Jenny and I have returned from Europe just in time for the start of the New Jersey Devils hockey season. Their first home game was a dud despite winning their first two games in Prague. I’m fairly neutral about the season, not bullish or tepid. I just want to see some exciting hockey. They happen to be in a competitive division especially next to their rich kid cousins across the Hudson so they have their work cut out for them, but even more opportunity for some fun. You can’t take sports thaaaat seriously. Look at how much the athletes get paid, and even worse at how sports teams are money laundering schemes for billionaires, mostly and not entirely. The owners of the New York Rangers don’t even pay property tax, because as we know New York City is run by idiots. Drink a beer at the game, yell at some refs, and cheer when the object goes from one side of the box to the other.

That’s enough of all that. I am here to write about our trip to Europe, specifically Croatia and Munich. Let’s get Munich out of the way. There is very good chocolate to be purchased there, not cheaply, but better than almost everything I’ve ever had here. I kick myself for not buying more. The beer is fine, the food fine, and it is pleasant to walk around town. Their subway system looks like it was designed by someone with a PHD who has zero social and practical skills. But once you get past the chaos it’s convenient. Lastly, the people there stink. I don’t mean they are rude or unfriendly. I mean they literally stink from the businessman in a crisp tailored navy blue suit, Uber driver, hipster barista, and biergarten bartender. On my last day there my senses had enough and I developed a stomach ache from their stank. I’d rather hang on the northwest corner of Washington Square Park next to the bums. In Munich, the BO, to quote Seinfeld, is BBO: Beyond Body Order. I’ll probably end up back there for chocolate, but ideally with a hazmat mask. It shames me that some of my ancestors are Bavarians.

Now onto Croatia. I’m notoriously skeptical of everything. If you told me oxygen was cool I’d hold my breath until blue. People used to tell me Venice was amazing, and I refused to go until my mother asked me to take her. And boy did I eat my words, because Venice is awesome. It was the same situation with Croatia except various things drew me there. We flew into Split. Yeah, it sort of reminds me of Venice which makes sense since it was under their control long long ago. I was told Split is a circus during the summer, and the locals are experiencing the positives and negatives of the tourism economy. But everyone we met was friendly and curious.

The food, if you must know, is not amazing in the way of Italian or some French cuisine. It is simple, fresh, straightforward, and makes you feel good. Double espresso for 1.90 Euros and people watching suffices for the morning. A sandwich of paprika sauce, yogurt, the softest feta I’ve ever had, and cevapi is good midday. For dinner squid risotto, grilled snapper, Pommes Anna, and wine followed by 3 Euro beers at the park overlooking the water. For a changeup there’s always the squid, barley, and lentil soup and lots of bread to dunk. There is of course the olive oil gelato which I had 6 times because no shit I’m the gelato guy. I’ll go back to Split, just not in the summer, though that can be said for almost all of Europe.

Then we were off on a ferry to an island far far away as I could be from proper society yet still have an air conditioner. And to our amusement the ferry was full of French guys headed to a music festival. They weren’t your ordinary baguette holding Frenchmen either. About half looked like the lead singer of Rage Against the Machine Zack de la Rocha, hair and mean mug included. During our two hour ride I watched as they unsuccessfully wooed this or that girl with their smooth talking or bizarrely, a pushup contest. Before you think they were 19 or 25 years old, they were closer to my age. I like to say most Americans never mentally get beyond junior year of high school, and there’s definitely a segment of the European population that has never left the club from their early 20s. Despite all the unwashed greasy jeans and white people dreadlocks, they didn’t smell anything compared to the businessmen in Munich.

Upon landing on the island the sun was slowly coming down. And since the air was damp from previous rain it felt truly Slavic in my mind. That is, reality is permanently set to “Vivid Cool” on your iPhone, everything is a bit grey and chilling. As we walked through town to our hotel I saw some men smoking while wearing Adidas sweatpants and finally I turned to Jenny and said we are definitely in Slavia.

