But in the consummate coddling of those eggs I saw only opportunity. Here, at last, was the chance to test an eggsistential hypothesis with a giant of French gastronomy.

Greeting Passard in the kitchen of the Vila Joya at the International Gourmet Festival in Algave, Portugal, I asked the chef at three-Michelin -starred L’Arpège in Paris to imagine a world in which a single egg sold not for 20 cents but for 20 euros. Wouldn’t the humble chicken egg then join truffles, caviar and foie gras amongst our most prized food luxuries?

“I agree with you,” said Passard. “The egg is so valuable in so many ways. It is the treasure of pastry. If the egg didn’t exist…”

The chef paused, took a deep breath:

“Why that’s unthinkable!”

During my visit by invitation to his London boutique I’d taken issue with his UK area manager dictating what I could and couldn’t photograph. My letter to Hermé concluded with a statement of acquiescence: all content for my website would henceforth be subject to his approval.

Had Hermé read the blog post? If so, had this rendezvous been arranged in response to it? All I knew was that Hermé had travelled to London from Paris for Valrhona Chocolate to help promote its new book, Cooking with Chocolate. Andre Dang, the ace food PR who’d arranged this brief meeting (but not the July visit to the boutique), had said nothing about the letter to me – nor had I, to him.

To play it safe I decided to interview a culinary genius in the art of saving the best for last by saving the worst for last. It’s an old journalist’s tactic: Pose the most difficult questions as the meeting is winding down. If the subject is offended and storms out you still have a story from the answers to the prior questions.

I was eager to learn about the creative process behind Hermé’s incomparable macaron flavours and signature combinations like olive oil & vanilla, violet & black currant and salted-butter-caramel & apple. How often, I asked, did new flavours in development end up on the cutting room floor? He answered with a shrug: Never.

“It’s a creation,” he said. “It’s not a process.”

Hermé tossed in lyrical French when discussing his oeuvre, describing, for example, flavour combinations not as associations or mariages of ingredients but rather as conversations des goûts – “conversations of tastes”. He nevertheless came across as an extremely serious, no-nonsense chef who reserved his puff and flash for pastries. Even if it did enter the back of my mind that he might have my letter in the back of his, Hermé’s matter-of-fact self-confidence could not be dismissed as posturing.

“When I imagine a new flavour I always have in my head a scenario de goûts,” he explained. “I write down the quantities before I do two tests.”

And what if a new scenario des goûts, to use his term for what most of us call a recipe, proved to be unpopular? Not his concern. Pastry, he scoffed, is not democratic.

His great challenge is identifying ingredients that meet his expectations. In his book a lemon is not just a lemon. The fruit can vary according to acidity, bitterness, juiciness, even the texture of the zest. Much like the perfumers at Guerlain and Rochas, the fragrance houses he’s worked with, Hermé must identify not just the main components of a formula but also the most suitable varieties of and sources for those ingredients. His recipe for the Infiniment Vanille (“Infinitely Vanilla”) macaron, featured in the recently released English edition of Pierre Hermé Macarons, calls for vanilla pods from Mexico, Madagascar and Tahiti. For this, the corollary to Guerlain’s Spiritueuse Double Vanille perfume, he desired a woody and floral vanilla with undertones of almond. He knew he couldn’t capture all that in only one type of vanilla pod.

Could so exacting a pastry chef sanction a scenario restricting the content, angle, composition and background of photographs taken of his macarons displayed in his boutiques? With his cappuccino cup nearly empty and the pages of my memo pad nearly full I at last posed a short version of that question. He was ready for it – yes, he’d read my open letter – but the words did not come easily.

“No, of course you can take photographs,” he replied, suggesting the behaviour of his UK area manager had been “maladroit”. That individual, he added, was no longer working at the boutique.

I didn’t like being responsible for anyone’s dismissal but I was happy with the interview. In 15 minutes I’d gotten more than I expected, plus the difficult business was behind us. In parting we discovered our mutual love for burgers. True burgers. I told Hermé about my BurgerMonday series of London pop-ups and my plans to organise one in Paris early in 2012. Lionel Lévy, a Marseille chef we both knew and admired, would be flipping the burgers. Hermé handed me his business card and said if invited he would be delighted to attend.

He was out the door and off to another rendezvous before I thought to warn him about the restrictions on photography at all my pop-ups: No one may take shots of the “young” behind young&foodish from a low angle. These give the false impression I have double chin.

Bistro Is Cool for Dinner, Not So Hot for Lunch: Paris Dining

2007-02-01 03:58:20.510 GMT

Review by Daniel Young

Feb. 1 (Bloomberg) — Dinner and lunch at Le Chateaubriand, a
fashionable bistro in Paris’s 11th arrondissement, are like night
and day.

