Clarence Trolls J-Date: Getting Your Deli Fix in Paris

B has been working hard on learning Hebrew the past few weeks with the eventual goal of reading the Old Testament. I’ve been working less hard, spending my time buying books that relate to my dissertation and putting them in stacks, working on my origami, and marveling at B’s capacity for filling notebooks with lists of words and conjugations for hours on end. I spent the last few lazy afternoons reading Mary McCarthy’s The Group, which my mother loved when it first came out in the 60s and I’ve been meaning to read for ages. It was pretty great, though it made me thank my lucky stars that I wasn’t born in a different generation. As I have a penchant for loving jerks in literature, my favorite character was Norine Schmittlapp, the nemesis of “the group” and the closest thing to a real radical that McCarthy’s 1930s New York has to offer us.  Even so, her portrait is terribly bleak, if surprisingly funny. After her first marriage fails, she marries a wealthy Jewish banker whose family has changed their name from Rosenberg to Rogers, a fact that she shares with “a particular kind of relish” with her aghast acquaintance Priss.

In fact, Priss’s chance encounter with Norine near the end of the novel was one of the best and sharpest parts of the book.  Priss meets Norine in the park, where Norine is pushing her infant son Ichabod (“‘Aren’t you afraid he’ll be called ‘Icky’ in school?’ she asked impulsively. ‘He’ll have to learn to fight his battles early,’ philosophized Norine. ‘Ichabod the Inglorious. That’s what it means in Hebrew. No glory.’”) around naked in his expensive stroller. Norine casually pats her son’s penis, a practice that scandalizes Priss, who is terrified of arousing her own toddler son and would almost rather “he be dirty than have him get an Oedipus complex from her handing him.” Norine insists that Priss come over to her lavishly furnished but disheveled home that nevertheless the site of a well-regarded bohemian salon. There, Norine recounts to Priss her affair with another woman’s husband and is brashly matter-of-fact about her sexual proclivities and experiences. When Priss attempts to describe her (or more accurately, her husband’s) behaviorist theories of child-rearing, Norine condescends the poor woman.  “‘You still believe in progress,’ she said kindly. ‘I’d forgotten there were people who did.  It’s your substitute for religion. Your tribal totem is the yardstick. But we’ve transcended all that. No first-rate mind can accept the concept of progress any more.’” When Priss accuses Norine of having abandoned her political radicalism, Norine declares that she leaves politics to her husband Freddy:

“Being a Jew and upper crust, he’s profoundly torn between interventionism abroad and laissez faire at home.  Freddy isn’t an intellectual.  But before we were married, we had an understanding that he should read Kafka and Joyce and Toynbee and the cultural anthropologists. Some of the basic books. So that semantically we can have the same referents.”

According to Norine, Freddy tolerates this curriculum requirement because

“Freddy’s philopregentitive; he’s interested in founding a dynasty. So long as I can breed, I’m a sacred cow to him. Bed’s very important to Freddy; he’s a sensualist, like Solomon. Collects erotica. He worships me because I’m a goy. Besides, like so many rich Jews, he’s a snob. He like to have interesting people in the house, and I can give him that.”

In her own self-diagnosis, Norine’s only real problem is “her brains”:

“[I was] formed as an intellectual…Freddy doesn’t mind that I can think rings around him, he likes it.  But I’m conscious of the yawning abyss.  And he expects me to be a Hausfrau at the same time.  A hostess, he calls it. I’ve got to dress well and set a good table. He think it ought to be easy because we have servants. But I can’t handle servants. It’s a relic, I guess, of my political period. Freddy’s taken to hiring them himself, but I demoralize them, he says, as soon as they start in the house.  They take a cue from my cerebralism. They start drinking and padding the bills and forgetting to polish the silver. […] I’ve been trying to turn over a new leaf, now that we have a new house. I start out with a woman who comes to massage me and give me exercises to relax. But before I know it, I’m discussing the Monophysites or the Athanasian Creed or Maimonides. The weirdest types come to work for me; I seem to magnetize them. The butler we have now is an Anthroposophist. Last night he started doing eurhythmics.”

When Priss asks if Norine really regrets the Vassar education the women shared, Norine declares “ ‘Oh completely…I’ve been crippled for life.’”