When we woke up in the morning the island was a completely different place. The filters were turned off and someone cracked up the saturation. I swear to you that the Adidas disappeared and replaced with colorful t-shirts, croissants and espresso; and kids laughing as they played along the dock. Everyone had a smile. During our stay I talked to a lot of people and it was nice to experience those who have only concern for what is in front of them or those who are so intensely focused on sharing the things deep in their hearts, at least appearing so. Days were void of advertisements.

I felt an equilibrium rather quickly, for deep inside I am bursting with Mediterranean zeal while outwardly carrying a Nico Bellic cynicism. Going to Croatia was about an element of refusal, a fucking breather from the suffocating chatter of our civilization. And I got some of that, if just for a bit. Where else can I read aloud Rimbaud with fury and fire alongside the Mediterranean? I had a short moment of lamentation while resting in a cove. During my mid 20s to mid 30s I lived in California and specifically in the West Marin County I regularly walked and spent time at the Point Reyes area. It was here I felt the birth at the numbness of being human at the dawn of social media and the smartphone. I’d climb the jagged rocks towering over the beaches and unleash fury much in the same way as Rimbaud.

And in this cove and on this mellow Adriatic island my trembling hands went still, if just for a few more days. I could face fears with calm and a smile. I’m notoriously in poor sync with time, it is the closest thing to a God in my life. It is always teasing, prodding, and warping. I needed to be some place where time is less of a concern and where possibilities can blossom. Croatia offered me that a feeling of possibility.

May elements of refusal find you.

I will be uploading a blog post about our trip to Croatia very soon. I’m just editing relentlessly and making sure I’m not ranting too much, as I usually do.

It was a great trip, and also a reminder than I am not a shithead, not always. Sometimes you become so bogged down by the bullshit in life you feel like a negative person. And it is nice to be know that it isn’t the truth, in the overall sense.

I had a blast from the past and came across someone from at the start of my culinary career. I worked myself to a manager and when I was leaving that job I found them crying. When I asked why they told me it was sad I was leaving. So even though they were crying it was nice to know that I could have an impact on someone like that. Closing APEM was sort of like that, but it wasn’t so close to the skin and I was quite young.

One of the special things about being human is that a lot of us feel almost too much, and yet are almost never emotionally capable. The rarest genius is who can encapsulate this humanity into something beautiful. I say this because I feel that we are in an era of false genius.

May the air of Autumn still our hearts,

Alex

Don’t our lives have a strange aura hanging over? Not so long ago, today and yesterday life hadn’t happened just yet. There was always something better to come and we were yet to be fully realized as individuals and as a society. I envy those delusions, for now we live in an era of awaiting catastrophes. An acquaintance posed the idea that they’ve already happened and we are living in the aftermath. To my American mind, it seems unbelievable since we proselytize grand spectacles raised under the boot of Hollywood. But my exhausted Romantic mind, the one that claws at the great blue sky for universality, will sit with these thoughts and play. And play together with my Spectral mind that passes through masses of genres and fashions to search for truths.

What a time to be alive. Reality is too dire, too real. In a society consumed with catastrophe what other way to be then to bravely exercise your dreams.

This conversion from a food person to whatever the fuck it is I am aspiring to has been full of peaks and valleys. Sometimes life feels like climbing out of a deep dark cave. Other days and weeks are so full of fog the only thing that can lead me out of it is my sheer desire to go crashing into the waves. You do one thing, learn another thing, and practice practice practice. Afterwards after you body and mind have consumed and digested it all you stare at what comes out. Is it mine? Is it ours? What the fuck? It is my effort to take the world around us, reach beyond the real, and conjure what can be. I don’t care about the dangers for the possibilities are already all around us.