At night, globe lights cast a flattering amber glow over
walls painted eggshell white and deep maroon. Minimal flourish and
wattage provide a plain, soft-focused backdrop for the modern,
meticulously crafted plates of the French Basque chef-proprietor,
Inaki Aizpitarte.

A visit the day after is sobering, as it can be in Paris. The
food and presentation are so workmanlike, you might assume they
are by another chef: A capable one, sure, but not Aizpitarte.
Light cast through the casement storefront exposes seams,
wrinkles, tobacco-stained walls. Even Erwin and Franck, silky-
smooth servers except for the five-day stubble they maintain in
solidarity with Aizpitarte, somehow look less dark, less handsome.
Aizpitarte, 34, who took over Le Chateaubriand almost a year
ago, transformed it into a dining destination from a neighborhood
relic in a matter of weeks.

So flow the currents in a city whose culinary compass is
stuck on SW: Today the city’s most restless chefs are foraging the
rustic glories of Gascony and the Basque country, more than
Provence and the Rhone-Alpes, for inspiration. Though Aizpitarte
hails from the hottest corner of contemporary French gastronomy,
his riveting cooking defies regional affiliation.

Divine Dessert

He cultivates ideas from unimagined flavor relationships,
marrying tuna tartare to flash-seared foie gras in one exceptional
appetizer or squid ink to passion fruit in another. He ennobles
humble ingredients, substituting “La vache qui rit” (“The
Laughing Cow”) processed cheese for mascarpone in a divine
dessert cream for poached pears. Nothing feels forced or silly.

The dinner menu, great value at 33 euros ($42.60) for two
courses and 39 euros for three, lists three choices each for
starter, main course and dessert. When asked if this menu changed
from night to night, Franck, a suave, accommodating server, said
the already overloaded staff would be dead if it did. Even with
this short program they didn’t manage to keep the dishware warm.

Sometimes that isn’t an issue. In an Asian take on the French
classic oeuf en gelee, the egg yolk is ingeniously submerged in a
soy jelly and paired with tiny cubes of smoked eel. The yolk, once
pierced, slowly oozes but doesn’t spill richness into the almost-
solid jelly. The eel bits detonate upon contact, providing more
smoke, gram for gram, than TNT.

A Basque-ish appetizer alternative floats tender chipirones
(baby calamari) in garlicky black squid ink with black rice
(Italian Venere) to match. Brilliant.

Asian Influence

Among main courses, the Asian influence is notable in the
pollack (the North Atlantic fish the French call lieu jaune)
poached in a broth with winter greens and black trumpet mushrooms
and striped with wasabi. A beef duo sets pristine fillets beside a
woven ball of stringy, crusty, fatty, succulent oxtail.

The best finish may be an ironic commentary on a prevalent
fashion of Parisian patisserie, peppered chocolate. Whereas most
pastry chefs do theirs with piment d’Espelette, the French Basque
chili pepper, Aizpitarte forgoes the spicy warmth of his native
red powder for the natural sweetness of roasted red pepper
prepared as a dip for bittersweet chocolate bars.

Le Chateaubriand’s location is a Metro-map millimeter too far
west of the Parmentier-Oberkampf intersection to be labeled
trendy. The bobos (bourgeois bohemians) who clog its small dark-
wood tables and chairs with monochromic chic don’t mind. The buzz
is unmistakable, yet the mood is relaxed and casual.

Case in point: A reservation was accepted for 8 p.m., though
the staff meal didn’t finish until 20 minutes later. While few
repeat diners sit down earlier than 9 p.m., some meet a bit
earlier at the bar for pintxos (Basque for tapas) and a wine
listed on the slate board.

Small Producers

The bistro personalizes its selection of wines from small
producers doing grand things through natural means by featuring
the names of the vignerons themselves instead of their domains,
e.g. Jean-Franois Nicq, the maker of an organic, fruity Syrah from
the Languedoc-Roussillon, rather than his Domaine des Foulards
Rouges. Most bottles fall within the 20-35 euro bracket.

Returning to the matter of Le Chateaubriand’s split
personality, it could seem ungrateful to fault Aizpitarte and
partner Frederic Penau for trying to preserve their bistro’s soul
and our “sous” through their 14 euro lunches. Only in an honest
bistro do you find an oversize entrecote quite as fatty as theirs.

Still, it is necessary to warn lunch regulars who might
puzzle over fare rendered unrecognizable to them by the chef’s
nocturnal aspirations.