Of course it’s obvious to both Priss and the reader that Norine’s real problem is not her cerebralism but her narcissism and anti-Semitism, which become apparent when calls her own husband a “Yip” and asks Priss with more than a touch of anxiety if she thinks that “Ichabod looks Jewish.” Norine is the great satirical monster of the text, a totally unsympathetic character that is an ingenious cipher for the other women’s anxieties, be they about housekeeping, sexual prowess, education, or parenting. But in her own right, she is such a riveting mess, with the neck-rings on her blouses and her dirty polar bear skin rug; her theories about underlying lesbian drives, oral gratification and penis-envy that are coupled with her brassy declaration that “Freud is out of date”; and her ad hoc parenting cues taken from anthropological texts about the Pueblo Indians. She wears little Ichabod in proto-Baby Björn to a funeral and declares that it serves the same function as a papoose, allowing her to give Ichabod the experience of death early, rather like the mumps.  She serves enormous wedges of chocolate cake to the children for lunch. I rather loved her.

Anyway, I don’t know if it’s my boyfriend’s newest obsession with acquiring Hebrew or reading about old-school New York and the dangerous shiksa Norine for the past few days, but I’ve been longing for some serious kosher deli food. I usually get my fix in Paris with a quick trip to Florence Kahn (24 rue des Ecouffes
at the corner of 19 rue des Rosiers, 75004 Paris, Métro St. Paul), a fabulous Jewish traiteur in the Marais with one of the best tile mosaic storefronts you’ll ever see.

Inside, you’ll find an amazing selection of fresh bread and pastries, pickled herring and other smoked fishes, blinis, pickles, goulash, latkes, and pierogis, as well as house-cured and smoked pastrami, corned beef, and tongue.  My go-to choice:

The Big Pletzel Sandwich. That’s really what it’s called, meaning ordering it always feels kind of silly:  “Je voudrais un Big Pletzel Sandwich, si’l vous plaît.”  For about seven euros, you get an enormous fresh bun filled with layers of homemade pastrami, pickles, roasted red peppers, fresh tomatoes, and some kind of unidentified special sauce. You can get it warmed up and take it to go, or you can sit in their lovely outdoor seating and watch the rue de Rosier hoards line up at L’As du Falafel. Florence Kahn is a great alternative to falafel if the lines at L’As are daunting or if you want a real carnivore fix.  It’s also a lovely place to buy the fixings for a picnic or an easy dinner, like this one I made earlier this week:

I bought the blinis and the glorious lox at Florence Kahn. I gave the blinis a quick shake in some melted butter in a pan, and added some crème fraîche, capers, and red onion that I had in my fridge.  Much fancier and more delicious than it had any right to be, especially given how easy it was to prepare.

The one thing I hesitate to buy and reheat, however, are latkes.  Somehow preprepared or frozen ones are never quite right, even if you fry them in oil. Ever since I saw a soggy tray of them at Florence Kahn, I’ve had proper latkes on the brain. Today I pushed up my sleeves and got to work. I’d never made them before, so I got some ideas from Epicurious and the food section of the New York Times online.  I settled on this compromise recipe (based on what I had on hand):

9 all-purpose white potatoes, peeled, grated, and drained

½ of a white onion, grated

1 shallot, grated

3 eggs, beaten

¾ cup of baguette breadcrumbs (you’re supposed to use matzo meal, but all the kosher stores are on vacation, just like the rest of Paris in August)

Salt and pepper

Canola oil for frying (I used extra virgin olive oil, because my kitchen is too small for ingredients I rarely use)

Applesauce and sour cream for serving (crème fraîche if you’re on this side of the pond)

After peeling and grating for what seems like forever, incorporate your potatoes, onion, shallot, and eggs together.  Then, add breadcrumbs (or matzo meal) gradually to soak up the excess liquid.  Salt and pepper to taste.

Heat up about two tablespoons of oil in a deep frying skillet. When crackly, add a heaping tablespoon of the batter to the oil, patting it down with the back of your spoon to form a thick pancake.  Fry each side 2-3 minutes or until golden brown and lacy at the edges. I was able to fit three latkes in each batch, and each batch took approximately one Róisín Murphy jam to cook. I incurred only two minor splatter burns in the whole process (the cost of doing business if you ask me).  I may or may not have been pretending to be Polly, the most sympathetic member of The Group, who cooked grandiose meals every night for her publisher lover (scandalous!) on her tiny hotplate.