Turning a mundane scene about roasting a chicken draft after draft into something with cultural symbolism and beauty at one point broke me down into tears. And not because it is so bad, but through the processes I catch a glimpse of those dreams of a world where catastrophe is a meaningless word. The spirit is allowed its wings. Things are far from over, but to you who is reading this I hope you too bravely exercise your dreams. I can live in yours and you in mine, and as this old stale reality that forces itself upon us fades it is replaced with possibilities and love.

e multis, plura

We hope all is well with you and enjoying Spring here in Northern New Jersey. The season has merited that I sort through our APEM account and clean out a few thousand pictures. Luckily, many were duplicates so that made it easier. But I kept many if not all the pictures of you all, the customers, especially the Halloween costumes.

It was sad looking over and deleting pictures and memories of APEM. But as time has gone by I know that my time in the food industry ended. It is natural that one should outgrow one thing and their world shifts to another. That is why I take Spring to be a time of vigor and discovery. Rather than hibernating during the winter I have been cocooned waiting to be reborn. And just like a newborn I have to learn new things, or rather in my case relearn. Books, books, and more books of various kinds have become my friends.

The culinary novel is moving along though sometimes backwards. There have been aspects of writing where my experiences at APEM have given me advantages. Our concept our APEM was to bring people along for a ride, a celebration, and to a place of comfort. And other aspects of writing I’ve had to slow down and pay attention, because I simply don’t know them yet. The book is about being in culinary school at a specific time. So I learn about writing to write about learning how to cook. A good way to spend the Spring.

Alex

Give me an ideal city and this is what I’d come up with: A dense broad shouldered city with deep history, pride, passion, its own language, great food, an even better culture of drinking and dancing, art and architecture so uniquely its own that people don’t know what the fuck to think, where you don’t need a car to do everything you want, along a coast, and you can wear shorts ninety percent of the god damn year. Well no shit huh that’s Barcelona. Am I absolutely gaga over the city? Not totally, it’s maybe a little too orderly for me and over touristed. Yeah I’m a tourist, but who the fuck actually wants to see other tourists? But Barcelona is highly recommended and has something for everyone. Eight days in Barcelona and three in Valencia wasn’t enough time to get to know the elan vital of the places, well maybe in Valencia’s case it was, but I feel that we got to know them personality wise.

I should mention my own style of traveling. Maybe you don’t really care, but people travel for so many different reason I don’t want you to assume we are the same. It is okay if you are nothing like me. I think the best word for myself is that I am a Culturist. I love seeing the overall human experience with all it’s creativity, uniqueness, and suffering. And sometimes the best parts of traveling are experiencing things outside the human realm. Ultimately traveling isn’t enough because you need to spend time in each place. The world has gotten more expensive, violent, and restrictive so that isn’t easy. Long gone are the days of my old San Francisco landlady renting a truck and driving through Afghanistan with her group of feminists. So traveling these days are short escapes that allow me to explore a culture but also dig deeper into my own psyche. I didn’t know this until my early-20s, but coming home I always felt as if I left a part of myself elsewhere. I definitely feel like that with Barcelona. Sometimes you leave something and come back with others, possibly unwanted things. Unfortunately, I did come back with something perhaps depressing in one manner, but in the long run possibly enriching. It is up to me to choose on the outcome.

From the get go I should lay down a few things that were consistent or typical as far as I saw. Everyone under fifty years old seems to love eating kebab wraps, really they’re like gyros except have the cultural pervasiveness of burritos. Espresso is about half the price of the New York City Tristate Area and is essentially the same, that is 75% of espresso have that standard or basic persona and the really good stuff needs to be searched out. The beer can be embarrassingly cheap, and people easily start drinking it at 10am. A lot of people smoke, but it didn’t seem as bad as Paris. People in Barcelona walk rather fast compared to the rest of Europe and maybe even as fast at New Yorkers. And apparently nobody has clothes dryers in Barcelona unless you are rich.

