Chez Michel with Nina

It's good to be back in Paris. Hadn't seen Nina since her last trip to Menton in July, so decided to meet up for a delicious dinner tonight. Going off on a recommendation by David Lebovitz, Nina accompanied me to dinner at Chez Michel - a bistro serving traditional cuisine from Bretagne. (Nina's favorite region of France is Bretagne - but I have yet to visit. We both love cuisine Bretonne.)

I ordered special Bretonne biscuits stuffed with Morue (salted cod).


Nina ordered this for her entrée - daurade


They ran out of cochon de lait, but I still opted for the tête de cochon (pig head) as a replacement. Lots of fat, some meat. Really rich and hearty.


Nina got the Bretonne version of the bouillabaisse.


Of course, we both ordered the Kouign-Amman. Caramelized sugar, butter, layers of brioche... what more could a girl ask for ?


We also tried the demi-sel Brittany butter - I had a picture of it but it is lost now =(. Really delicious. We both really enjoyed our dinner here. Everything was well-cooked and perfectly seasoned. Highly recommended.

Chez Michel
10, Rue de Belzunce
75010 Paris
M: Gare du Nord
Tel: 01.44.53.06.20

The Last Supper...at Tricotin

... well the last supper of the "Eating with Pim weekend."

This Cambodian owned "Chinese restaurant" served a myriad of items ranging in Chinese/Cantonese food, Vietnamese, and Thai (typical of "Chinese restaurants" in Paris).

Funky tasting Nems


House noodles with all types of goodies like shrimp, pork, and kidney. Normally, Pim just orders this here, with the soup separate so that she can season the noodles with hot sauce, etc. I will try that next time.


Fried shrimp that Pim likes to dip in the broth. Same breading as fried bananas. Ummm...


Beef "chow mein" - not your typical chow mein. It was okay - I did enjoy all the crunchy Chinese broccoli.


Overall this place is okay. Not super Chinese as it is Cambodian run but if you are looking for some cheap and quick Asian food, then why not? This place is HUGE too - crowded but probably won't have a long wait time.

Tricotin
15, Avenue Choisy
75013 Paris, France
+33 1 45 84 74 44‎
(Open late 00h00)

Breizh Café

This midi, Pim, Matt, and I met up with (omg, it's~!) David Lebovitz for lunch. He brought us to one of his favorite crêperies - Breizh Café. It was crowded so we couldn't be seated until 14h00. We all took a coffee at a nearby café which, I swear, had the best looking and authentic club sandwich I have seen in Paris thus far. And you know the French love "Le Club." That will be the next culinary stop.

Okay back to the subject. The owner of Breizh Café is originally from Bretagne, and his wife from Japan. The crêpiers/crêpières are mostly Japanese, and you can see the Japanese influence on some of the things like the wasabi salad and oysters, but the gallettes as I have learned is the true name for buckwheat crêpes, stay true to their roots.





I got my gallette with champignons de Paris, smoked poitrine, crème, and piment d'espelette.


And for dessert, we shared a crêpe natural avec caramel salée et glace de sarrasin. (Salted caramel with buckwheat ice-cream)


Crêpes have been my favorite thing ever since I was 5. Doesn't matter what time, season, or country I am in, I can always eat crêpes. This is now my new favorite crêperie in Paris. Traditional menu made with the highest quality of ingredients. I can't wait to go back. (David has a great post about it here).

Breizh Café‎
109, Rue Vieille du Temple
75003 Paris, France
M: Saint-Sébastien - Froissart
Tel: 01 42 72 13 77‎

Le Bistro Paul Bert

We spent the rest of the afternoon in the first and second window shopping, taking a coffee, and buying some kitchen stuff. (Yay, I finally got financier molds !) We were pretty tired from being out all day so we went back at home to rest.

Then dinner at Le Bistro Paul Bert... at 22h30. It was the only time available.

Me and Matt opted for the foie gras with figues confit.


He got the parmentier


I got the côte d'agneau on top of a bed of legumes, of course. Really good.


Pim got the steak frites. This was delicious.


I'm in a huge figue phase right now - so I had to get it for dessert. (Figues in honey + vanilla ice-cream)


We finished eating around 1h00. =D

If you want some good ole rustique traditional French cuisine, this is the place to go. And I love how there is a sign underneath the steak frites option that says "Cuire bleue ou saignant seulement !" (Cooked 'raw' or medium rare only!) That is the only way to do it! And the right way.

Absolutely wonderful. I will be back.

Le Bistro Paul Bert
18, rue Paul Bert
75011, Paris
M: Faidherbe-Chaligny
Tel: 33 1 43 72 24 01
(Be sure to make reservations)

Le Jeu de Quilles

"Amuse bouche" - a rich, buttery, flaky, moist croissant d'amande et chocolat noir and a brioche sucrée feuilletée from a delicious bio (organic) boulangerie Moisin. That will be in another post.

Lunch at Le Jeu de Quilles. Tiny place. Not more than 16 covers. Two cooks. Simple food but good. They get their meat from the butcher next door.

Plate of delicious charcuterie to start.


Of course wine - a white and red. And some water with gazeuse.


Pim and I went halfsies on everything - it was a great idea. Like a menu degustation !

Salade de roquette avec des tomates et chèvre


Really delicious rabbit terrine. Perfectly seasoned and very moist. Strong liver flavor but balanced. Fabulous.


Variety of calamar and fish atop les legumes Basquaise


Chevreau (Goat) braised with "couscous" and piment. The meat was so tender and well-seasoned. Rich, fell off the bone.


Assiette de fromage


Rasberry "flan"


Good times.