Drain on papertowels.

Keep the earlier batches warm, either in a low oven (aren’t you a fancypants!) or in a covered pan.

Serve with sour cream and applesauce, preferably to a bewildered student of Hebrew, who will likely seem very impressed at your labor-intensive weekday lunch.

 

Sunday night jam

This song was more or less on constant repeat in my Dad’s car in 1987. We listened to it so much that the cassette tape (oh my!) eventually warped in the fourth round of the chorus. We kept listening to it anyway. I found it on Youtube tonight and have been dancing around in my pajamas ever since.

Hope you had a great weekend!

Hungerdome! The Macaron Battle

The idea: Two men enter, one man leaves. Need a refresher course?

You remember now. Man, I miss Mel Gibson circa 1985.

Today in the Hungerdome, three Parisian macaron stalwarts go head to head in a pseudo-scientific tasting battle.

The contenders:

Ladurée (16 rue Royale, 75008 Paris, Métro Madeleine). Ostensibly the inventor of the double-decker macaron that we know and love, the Ladurée bakery first opened its doors in 1862 and is undoubtedly considered the purveyor of classic French macaron. With the largest selection of our competitors, Ladurée sprinkles in seasonal offerings (lily of the valley, Granny Smith apple, grapefruit rose) with the classic macaron battery of flavors (lemon, chocolate, vanilla, coffee, pistachio, and rose). Long lines cue outside of the various pastel-signed Ladurée locations for cookies, chocolates, and massively overpriced brunches.  Most guidebooks would call Ladurée a must-do Parisian experience. The décor is totally over-the-top, with baroque brocades and gilded everything. The kinds of women I don’t particularly like make a point of eating here. Not for the claustrophobic or sociophobic. Definitely not for the overweight tourist phobic.

We chose: lemon citronella, pistachio, salted caramel, mimosa, cassis violet, and rose.

Fauchon (24-26 Place de la Madeleine, 75008 Paris, Métro Madeleine, though if you need to take public transportation, you probably can’t afford to shop at Fauchon). Operating in Paris since 1886, Fauchon is perhaps the most rarified of the fancy food markets in Paris, though for my money overpriced and overplayed (I would recommend real foodies go to La Grande Epicerie instead). The smallest selection of flavors of our competitors, Fauchon keeps their macaron selection tight and mostly classic (apricot and lemon mint were the most adventurous flavors available today). Fauchon is worth a gander if you enjoy looking at food that is too beautiful to eat or if you need a gift for that one person you simply can’t figure out a souvenir for.

We chose:  lemon mint, coffee, bourbon vanilla, apricot, salted caramel, and raspberry rose.

Pierre Hermé (4 Rue Cambon, 75001 Paris, Métro Concorde).  The newest kid on the block, Pierre Hermé (the pastry chef) defected from Fauchon in 1996 to start his own mecca for the sophisticated sweet tooth. A particular favorite of He Who Will Not Be Named and No I Don’t Want to Read His Blog Dammit, Pierre Hermé has wowed critics with his adventurous flavor palate. Much-hyped seasonal flavors in the past have included ketchup, foie gras and dark chocolate with gold leaf, strawberries and balsamic vinegar, strawberries and wasabi, white truffle, jasmine tea, and olive oil vanilla. Pierré Herme stores are clean, minimalist, and much easier on the senses than our other competitors.

We chose:  lemon, praline hazelnut, olive oil and vanilla, peach apricot and saffron, chocolate, and rose.

A few caveats:

I’ll ‘fess up. If I saw someone doing this exact same thing on the internet, after I stopped being jealous I would immediately be inclined to tell him or her to get a job. Or a hobby. So let me defend the decadence for a moment. It’s my boyfriend B’s birthday and we decided to do this in lieu of getting a cake. He doesn’t particularly like cake, and this was more suited our love of competition, grid-making, and egg white based cookies. I would never spend this much money on macarons otherwise. No matter how you slice it, these little buggers are expensive (around 1.50€ apiece). And there’s no savoring your booty. Macarons turn stale remarkably quickly – most purists will tell you that macarons must be eaten the day they are made. I made a point of giving horrified looks to all the tourists that were buying dozens of macarons that would be stale in 24 hours. Thinking about the fact that we spent 30€ on cookies in one day is kind of making me nauseous. Or maybe it’s the 15€ worth of macarons that are sitting in my gut.