Food, that is why one comes to Barcelona right? Sure there’s Picasso and Gaudi, but food is undeniable here. It has something for everyone from the penny pinching college kid, overly Spoiled Upper Class Twats (SUCT), fresh faced foodies, vacuous social media influencers, to regular schmucks and industry people like us. You can go high or low. You can even go abstractly ridiculous. I highly recommend finding a traditional Catalonian restaurant and eating anything with blood sausage, the face of an animal, or chickpeas.

We had clear objectives in Barcelona in regards to food. One was to put closure to my time in the food industry. Personally I’ve been living multiple lives with one being the food or gelato guy. It will always be part of me, but for me to move from one thing to the next I have to say okay it is over, so to speak. And being in Barcelona enabled me to put some of that in its place. When Jenny and I were in culinary school molecular gastronomy was at its peak. I’ll never forget being in Level 3 and some kid bringing in one of the El Bulli books. It was fucking massive and full of shit that looked like ancient Phoenician, what the fuck was that. But I searched this guy Ferran and was blown away. I couldn’t believe you could do this shit with food. It was theater and art. At some point I read an article about him talking about his creative efforts and ultimately concluding he had to create his own language or world. I had a lot of respect for that even though I wasn’t entirely interesting in molecular gastronomy outside of concepts of trying to get the most out of an ingredient. One can speak negatively of a genre of art, but a master’s power is undeniable. You can hate the game, but only a fool denies respect. After culinary school I was an empty pocketed 20 something and looked for my own path that eventually led me to gelato. The best Jenny and I could do was to go to Alinea in Chicago and it was mostly theater. The hot dog I had the following day was art. Catalonia was out of reach.

Now we had more means and time we decided to go to Disfrutar and Enigma in Barcelona. The whole molecular gastronomy era was absorbed into the mainstream so maybe where we were going was more museum than restaurant. That is okay of course. Disfrutar was opened by two people who met at El Bulli back in the day and Enigma was opened by Albert Adria, the brother of Ferran. Albert isn’t just the brother but was part of El Bulli back in the day. I even have his book Natura from during El Bulli.

The first thing I need to say about both of these restaurants is that the service is far and above anything in America and other parts of Europe. Yes, I’m looking at you Paris and Vienna. Chalk it up to the natural personality of Spaniards, but every single service staff in both places were at the top of their game. This was from friendliness, formality, movement, and personality. Shit some of them had the best skin I’ve ever seen on a human being. Funny enough during one of our meals I thought of the polar opposite: a rude and chaotic Chinese restaurant but equally masterful food. So was the food good? I’d give you a five second long blank stare and say: yes and no. It is creative, executed masterfully as I just said, and performed with the pacing of a philharmonic. But there’s one thing I felt they were lacking though it is something easily forgivable: because there is a lot of contorting of ingredients and because ultimately they are conforming to those spoiled upper class twats it tastes like a broken story like a book that just went into another direction out of the blue. We were here, there, and now where? I’m not sure. And this type of dining is completely dependent on the story unless of course you are a SUCT who needs to check off a box to compete with others. Like the New Jersey Devils this season I feel they are playing down to those lesser and people like Jenny, me, and hopefully you are dismissed. Cuisine can be so beautiful. It truly is art and that something I am determined to reveal in my book. But it doesn't and shouldn't be the sole domain of the wealthy. It's a lack of imagination and societal organization (not economics) that prevents really amazing food being available to regular people. At the same time the food industry along with many things today are flat. There isn’t much pizzazz in today’s world. But that is natural for being in the downward swing of a curve. Eventually things will tick back up. I know enough of history to know this is true. It just sucks that we all have to live through it, some have it a lot worse. To all those who have a creative impulse towards food, art, music, writing, nature, and beauty in general I encourage you to hone yourselves. Practice, refine, discover, taste, smell, and question. Go out there and stick your neck out. It is okay to look like a jackass. When the world comes alive again it will need a billion little burning heads of desire to make it beautiful. And I mean something deeply beautiful like a hundred thousand salmon rushing up a river or waves during a hurricane. It is hard being human. Our brains are too big and we can’t seem to not make things more complicated than they need to be. It doesn't help that the wider society is relentlessly bombarding us with content that ultimately is a distraction. There has to be a level of refusal in order to be free. Everything we do to be creative is to glorify that breath we take for granted.

