medieval town imaginable complete with crumbling castle and papal lineage.

Burgundy by contrast is unappreciated and pshawed, however, it is everyone else’s loss as Burgundy year after year produces some of the most highly treasured wine made today. Romanée Conti can fetch upwards of $5,000 a bottle and the whites from Chassagne-Montrachet or Puligny-Montrachet are unrivaled.

So in honor of middle children everywhere, or anyone or any wine who doesn’t receive rightful applause, I salute this wondrous Burgundy region with a tip of my hat, or wine glass as the case may be, to Domaine de l’Arlot.

Domaine de l’Arlot, located in the Côte de Nuits region, is nestled between the towns of Nuits St George and Premeaux, a 2 hour train ride from Paris. Owner and winemaker Jean-Pierre De Smet purchased l’Arlot in 1986 after working for the previous owner for 8 years. Today, about 33 acres (14 hectares) are planted with Pinot Noir grapes for the red wines, and approximately 2 acres planted with Chardonnay and Pinot Gris grapes for the whites. Robert Parker has heralded L'Arlot as "all that red burgundies should be."

Domaine de l’Arlot, Nuits Saint Georges 1er Cru "Clos des Forêts St. Georges"

“This monopole (single wine maker) is a wonderful 1er cru located just north of Premeaux. The old vines produce a deeply colored and aromatic wine, with hints of plums & chocolate. It has real concentration and length with a meaty, silky texture.” "Great Value" -- Saveur Magazine

The Domaine has two premier cru (2nd highest ranking for a Burgundy wine, grand cru is the higest) wines: Clos des Forêts Saint Georges (17 acres or 7 hectares) and Clos de L'Arlot (10 acres or 4 hectares). The Nuits St. George AC is made from young Clos des Forêts vines, producing about 3,000 bottles (250 cases!). In 1991, Jean-Pierre De Smet added a parcel of Romanée Saint Vivant to its portfolio. These vines are located literally a stones toss (20 feet!) from the Romanée Conti parcel…..fortunately for us mere mortals eeking out a meager living, these Romanée Saint Vivant wines are much less expensive than their neighbor across the path!

Romanée Conti, Burgundy, France ~ September 2005

Now in the interest of full and fair disclosure, I can not take credit for discovering this Burgundian jewel. My friend Beth, with whom I cooked at the Cannes Film Festival last year, worked their vendage (grape harvest) this fall...

Vendage in the Burgundy Grand Cru vineyards ~ September 2005

...and I was fortunate enough to reap the rewards of her backbreaking work when she popped by Paris for a few weeks to recuperate.


(left) Nuits Saint Georges Blanc, AOC "Nuits Saint Georges" with tropical fruit and exotic aromas due in part to few old Pinot Gris vines in the mix. (right) Côte de Nuits Villages, Clos du Chapeau, AOC "Côte de Nuits Villages" with earthy, red fruits aroma.

So the next time you are perusing a wine list and immediately gravitate to the Bordeaux or to the Loires, give good ol’ Burgundy a break and indulge in one of their beautiful, buttery (not oaky!) chardonnays or an elegant, earthy pinot noir.

And mark your calendars, this years’ Beaujolais Nouveau's Release is just a few weeks away!

The Most Expensive Prunes in the World!

Dear David, I take back everything I said along with all my snide digestive-cleansing comments regarding the pedantic prune. You were right. I am converted. Prunaliciously yours, Laura

Since God forbid I do anything moderately, I took on David's Prune Blogging Thursday challenge with great gusto and headed to J Detou for some prunes. I was actually searching for passion fruit puree (coming in a few days) and I saw a tin of Pruneaux d’Agen that he’d exhalted. 18 euros later and a severe case of sticker shock, I staggered home glassy-eyed.

However all was made right in the world when I opened this little box o’ gold a la Charlie Bucket and his first bar of chocolate. There are 16 individually wrapped prunes in the beguiling blue tin. Are you doing the mental calculations as in 18 euros divided by 16 prunes equals 1.125 euros per prune...approximately...which comes to 1.406 or $1.41 PER PRUNE!  I could by a 10 gallon drum of prunes at Costco for that! But...

Bite into one of these little jewels and you will be transported to an out-of-body experience. They were firm on the outside, but sweet, creamy on the inside as if little Agen elfs magically removed all the insides, pureed them, sprinkled with fairy dust and reinserted it into the prunes. Maybe they did indeed do this and I am completely clueless and have no right to call myself a 'culinary professional' but these little babies just about knocked my socks off...and I wasn’t wearing socks!

A tin of Pruneaux d’Agen: 18 euros
Eating a Pruneaux d’Agen: Priceless

Blog Deadlines?

Funny, but pathetically true....

Doonesbury, by Garry Trudeau, 29 August 2005

The Funniest Human Being on the Planet

Babies and Restaurants are the Chernobyl of Parenting
By Dave Barry ~ Posted Sun, Oct. 02, 2005 on The Miami Herald.com

If you're a new parent, there will come a time when either you or your spouse will say these words: ''Let's take the baby to a restaurant!''  Now, to a normal, sane person, this statement is absurd. It's like saying: ''Let's take a moose to the opera!''  Click here to read the entire column.

Hi-tech developers and marketers have an inherent distrust toward each other as marketing feels that developers are overpaid with huge egos and developers feel that marketing is just a waste of money.

My friend Kendall says there are 3 sides to every story: one side, the other, and the truth somewhere in the middle so I guess there’s something to be said for both sides but an interesting dynamic none the less that I observed while working at a Huge Software Company. I fortunately landed in a group that was comprised of half development, half marketing so I could watch this human Petri dish spawn before me.