Moreover, let me make it clear (as I’m anticipating all the heated responses): macarons are a highly subjective affair. Within an hour of my posting on Facebook that I was doing a macaron face-off, a half dozen different opinions from various corners of the globe arrived on my status update. From what I can tell, the real armed camps are between Ladurée and Pierre Hermé (the classicists and the avant-gardes, the oldest story in the book). Nobody really seems to assert Fauchon as their favorite, though the Fauchon store certainly has its fair share of admirers. For the sake of full disclosure, I’ll admit to being a die-hard Ladurée fan in the past. I like buying myself a few Ladurée citron macarons when I’m having a lousy day. Despite excellent word of mouth, I’d never stepped foot in Pierre Hermé until today. On the contrary, B is a big Pierre Hermé fan and avoids Ladurée as waiting in lines makes him want to unzip his skin and run. Neither of us had braved the terrifyingly slick world of Fauchon before today.

Finally, it’s important to note that the freshness and selection of flavors vary from day to day, even in the same stores. Macarons are fragile, temperamental little beasts! Moreover, sometimes these companies make horrible (but hopefully short-lived) mistakes, like MESSING WITH THE CLASSIC CITRON MACARON. I’m looking at you, Ladurée. I think this whole thing could have gone down differently on a different day, or at a different location, or with a different set of flavors.

You might ask then, why do it? Why did man go to the moon? Because it was there. Why sample eighteen different macarons in a single sitting and spend the next few hours tabulating and calculating highly subjective results and contemplating the onset of type two diabetes? Because we can. And because it was my boyfriend’s birthday wish.

As we were both avid science fair competitors in our youth, we tried to introduce some standardization to the proceedings. We sampled the lemon and rose flavors at all three locations (although the aforementioned MUCKING AROUND meant that at Ladurée we sampled the lemon citronella and at Fauchon we sampled the lemon mint and the raspberry rose). Moreover, B and I do differ a bit in our macaron preferences (he would argue I like the stale ones), but our combined scores should counteract slight differences in predilection.

The setup:

Each macaron was scored by each judge in four categories: looks, flavor, mouthfeel, and inspiration. By “looks,” we mean the aesthetics of the cookie, which is as absolutely important as anything else when you are dealing with this überfussy whatsit. “Flavor” encompasses taste, smell, and fidelity to the original concept (meaning a mimosa-flavored macaron should taste like an actual mimosa). “Mouthfeel” is an excellent word that beer connoisseurs use to describe how something feels when it’s in your mouth. Here, we mean the texture of both the cookie and the filling, that is, how tender and pillowy the combination. Finally, by “inspiration” we mean a variety of things, including creativity, originality, execution, and the generally ineffable “wow” factor of the macaron. Each category could receive up to five points from each judge, thus each macaron was scored out of 40 possible points.

After about an hour and a half of careful tasting, discussion, consultation with M over Skype, and rolling around on the couch moaning in agony about how much sugar we had eaten (okay, maybe that we just me), we arrived at this:

The verdict:

B’s scorecard:

My scorecard:

The final tally for each macaron:

Our individual favorites were the cassis violet and salted caramel at Ladurée, the rose, praline hazelnut and peach, apricot and saffron at Pierre Hermé, and the apricot at Fauchon. I spit out the olive oil and vanilla flavor from Pierre Hermé and the lemon citronella (WHY LADUREÉ, WHY?), as I thought they tasted respectively like handcream and mosquito repelling candles. I discovered that my boyfriend will happily eat my regurgitated cookies in lieu of wasting a buck or two. While the Ladurée and Pierre Hermé macarons were both consistently well-textured to our tastes, we really disagreed about the Fauchon texture. I found their slight crunchiness a welcome contrast from all the pillowy gooeyness, but B thought they were stale.