Well I’ve kind of blown out the tires with all that. There’s plenty to see in Barcelona aside from food. Sagrada Familia is worth the money, just make sure to book your time ahead and don’t just walk up to it like us. It is more art installation than actual church. And speaking of art is the Picasso and Catalan art museum a must? Well, if you don’t care about art or don’t understand Picasso then why bother. At the Catalan art museum you can see all kinds of art from the Inquisition to the Spanish Civil War. If anything, it is worth absorbing as a whole to see the Catalonian experience.

Valencia was a whole other ball game. We came during their Fallas festival which celebrates the changing from winter to spring. And we had no idea this was going on. The city is loud and crowded, pure chaos. People are blowing firecrackers at all times even with some of those being more explosives than toys. At 2pm everyday it feels as if the city is under attack. And I just came for the fucking paella. We had it everyday there from typical to with squid ink. A black smile is a true smile.

I wouldn’t recommend going to Valencia during this time unless Fallas is your goal. And probably avoid summer when the Brits and Germans descend like locusts. But at some point we will return to Valencia to truly enjoy its many plazas. I want to enjoy my paella without bursting an ear drum. That being said I did get rather buzzed and enjoyed moving from one plaza party to another until past midnight.

In conclusion, if you are in Barcelona go to the tapas bar, kick sand at the beach, if you have the means go lick what looks like LSD off a white chocolate leaf, laugh at Picasso’s pottery, and take a moment with closed eyes in a church even if you aren’t religious. Art, food, genres of architecture, and great weather it has something for you. It is worth going just watch your pockets and don’t forget to get a kebab wrap.

Here are our recommendations:

*Note: Make sure you enjoy your time. Don’t take shit so seriously.

Ca l’Estevet: for Catalonian cuisine

Bar Canete: for fancy tapas

Mercat de Santa Caterina: for a food market and tapas

Bar Pimentel: for casual tapas

Bodega del Vermut: for tapas and Vermut (became our regular spot to enjoy the day and talk shit)

Los Tortillez: for tapas

Restaurante Futami: for sushi (yes you read that right, it’s really good)

Bismillah Kebabish: for some kebab

DeLaCrem: gelato (probably the better gelato I’ve had in years, not too sweet)

Disfrutar: high end splurge meal (make sure to enjoy yourself)

Enigma: high end splurge meal (the music in the bathroom was so psychotic)

Sagrada Familia: probably cooler than the place you worship at

Parc de la Ciutadella: to vibe off the people practicing drawing or painting and to enjoy the sun and plants

Barceloneta Beach: don’t think of it as a beach, think a park to hang at while dipping your toes into Lacus Romanus. Or fuck it just dive in the water was very refreshing.

Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya: for various art and views of the city

Park Guell: Gaudi designed park with views of the city

Bainbridge Island Japanese American Exclusion Memorial.

The Pacific Northwest is filled with wondrous natural majesty, and maybe so much so that it is heavily imposing on what American society exists there. Melancholy sure, but indifference and resignation seem to be current cultural norms. Is it the mountains, the Sound, and the grey sky? I felt as if I was in a place where they’d recently lost a war yet they, you, me are all Americans in our own land. During our vacation in the Pacific Northwest through Seattle, Olympic National Park, and Portland I pondered over this sense. It is the land of Cobain, Staley, and Earth First! yet is disturbingly quiet. Jenny and I could have gone anywhere in the world, in theory. But we chose this area because it was known for many of the things we grew up being influenced by. In Jenny’s case it was more aesthetics. For me it was the music, the melancholy, the trees, and monkey wrenching. Sometimes I like to joke that my worldview is FernGully.

