[Paris/France] Bonjour Chowhounders

OMFG am I in? Am I out? Where am I? Who am I?
But I know who all of you are. If I don’t, I do. It’s only senilityt hat stops me from thinking I do. Or don’t.
Enough of the jingle-jangle morning.
Very happy to see all your names. This feels like a class reunion.
It got lonely on rue des Martyrs for the first 2 years of the pandemic, even though all the food stores were opened and we were not deprived of anything. Now travelers are back with a vengeance. Except my favorite lunch companion. I miss him so direly.

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Very glad to see you here!

Yay! :smiley:

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Speaking of r. des martrys (and environs)… do you have any thoughts about the following places:

Belle Maison
Claque Fromage
Coeur de Breizh
Pere Tanguy
Cafe Limo
Artisan de la Truffe
Pompette
Blé Noir

Thanks so much and great to see your handle again!

Belle Maison. Had very nice meals there but not recently. But I pass by it very often, and it is packed as always. The first time I went there was with John Talbott, who doesn’t come to Paris anymore. No words can express how much I miss lunching and yakkety-yakking with him.
The second time was with another Chowhounder, a young lady from New York, very nice girl and a real gastronome. The last message I wrote on Chowhound was to help her pack a foie-gras-champagne train picnic at marché St Quentin as she was taking the train to Strasbourg with her elderly mother right after their arrival to Paris. She is no longer with us. Gone too freaking soon.
Back to the good eats around rue des Martyrs

  • Comptoir Boutary. John and I went to Petit Boutary in the 17th many times. One of our favorites. Now a Boutary spawn in the 9th, yeah.
  • Vermillon. Another fave of John’s and mine. There are about 6 tables, so don’t forget to book.
  • Ramdam. This new exciting place is packed packed packed. You want to try the whole menu. And the buzz is fun.
  • Kozo. French cuisine with a Japanese chef. John and we could never get enough of the genre.
    Mieux. Very pleasant bistro, good vibes. A place you want to linger after a meal and have one or three glasses of chartreuse.
    A word on our beloved Louis. It is no more. Cher monsieur Crépel is in Ireland !
    As for Café Limo and Père Tanguy are on a very nice square. I have not eaten there. Menu a little commonplace, more like a café than a restaurant. We much prefer the nearby Kozo, or, if we want a simpler meal, Le Bouclier de Bacchus, where Philippe always gives us excellent advice on wine without the mumbo jumbo. He was the one who turned me on to Les Creisses and I will always be grateful.
    The 'hood gets a bit oppressively hip at times. Be careful of hipster places.
    Haave fun, Steve !
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Tiens ! Are you still in Sète ? See you next September when we will be en route to Collioure.

Just saw your post on another thread and responded there. I will stay here again: so great that you are here! — Jake

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Have you done your Normandy/Brittany trip?
Last time we were there, we chose the beautiful village of Genêt - with its wowey view of Mont St Michel - as our base, and nearly every firenight we walked to chez François, a small village inn where all the meats are grilled in a big fireplace dating back from who knows how many centuries.
Other bases we love are along the Rance river, either the port of Dinan or the village of St Suliac. But since we have a house rental, and my husband is a fiendish cook, we cook at home most of our dinners at home instead of eating out, as neither of those two spots, as beautiful as they are, have standout restaurants.
If the season is right, you must not miss the famous présalé lamb, from the sheep in the low-lying grassland along the Baie St Michel. Because hey graze on grass that is covered by the sea tide everyday, their meat is naturally subtly salty yet juicy and lean.

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PARIGI!!! All good things are worth waiting for. So good that you are here!!

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Chère Pilgrim. I don’t een know what I had done to log in suddendly mais me voilà. So happy to give you a hug and a bise.

Hey one day you and I - and all others - should restart that thread on all the good eateries in France’s countryside.

And, hey, one day you should visit your West Coast kin and come join me on a Clement Street dim sum crawl!

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I wish there were a screen-licking emoji.

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Parigi!!! Great to see you here! And looking forward to seeing you in person next month.

Rio Yeti, you too! While this board is heavily weighted to Paris, it is for all of France.

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Parigi,
So very, very happy to see you here! Your presence has been so missed! Yeah!!!

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Gotta admit, I was wondering, both here and on the SlowEurope board. These days, I just don’t want to ask. Glad you’re back on board (not sexy, but a turn of word all the same) – sorry I left before you returned.

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@SteveR, She just got back, and you’re telling Parigi she’s not sexy? Idk, sure seems like a TOS violation to me… :smirk:

I was told the “secret” was mustard plus shallots plus crème fraîche.
I wish Ptipois were here. She’s the real deal.
Try this not-the-real-deal:
In the pan where you had sautéed the steak, sink in a shallot. Let it wilt and turn golden.
Add big Tablespoon of mustard (not the sweet kind).
Mix with 20 cl crème fraiche liquide.
Reduce until mixture thickens slightly. Should be about 1, 2 minutes.

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She may be closer than you think.
(Thanks!)

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Waaaaaaa.
(The Cantonese fat-Wa)

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Through the years, pigging out with chowhounders has been a moveable feast, moving from Paris to the France-Spain border.
And one such meal involves unlimited gillardeaux oysters.
One frigid winter day, a chowhounder whom I had never met contacted me and made an offer I could not refuse. He was expecting a delivery of a few dozens gillardeaux and asked me to help him eat them.
Nietsche was wrong. Yes there is such a god.
My arm was twisted one revolution.
And why did he end up with half of Pari’s supply of gillardeaux?
Fast rewind to 1 week before that.
He went by a poissonnerie in Paris and saw some “gillardeaux” that did not look right.
Gillardeaux, it turns out, are one kind of oysters that have their own counterfeit. They are rare and expensive, and some poissonniers would sell their oysters as gillardeaux, with price to match, and they are not.
RB had a doubt and contacted the gillardeaux people, asking them if they indeed supplied that poissonnerie.
As he hadd suspected, they did not.
They in turn made an offer to RB that he truly could not refuse: they asked him to send on a photo of the counterfeit, with the name and price indication, and they would send him an obscene number of oysters as a token of gratitude.
RB who was de passage in Paris had to call up an emergency pig-out force. Me voilà.
That’s how I met the charming RB, at his pied à terre in the Marais, on a Siberian day.
A good time was had by all. After stuffing face for an hour, I looked up. to find the courtyard had turned all white, blanketed by snow.
Merci RB. Total magic.

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