Le Jeu de Quilles
45, rue Boulard
75014 Paris.
M4: Mouton-Duvernet
Tél. : 01 53 90 76 22.
Open only for lunch, Tues - Sat.
Dinners are private.
Métro : Mouton-Duvernet.

Wally Le Saharien - that's some good f'in couscous

Pim's in town. This morning we stopped by Ze Kitchen Gallerie - Pim was helping Chef Ledeuil make curry paste. Unfortunately I couldn't stay long enough to see the paste in progress since I had to deal with my papers at Ferrandi. But it's finished.

Ah, I feel much better now.

Had a delicious tuna sandwich (ummm they added dill!) from Maison Kayser and a monge. Good first lunch back in Paris.

Later, we went to pick up Pim's friend Matt at Gare de L'est. Grabbed a café at their hotel and shared some Pierre Hermé macaroons I picked up for her. (It was her birthday yesterday! Happy belated!)



Then off to get some couscous. I am familiar with couscous (well, the course, grainier stuff) but have never had the "real thing." We went to Wally Le Saharien (recommendation from Sophie's friend) where it is handmade.

These photos suck but I had to post something. The food here is really delicious (sans the dessert).

Delicious soupe - loved loved loved the coriandre in it. Probably one of my fav herbs.


This was brick filled with farce - good balance of savory and sweet. Powdered sugar on top! Loved it.


Nicely cooked - plus it was nice to have salad again!


Delicious lamb - the couscous was heavenly. Light, fluffy, airy, buttery. Not coarse and grainy. Ummm super bon.


Desserts no good - soggy like it's been sitting out all day long. Tea too sweet, not enough mint.


Matt, Pim, Sophie


Afterwards, we walked across to Spring. Chef Daniel offered us some Calvados. Couldn't finish it. Brung back memories of our trip to Normandy.

Regardless, tummy is happy and full of couscous. Delicious like eating "light and buttery clouds" couscous. Now I know. Ummmmmmmmm. I will be back.

Wally Le Saharien
36, Rue Rodier
75009 Paris
M: Anvers or St-Georges
Tel: (33 1) 42 85 51 90

Faire des cours à Nice

Train was to leave at 17h32. Wanted to see if I could catch an earlier train so had Nicolas drive me to the train station around 11h00. Unfortunately, I couldn't exchange my TGV ticket in Nice since I bought it at a special price online. I had a good 5 hours to kill in Nice. Another blessing in disguise. I ended up fait des cours, or running errands the rest of the afternoon. Luckily there were lockers there to hold my luggage and carry-ons.

What a day - I was at the bank for a good 30 minutes, at least. Got that over with. Sigh of relief. Tomorrow I had to deal with my papers to extend my Visa.

Finished a bunch of other errands. Went window shopping. Wrote some more for my blog at a café and in the fancy McDonald's in downtown Nice - had a lot to catch up on since internet is banned from the cooks at the restaurant. A month with barely any internet. In a little retirement town on the Cote D'Azur. With cold weather brewing so no more trips to the beach. Nothing to do. Ah, qu'est-ce que je ferais sans l'internet ?! (This explains the heaps of entries being posted within just a few days).

My bad karma seems to be lessening a bit. Well minus the date mix-up and having Pim show up at my friend's apartment a day earlier than I thought. But that is another story.

Anyway, things worked out. I got really important shit done. Had a shitty cappuccino and pain au chocolat. Then tried to make up for it buy buying this chocolate muffin with chocolate chips that looked good but tasted like shit. But had a financier that was quite tasty from a place downtown. Hadn't had any super delicious pastries for a month. But Paris will take care of that.

Good karma came when the wait for the subways and RER were less than a minute. I got home around 23h30. Tomorrow the eating begins.

Last day of work

To be quite honest, I have been having a shit past two weeks (except for my days off - for the most part.) Just bad karma all the way around. Little things have been going bad for me here and there, - yes, that is life, but this literally was a consistent two weeks of bad karma. I wonder what I did wrong ?

Anyway, today we had a lot of mise en place to do since there was a food event being held in Monaco. I was supposed to get off the first shift slightly early to do some paperwork at the bank for my Carte de Sejour. By the time I got off work, the bank would be closing in 30 minutes. No car - guess karma didn't want it to happen. (I'm starting to sound like My Name Is Earl. Didn't have much of a break today but it was okay. I wasn't too tired. For the little amount of time I had, I went to the little store in Italy to buy Coke, wine, and snacks for tonight.

When I returned, I got dressed and went back to work. On my last night of work, one of the commis told me to be the plongeur (our plongeur was in Monaco) and that we would "take turns" (he would do it after, and then another girl.) Uh huh. Both of them have never washed the dishes during an entire service. And if they have - it's been for about 2 minutes... because they needed to use something. Keep in mind that I am one-handed and can't get my left hand wet. I was washing dishes and putting them away - with one hand.

Guess who ends up being plongeur the whole service AND during the end of service? Yah, on my last night. WOO! I have done it for about 3-4 services already when others "claim" they will take turns. It was BS. But whatever, tomorrow I am going back to Paris. Home Sweet Home.

I was glad to finish my final duties as professional plongeur. I went back to the room, showered, and went out on the terrace to hang out on my last night. We had a nice feast of junk food and good last night of bonding.

Masa, Maxime (Nice, Stagiaire), Jennifer (Quebec, Stagiaire), Chiho, me




À Bientôt !

Chef David and Miss Pim come for a visit

Jardin




Montagne. So tranquil when you are not working.












Lunch made by Les Grands Chefs.




And served by Les Grands Chefs.


Mia prepped all the desserts by Mika for us






Their friends Michael from Monaco, and Julie, former sous of L'Arpege (she says HELLO, Andrew!) joined us as well.


Was nice to hangout with Californians again ;)