And so more than Seattle or Portland I desired to go to this area for its beauty and symbolism against blanket industry. And it wasn’t so much surprise as curiosity that I found the place that should be the most against industrialism rather submissive to it. And I do not mean that there are factories scattered all over. Rather I am speaking of the higher industrialism of the cloud, AI, or whatever celestial tech that is consuming the world and attacking our humanity. And I rummaged over if maybe that is the war that was lost here. In New Jersey, we consume the same things but we may not be at this stage just yet. I always find the majority of New Jersey people to have adequate social skills, a sense of humor, and general self perspective, contrary to what the media loves to sell. Meanwhile in the Pacific Northwest I have never encountered such common social awkwardness except for on Bainbridge Island. This was evident in coffee shops, seafood markets, museum, and walking in a park.

The most beautiful beach I have yet to set my eyes on was several hours west of Seattle. Jenny and I had to walk an undetermined distance through fern covered woods to reach it. I say undetermined because I am reluctant to name this beach or else others will go. It isn’t just a beach with sand and waves, but it is a cove hugged with tree covered cliffs. When I stood on this beach and looked out into the ocean I felt as if I was in the attendance of the gods at their hearth. In a place like this you experience a sense of freedom where life is a deep pool beyond the chains of modern civilization. It is where a strange feeling of endless ideas and possibilities flood your mind yet they are all equally irrelevant in the presence of such benediction.

You can, but being here is everything.

Beyond this moment in our trip I find most everything else neither here nor there. Yes, there was coffee, salmon, thick boots, ferry rides, books, and the space needle. But even as I sit here back in Jersey things still rumble in my head. Maybe many in the Pacific Northwest have visited these same beaches and experienced such benedictions, perhaps not. When one experiences moments of stillness is the part afterward indifference and resignation? That is the challenge, of course, how to act when there is no path and what is required is to start walking. Sometimes being exposed to such beauty can be painful.

Jenny and I regularly went on late night walks to enjoy the city as if we were the only ones around.

Jenny and I have been back from Paris for a few weeks. I’m assuming maybe at least half of you have been to Paris before so it needs no fancy introduction. If you have not maybe this blog post will help you set aside time and a budget to visit the French capital. It is worth it if you are someone who either enjoys or likes the idea of seeing art and architecture along with eating good food and taking a well run subway system. It is also a good place to shop since you can apply for tax exemption. I don’t recommend going all out with the shopping, it is your money to spend, but its a tedious thing and the lines can be long. Jenny and I believe in buying one token to remember a trip. Sometimes it’s a nice Tuscan wallet or a funky pair of sneakers you can’t get in America.

The best croissant I had was from a street food restaurant.

One of the main things I wanted to do in this blog was review some restaurants and other food places. We went to them enough times to have a good handle of what they were trying to do and how well they could cook and serve. First let me say that I have started a culinary novel, I don’t know what else to call it, that is based on my time in the food industry primarily from 2006-2014, but also up until today. The majority of the novel will take place during culinary school in 2006 and move through all the food trends using my own personal experiences along with the many people I have encountered. I’m only in the beginning, but I’m rather enjoying myself. It does renew some of my love for the food industry considering I’m rather bored with it now. Being in Paris also helped to renew that love since there the little things are exponentially better than the big things here.

This past trip cemented what Jenny and I had been feeling for a few years now even before covid. Actually I don’t think I’m going to say anything amazing right now since many of you probably already knew this. The food industry is at a lull. Social media and an unequal balance of money is mostly the reason, but also that we’ve exhausted the trends that could possibly be flavorful. I’m staying away from social media’s influence in this blog post. That could be a whole other post, and I’m just tired of hearing about it. It’s like hearing about cancer, I’d rather not.