Developers at software companies are treated like demi-gods. They are after all the “assets” of a hi-tech company. They received the highest salaries, most stock options and, most disconcerting, the best offices with views of the Bay or the hills while marketing was banished to the dark inner cubes with artificial light. You might think that a ray or two of sunshine would slip through their office windows but let me remind you that it was developers occupying the offices with windows.

So?, you ask? Well let’s just say that had I not noticed the corporate ID badge on a few of these developers at above mentioned software company, I would have called the police. More than a few looked like they’d lived on the streets for years while their personal net worth could actually relieve the combined national debt of most 3rd world countries. Caveat: Now no one in my group was and not all developers are like this, so I am stereotyping, spare me the nasty emails, but more than a handful would qualify under this description.....

They are part bat working from 3pm until 3am at the earliest, personal hygiene is optional, haircuts and shaving are non-existent as that would take unnecessary time away from coding or playing Death Star, and the blinds are shut tighter than a drum lest any Vitamin D whatsoever penetrate their Star Trek t-shirt to their blindingly white skin which made any blemish resemble Rudolph’s nose. So a cross between Bart Simpson and a vampire would be relatively accurate. Ironically, they spent most of Monday lunch recapping the previous evenings’ Simpson’s episode, quoting it verbatim followed by peals of laughter.

Now what does this have to do with the funniest human being on the planet? Oh yes, that. Sorry. A rather large portion of Dave Barry's fan base (or target audience in marketing speak) are hi-tech developers who can also quote his columns verbatim, hence my introduction to Dave Barry. Their disgust of me was palpable when I asked them “Who is Dave Barry?”

Only the funniest human being on the planet, that’s who! One of the developers, bedecked in a South Park t-shirt, handed me Dave’s most recent book at the time and only a few pages into it I wholeheartedly concurred. While savoring his columns I inevitably laugh out loud, more often than not with tears rolling down my face. 

His depiction of Rollerblade Barbie still makes me cry—you might remember this when he demonstrated it on Late Night with David Letterman years ago and nearly set Dave’s desk ablaze. Unfortunately Dave, Barry not Letterman, is on hiatus but I receive a weekly email with a link to a previous column and some highlights from his blog. I hope you enjoy his writings (old or new) as much as I do!

Le Pré Verre, Paris

This blogging phenomenon has flung open the doors to the world and connected me with people all over the planet. This particular evening I was having dinner with a woman from Los Angeles who, like me a few years ago, wants to make a change in her life and being a Francophile at heart, is naturally drawn to Paris.  She stumbled on my little web site, felt a kindred spirit, et voila two months later she lands in Paris!   

We met at Le Pré Verre, a bistro du vin (wine bar) in the 5th arrondisement in the heart of the Latin Quarter. It is on the corner of rue Thenard and rue Sommerard, 1 block south of blvd St Germain and 1 block east of rue St Jacques. My friend Antoinette enlightened me to this local gem that I never would have stumbled upon. Chef Delacourcelle lived in Asia so he incorporates ingredients such as a cassia (cinnamon), bard and tamarind into traditional French cuisine. He also trained with the late Bernard Loiseu and mastered French pastry at Fauchon.  Needless to say, we were in for a memorable meal.

I had the exact same plat (entrée or main course) and dessert I had the week before as it was so superb I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I opted for a different entrée (appetizer) as the petite pois et fois gras (baby peas and duck liver) terrine was too tempting.  Last visit I started with the velouté de cresson (watercress soup) topped with chorizo sausage flavored foam and chopped peanuts. The melding of flavors and textures was a wonderful surprise and simply delicious.  This time, in honor of spring blooming around me, I opted for the petite pois et fois gras terrine. Once again a subtle combination of flavors and textures and combine perfectly. The lettuce on the bottom was unnecessary and distracting but the lovely little radish disks and slightly spicy vinaigrette added a wonderful crunch and spice to this already perfect dish. 

For my plat, I selected the morue avec purée fumée (cod with smoked mashed potatoes).  The cod was seared in cassia (cinnamon) which not knowing this when I ordered it (on my first visit) made my first bite a brilliant surprise. The cod simply melted in my mouth and the unctuous  cinnamon cream sauce enhanced the caramelized spice. The puréed potatoes were other-worldly.  They were smoked first so they had that earthy, smokey, hickory taste and puréed perfectly smooth.  When scooped with a bit of the cinnamon cream sauce, I didn’t want to stop eating them…ever.

Dessert, the crescendo, was simple yet spectacular. The descriptor, fraises mariné au persil (strawberries marinated in parsley), doesn’t begin to do it justice. The strawberries were quartered and marinated in cointreau and chopped parsley. The mound of berries were then topped with a sprinkling of chopped nuts and a large quenelle (football shaped scoop) of glacé du persil! Parsley ice cream!!! Who’d a thought? Pas moi (not me) that’s for sure! A very refreshing, light, and visually beautiful end to another amazing meal. Cue cymbals!

35 euros each with a glass of wine…worth every centime and then some!  Make reservations!

Le Pré Verre
Chef Delacourcelle
8 rue Thenard
75005 Paris
+33 (0)1 43 54 59 47
Metro: Maubert Mutualite (#10)

Bay Area Bites

Not literally!  The Bay Area, the San Francisco Bay Area that is, actually rocks, and even more so with this cool new culinary blog, Bay Area Bites, courtesy of KQED, the local PBS station.  I am so excited that I am now one if their contributing "bloggers" (hate that name but if the proverbial shoe fits...) and hopefully providing an interesting perspective of culinary life in France.  Click here to see my first story about cooking at Chateau de Villette (of The Da Vinci Code fame) just outside of Paris. I'll be posting on Fridays so please stop by and see what life has stirred up on this side of the pond.

à vendredi (see you friday), Laura