If you were just a simpleton like me, you’d be content to tally the six scores for each contender, add up to 10 bonus points for in-store experience (retail space, macaron packaging, wait time, staff kindness, general claustrophobia induction, etc.), and call it a day.  So for all the simpletons out there, that would mean the following:

Ladurée: macaron score 127 + 1 point for in-store experience = 128

Fauchon: macaron score 121 +  3 points for in-store experience = 124

Pierre Hermé: macaron score  133 + 9 points for in-store experience =  142

Taking additionally into account that Pierre Hermé won each of the individual flavor battles (lemon and rose), Pierre Hermé is the clear winner.  Can we have a cocktail now?

Unfortunately, my boyfriend is no simpleton.

Long after I had eaten all the crumbs and begun complaining about my bellyache, B was still calculating how exactly he wanted to assess our raw data. After much talk of the importance of each category, in-store experience, and rankings in the individual flavor battles, he eventually settled on this equation:

(Ia(Fa+Ma)2+(La+S/2)+T+B)/P = likelihood of enjoying a random macaron from the store

where a is average, I is inspiration, F is flavor, M is mouthfeel, L is look, S is in-store experience, T is number of macarons in top 10 ranking, B is flavor battle wins, and P is price.

Using this (batshit crazy) rubric, Pierre Hermé receives a 7.6, Ladurée a 6.2, and Fauchon a 3.7. While the ranking is still the same, this illuminates the disparity between Pierre Hermé/Ladurée and Fauchon a bit more clearly (as in, don’t even waste your time with Fauchon for macarons). Finally, B notes that according to his calculations (and this is a man who just spent the better part of his birthday evening creating an ultimate Hungerdome macaron equation), Ladurée has better quality (that is, taste and mouthfeel) on average.

As we’ve now crossed over the 1500 word mark, I’ll leave it up to you what you choose to do with this information. I suspect that the classicists and short-timers will still be going to Ladurée, the avant-garde foodies will hit up Pierre Hermé, and everyone will continue to not bother with Fauchon. Me? Well, despite the close race between my old standby Ladurée and Pierre Hermé, my eyes are now open to the delight that is the latter. I’m on pins and needles in anticipation of the release of their white truffle and foie gras macarons. That is, if I’ve recovered from this stomachache and sugar high by sometime this fall.

LEAVING THE HUNGERDOME:  PIERRE HERMÉ!

Hey there old man

Today is B’s birthday.  He’s turning one of those rather anticlimactic ages, right at the tail end of one decade and on the cusp of another. He’s a fine specimen of 29 today, folks. I know that these mushy-gushy shout-outs might be getting a little old, especially if you don’t know the guy. Bear with me, okay? I’m not going to post much in the next few days, because we’ve got delicious restaurants to eat at, macaroons to buy, and an antique book market to drool over.

More importantly, here’s sending the best wishes to my best guy. You’re the smartest, funniest, dreamiest, unabashedly dorkiest, and kindest person I know and I thank my lucky stars that we found each other and that you’ve stuck around for so long.  Breaking both your legs Misery-style has certainly helped with the latter. I hope this is the beginning of an amazing year in your life.  Happy Birthday, B!

The best museum in Paris that isn’t on your itinerary: Musée de la chasse et de la nature

One of the pitfalls of actually living in Paris (I know, cue the world’s tiniest violinist) is that it’s easy to put off things with the idea that I’ll get around to them eventually.  Sometimes I do this because I’m genuinely intimidated or frightened. This was certainly case with the Vélib’ (free bicycle) system. Even though everyone I knew was gleefully riding about on virtually-free, totally darling bicycles that are available in every corner of the city, I was convinced until this week that Vélib’ was just not for me. Why? Honestly, I’ve always been kind of terrified about riding bikes in an urban setting. I grew up in a mountain town that was so hilly that I couldn’t have ridden my bike on the street if I had wanted to (and I didn’t). Until this week, I hadn’t even been on a bicycle for the better part of a decade. So when B suggested that we save some cash and take Vélib’ instead of a late-night, post-métro cab ride, I was freaked. But after I got the hang of the bike, I was in heaven. Riding down the middle of empty Parisian streets in the dark on bikes is actually quite fun.  I’d rank it right up there with driving fast on a ten-lane Los Angeles freeway alone in the middle of the night. After our two a.m. adventure, I was bike-crazy and insisted that we spend the next day riding out to the Bois de Vincennes on the Promenade Plantée.  Because (if you haven’t caught on yet) I’m either phobic about something or all in. If I dip a toe in the pool, you should expect a cannonball within moments.