And this is why Paris was a relief for me personally. For one I did go to a 3 star Michelin place the second day I was there and it was terrible. Ok, I had a lamb dish that was one of the best I’ve ever had. But aside from that start to finish it was one of the worst experiences I’ve ever had in a restaurant. Some things were out of their control like the drunken WASP across the dining room, but it is how they reacted to that and basically the whole meal. Aside from the lamb all the other food was mediocre and there were 40 minute gaps between courses. And right after that meal I canceled anything we had lined up that possessed any Michelin star. I’m done with that, with San Pellegrino, and anything else. If you come by my house I have old Michelin guides from the 2000s and 2010s, and I’m embarrassed to say I have been to many stars. And consistently they’re just a useless measurement now. Finding a good restaurant has never been harder for us. Luckily, in Paris we were able to find a few with some being outstanding. Either way, for the foreseeable future any new place I will avoid anything above a bistro or trattoria. Plus I had the same quality of pork and other dishes at bistros than I did at any Michelin star. The only edge I could see between a high end place and a nice bistro was the quality of their sauces. And that’s not worth the price difference.

The first place I would recommend is Le Bon Georges. We had both classic as well as some more modernized dishes such as a mussels soup with saffron, fennel, and oranges. As you can see from the menu to the side it reads like a classic bistro. And it is, but the quality was higher than you’d might assume. Twice I had the Coeur de filet de cochon and I loved that dish because the pork was always cooked properly to medium rare and the flavor was that succulent porkiness. It came with a simple sauce with carrots that were just between soft and still crisp, perfect. Generally I don’t like cooked carrots, but this were spot on. The only thing we didn’t try on the menu was the Liver a la Royale, because I had my full of hare at another place, and the Lieu jaunt de ligue. The tartare was one of the better ones I’ve had because it was so clean and fresh. The Rise au Veau (sweetbreads) was both crispy and creamy. And aside from the Creme de moules my favorite entree was the Poireaux fondant haddock because it was excellent for this time of the year.

The place itself was classic French, and they were even repainting the outside in that typical French blue. Another good thing with this place is that when talking to people next to us it is their regular spot. I made a reservation weeks prior, but for our other visits I’d just ask my waiter and since it’s fairly busy we had to eat outside. It was usually 50 degrees, but they give blankets.

The wait staff all spoke English well, and most of them were full of bubbly friendliness. I would have been happy with quiet and efficient in terms of wait staff since I have little expectations when it comes to this, so anything above “too cool for school hipster” is great. I don’t know what kind of diners you all are, or if you eat out at all, but I’m mostly there to enjoy the food and talk shit with Jen or whoever I’m with. But if the staff are funny and welcoming I’ll talk for days. Unless things go downhill this is one of the places I’d recommend to come visit in Paris. Let me know if you are going though, maybe I can cash in on some miles and meet you there. Ideal meal: creme de moules, coeur de filet de cochon, a bottle of red, side of frites, and tarte fine poires. Their menu will change obviously, as most good places should, and I’d look forward to eating here in Spring if I was able. It is the ideal place to both enjoy food and talk a lot of shit while being in a beautiful neighborhood.

