Our Paris Eats-Ethnic

One of the best parts of a Paris stay is to go to ethnic restaurants. Our first evening in Paris was spent searching for sushi which turned out to be extremely easy. Sushi restaurants are everywhere in our neighborhood! Next on the list was falafel. L'as du Falafel is the go to place in the Marias. Vietnamese will be next, we have a lead on a great but yet unknown place near Madaleine. We have had many good classically French meals as well which I will post later.

Nous Sommes Arrives en Paris

Despite the indignity of being stuffed in a carrier, put on a train, and then wheeled through the streets of Paris on a cart, we (all 4 of us) are now in week 3 of our Paris stay. Dante and Calypso find the apartment to their satisfaction as do we. We are entertaining ourselves well: Baroque music, piano recital, and tonight will be Beethoven. Lots of socializing with friends both Parisians and those who are passing through the City of Light. There was a Diderot play, several museums thus far, and much good food and baked goods. We love the neighborhood which has good markets and we can walk to most of our favorite destinations. Weather is currently cold but it has been very dry during our time here so far. We would like to see the view from our window covered with snow!

We're Going to Paris

Tomorrow we are off to Paris for a month. As you can see Calypso and Dante can't wait. This year we have rented a 65 sq. meter apartment on Boulvevard Montparnasse, 9th floor. We love the market at Edgar Quinet so we will be looking forward to this 3 day a week market (crafts market on Sundays). We are taking the TGV near noon and should be settled in the apartment by 3:30 pas terrible for the kitties. So the adventures begin.....

What Else We Did with the Truffle: Omlette

We stored the remaining half of our truffle in a lidded bowl with eggs. The idea is that the scent of the truffle will be absorbed by and flavor the eggs. We had mushrooms in the house so we took a bit more of our precious truffle and chopped it up into little pieces and added it to the sauted mushooms. This we added to the scented eggs and had a fabulous omlette.

So What We Did with the Truffle

A fresh free-range chicken was purchased at the market with the truffle. When we got home, we cleaned the chicken and sliced the truffle (about 1/2 the truffle actually). The small crumbs of the truffle were mixed with duck fat, salt, pepper, and pineau de charentes (our local fortified wine). The skin of the chicken was separated from the meat and the sliced truffles were gently pushed under the skin. The paste was slathered over the chicken which was then trussed and wrapped in plastic and refrigerated over night. The next day we nestled shallots around the bird for cooking. It went into a medium hot oven and roasted for about an hour. The results were excellent.

In Search of the Perfect Truffle

If it is December it must be time for truffles here in the Dordogne. Saturday we went to the truffle market in Perigueux for our annual truffle purchase. We left the house in the dark to be sure to arrive at the market in time to hear the judge evaluate, comment on, and assign a quality category to each truffle before the market opens at 9 AM. Unfortunately, we did not arrive in time because we apparently also needed to find a closed RV store miles outside of town. We did arrive a bit after 9 and in time to buy a truffle. Here is the truffle we selected in hopes that it would be that perfect truffle. How we use it will be my next post.

La Tourtiere

In the last post I mentioned the flaky apple pastry flavored with armagnac "la tourtiere" which is a regional speciality. A mother and daughter team from la ferme des Tuileries demonstrated how to make this delicacy at the agricultural fair we visited a couple of weeks ago. It is made with a pastry much like brik. Originally the dough was beaten with a heavy baton at least 50 times, left over night and then the next day spread out on a large table until it is paper thin. It is allowed to dry and then cut into circles to begin the tart. Today a mixer beats the dough and a hair drier can be used to dry it out. The pastry circles are used flat and folded into triangles to construct what ends up looking like a work of art. Apples, sugar, and armagnac are added along the way until it is ready to go into the oven. All my photographs of the process are posted at our Flickr site http://www.flickr.com/photos/petillant/

But if you would like to get the recipe and meet the family who make these wonderful tarts go to http://www.ferme-tuileries.com/