Another things I’ve been meaning to do for almost a year now was visit the Musée de la chasse et de la nature (Museum of Hunting and Nature, 60 Rue des Archives, 75003 Paris), which is only a stone’s throw from my house and directly on my oft-traveled route to my favorite market and takeaway sushi place. My friends J and BC went bananas for this place during their stay in Paris and insisted upon taking all their visitors there before even the Louvre or the Musée d’Orsay.  They had likened it to everybody’s favorite non-secret, the Museum of Jurassic Technology in Los Angeles. I’d agree that it is something like the MJT, in that it disrupts your expectations of what a museum can or ought to be.

But I’d venture even further and say the Musée de la chasse et de la nature might be even better than the Museum of Jurassic Technology.  It’s not nearly as painfully ironic, and it actually houses a staggeringly beautiful collection of lovingly collected and curated objects.  Where the Museum of Jurassic Technology is housed in a mishmash building on funky street in Culver City next to a hardwood floor retailer, the Musée de la chasse et de la nature is a gorgeous facility located on the swoon-worthy rue des Archives just up the street from the Archives Nationales. Obviously, not all museums and not all cities are created equal. And let’s be honest, at the end of the day, there’s no better city than Paris.  Los Angeles wasn’t even in the running for that one.

At any rate, the Musée de la chasse et de la nature is one of the best places that isn’t likely on your itinerary for your Parisian vacation.  I can say this with some assurance given that we went on a Sunday during the height of tourist season and were effectively by ourselves for our entire visit. That alone makes it a nice reprieve from the block-long lines at the bigger museums in Paris this time of year.

The first thing you’ll notice about the museum is what a gorgeous facility it is housed in.  White limestone walls and floors are offset by handcast iron chandeliers and handrails in biomorphic forms.  Each room makes the aristocratic hunting lodge aesthetic seem more and more appealing, until even those of us that live for mid-century modern furnishings are dying for some leather club chairs and a collection of antlers on the wall.

Each room in the permanent collection is thoughtfully curated around an animal or a concept. There are amazing displays of antique guns and ammunition, bird calls, and home furnishing that depict the hunt.  There are rooms or displays devoted to dogs, wild boars, game birds, foxes, raptors, wolves, elk, horses, and exotic trophy animals. And while I won’t be sending any hard-core animal activists or vegans to this museum anytime soon, I would describe the relationship that the museum has with its animal subjects as one of deep and abiding appreciation and respect (an attitude, in fact, that is very similar to the one that most of the hunters I know have towards the practice).  Bring on the hate mail! So, it goes without saying, but don’t go here if you have any issues with taxidermy or firearms. But if you find taxidermy or vintage weaponry of interest, this place should be on the top of your list.

Moreover, the curators have thoughtfully integrated other art forms into every aspect of the museum.  In addition to the amazing collection of tapestries, paintings, and ceramics that you might expect, there are beautiful storybook drawings of animals in the huge wooden display cases that also house bronze casts of the footprints and simulacra scat of the animals.  Many of the rooms are graced with large-scale sculpture by contemporary artists, both abstract and representational. The climax, and my favorite part of the museum, comes in the form of Belgian artist Patrick Van Caekenberg’s Atlas of a Cosmogony, a large-scale installation in on the second floor complete with two enormous apes and a dining set in an altar that “purports to be a microcosm, a compendium of both the world and scientific thought.” It’s fantastic, and my sad little photo hardly does it any justice.

At any rate, I’d really recommend you visit this museum if you are in Paris for a little while. While I would especially love to take some of the hunters in my family to this amazing place, it would also be a terrific stop for someone with small children. We had a great time watching two small boys explore the museum, which is filled with hands-on activities.  My favorite chap made a habit of announcing that “THIS is my favorite thing!” upon entering each and every corner of the museum.  I couldn’t help but agree with him.