The second place I would recommend is Bistrot des Tournelles. This place reminded me of being back in culinary school because of the menu. But the food was better than anything some know nothing like me could cook. Jenny and I really pigged out at this place. I concluded that the only way I was able to digest the food was because I drank a whole bottle. But then that doesn’t make sense. Somehow I ate a lot here. And I’ll tell you right now that the foie gras is great, the oeufs mayo just classic, the lettuce salad was fresh and the vinaigrette was amazing, and the artichokes were delicious because of it’s sweet and saltiness, but I could eat the saucisson sec with every meal if I wasn’t going to die. My first bite and I said to Jenny, “now this is my shit.” We also had the filet de boeuf, daube de boeuf, poulet fermier, and noix de Saint Jacques. Oh and frites, and frites again another time. The only thing that was average was the noix de Saint Jacques, but like above average here around the tristate area. Then there were the desserts. You’d imagine I like dessert, and if so then you’d be right. But I’m very bored today. I’m sure someone will spit on me for saying this, well a pastry chef at least, but they’re thinking too much and giving too little. Cut back on the sugar and give more. I’m an American I like to be topped off properly. So please don’t give me some rectangular looking bullshit that has some savory element with a teardrop of chocolate sauce. Pour that sauce on motherfucker. I need my fix. Well, Bistrot des Tournelles topped me off so well I needed a digestif. Yeah, the creme brûlée is good, but the tarte tatin was as it should be: soft with that deep apple flavor and ice cream so thick you can smear it like butter. Speaking of ice cream the profiterole was my favorite dessert. You know how much pate a choux I’ve made in my life? More than I care to remember and good choux isn’t some joke. A lot of places do it wrong and it ended up tasting funky. And if you go to a restaurant that serves profiteroles and it’s not that thick slab of vanilla and drowning in sauce then tell them to close. Oh and speaking of digestif I had a few at my two visits here. I wish I had the presence of mind to ask for the names of these digestifs because one especially was delightfully fun. Maybe you don’t find alcoholic drinks fun, but they can be. But at the time I was busy talking shit about the positivity of negativity. I guess I’ll just have to come back and get the name of that digestif.

Bistrot des Tournelles was as bare of a bistro as one could hope for. It was clean, cozy, and not chaotic. The wait staff were just like Le Bon Georges in that they seem to have the concept of relating to people without knowing them. Is that such a hard thing? It seems so here in America. So do come to BDT and hopefully you’ll have a good meal and talk some fun shit. My ideal meal: saucisson, artichauts, poulet fermier, frites, profiterole, and digestif.

Another restaurant we would recommend is L’Ami Jean. I’m not going to write up a whole thing about it because we only went once. We planned on going back, but we ate so much and the food was heavy that I totally maxed out on it. The hare stew was delicious and reminded me of mole, my partridge was finger-licking good, the mashed potatoes proper, the red burgundy we drank was pleasant and refined, and the charcuterie fairly standard. I wanted the rice pudding and we did order it along with a chocolate mousse. L’Ami Jean is known for their rice pudding, but the mousse was a more interesting dessert. It was all the things you’d want in a chocolate dessert: sweet, chocolatey, salty, and slightly bitter. The rice pudding was thick and quite good, but not as good as I was imagining. Mostly it was just thick and I wish it had something to perk it up like candied fruit or caramel. The staff was friendly and personable but not overly so. L’Ami is definitely more of a tourist trap at this point, but worth it still. Just don’t be surprised if you are seated shoulder to shoulder with other Americans who are on their way to watch the NFL in Frankfurt or a French couple so enraptured with each other I’m surprised they didn’t have sex right next then and there.

That’s as much as I can say about Paris and food there. Below I’ll list some dessert and other food places we tried. This blog post is long enough and I was going to muse for philosophically about the non-food aspects of Paris, but I hope to put that into a separate blog post. I will also put up some food pictures below.

Other food places:

La Maison d’Isabelle for croissants

Gido for croissants

La Grande Epicerie de Paris for specialty food, and they actually have decent baguette

Philippe Conticini for pastries especially their Paris Brest

Le comptoir du Relais for a quick lunch. I enjoyed their Baba and squid ink risotto with shrimp

La Cabane Opium for oysters especially the Belon variety

I am grateful for what I am and have.

My thanksgiving is perpetual.

It is surprising how contented

one can be with nothing definite -

only a sense of existence.

Well, anything for variety.

I am ready to try this for the next

ten thousand years, and exhaust it.

How sweet to think of!

my extremities well charred,

and my intellectual part too,

so that there is no danger

of worm or rot for a

long while.

My breath is sweet to me.

O how I laugh when I think

of my vague indefinite riches.

No run on my bank can drain it,

for my wealth is not possession

but enjoyment.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Jenny and I hope you are with family and friends having a delightful time.