Le Chateaubriand, 129 Avenue Parmentier, 75011 Paris. Tel.
+33-1-4357-4595

The Bloomberg Questions

How much? Dinner is 39 euros for three courses.
Sound levels? Parisian buzz.
Special feature? Breads from Au Levain du Marais.
Private room? No.
Date place? If you’re dating a foodie who wears black.
Will I go back? Yes.

(Daniel Young is a food critic for Bloomberg News. The
opinions expressed are his own.)

–Editor: Vines (jmr/fnn/bam)

Eric’s Gainsbourgesque nose bump did not escape the attention of the producers of Serge Gainsbourg: Vie Héroïque (see trailer), directed by the influential comic book artist Joann Sfar, and they sure as hell wouldn’t let it escape the attention of the Parisian public. The poster for the biopic (to be released in France on the 20th of January) features a stark image of Eric-as-Serge in profile, the spotlit outline of his nose set off by a dark shadow. That nose, anywhere from 1 to 5-feet high, depending on the poster format, is plastered everywhere: You can’t travel 100 meters in Paris, above- or underground, without bumping into it.

Eric’s acquaintances may no longer poke fun at his Gainsbourgesque nose, but others may find themselves staring at it in the poster, wondering if he had it expertly broken or enlarged for the role by a plastic surgeon. Might this reverse form of rhinoplasty be de rigueur in the new decade? Or will it be more of a fashion bump than a lasting trend?

Turns out Eric was fitted with a prosthetic nose and prosthetic ears for the role (see Paris Match interview with Eric and Le Figaro interview with the director). Even his schnoz was judged inadequate for a convincing portrayal that appears to mythologize Gainsbourg’s outsized features. Whatever the motives of director Sfar, whose comics are often inspired by his Jewish heritage, it is refreshing that a famously big and, yes, Jewish nose – so long a target of ridicule and caricature – is held up in the Métro of Paris as an emblem of cool.

Although being cornered is the worst fear of the hunted animal, at a brasserie it is an enviable position in which to find oneself. No one can sneak up to the table from behind. The orientation of each diner is ideally divided between his or her companion and the many characters who turn the brasserie into a theatrical spectacle. Moreover, the corner configuration makes it easy to share, cold oysters as well as warm caresses. During their regular meals at the Balzar, Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir always occupied the same corner table. At La Coupole the corner tables 83, 130, 141, or 152 have long been the greatest in demand. Just asking for one of them by its number wins you respect from the directeur, if not the table itself.

Some couples prefer to sit as co-conspirators on a banquette, side-by-side, in a giddy us-against-the-world posture. At the notoriously snobbish Brasserie Lipp, seating for A-list celebrities from the political, literary, and showbiz worlds is usually found on le rang de radiateur – “radiator row.” Its eight, well-heated places run along a banquette on the right side of the main dining room. The occupancy of the long table known as centre-gauche (named for its centre-left location, not its political orientation) is determined by the tastes of the headwaiters who amuse themselves with a silly nightly contest won by the one who can fill that section with the most beautiful women.

At a glance, the cross-cultural dessert pairing of chocolate and matcha, the prized Japanese green tea powder, may not seem the sort of combination to elicit uncontrollable cravings. Among the many terms used to evoke matcha’s elusively complex character — grassy, spinachy, watercress-like, seaweedy, earthy, floral, herbaceous, aquatic, bitter — barely a single one screams dessert.

But still, it’s quite the rage in Paris and Tokyo, where the only really big question is: Which chocolate makes the best matcha match? Read full article

• First warm the steaks to room temperature.
• Use a nonstick skillet so not much oil and butter are required.
• Use an oil with a high smoke point, such as soybean (soya), grapeseed, peanut (groundnut) or canola (rapeseed).
• Add the butter to the pan just before the steaks, not giving it time to brown.

This recipe for a pan-fried bistro steak with Béarnaise sauce, from The Bistros, Brasseries & Wine Bars of Paris, is an adaptation of Le Bistrot Pau Bert’s entrecôte grillé.

Makes 4 servings

4 rib, rib-eye or sirloin steaks, 3/4 inch thick, 8 to 10 oz (225-285g) each
4 tablespoons peanut (groundnut), soybean (soya) or grapeseed oil
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
salt
freshly ground black pepper
Béarnaise sauce

1. Remove the steaks from the refrigerator 30 to 60 minutes before cooking them.
2. Heat 2 tablespoons oil in 2 large nonstick skillets over high heat until very hot. Drop 1 tablespoon butter in each pan, immediately add the steaks and sear for 3 minutes (for medium rare). Turn the steaks, season the cooked sides with salt and pepper and sear the uncooked sides for 3 minutes.
3. Transfer the steaks onto plates, season with salt and pepper and serve immediately with Béarnaise sauce and frites.