THIS RESTAURANT IS NOW CLOSED Since I am no expert on the cuisine of New Orleans, I went to Nola with three Texans who know their gumbo. We soon discovered, however, that there is much more to Nola than Louisiana’s … Read More
Three young food-loving entrepreneurs recently opened a new kind of restaurant in Paris as a springboard for talented new chefs. Its name, Fulgurances, is a reference to lightning: they hope to strike their customers with a lightning bolt of joy every time they encounter a new chef.
It’s a sure sign of approaching gentrification when a restaurant like 975 opens in one of Paris’s quartiers populaires, in this case the area around Métro Guy Moquet in northwestern Paris, not far from the Périphérique.
Summery weather and an evening reading at Shakespeare & Co (Zadie Smith and Nick Laird), could lead to only one conclusion: dinner at one of Paris’s top terraces, the nearby Beaurepaire. A meal there was also an occasion to check on the evolution of a restaurant first reviewed here in 2012.
Paris is seriously lacking in restaurants with quiet terraces where one can have a meal in peace on a summer evening. And, when such a place does exist, the restaurant is often not up to par – it’s almost as if the owners figure they don’t have to make an effort because they know they will fill their tables anyway.
Rodolphe Paquin, 43, a.k.a. “The King of Terrines,” grew up on a Normandy farm, studied hotel management then made his way to Paris where, for 16 years, he has presided over the kitchen of Le Repaire de Cartouche in the … Read More
Shaun Kelly, 28, is the new chef at Au Passage, the bistro everyone’s talking about in the 11th arrondissement. Originally from the small Australian town of Eumundi, he trained as a chef in Melbourne, Manchester and London before moving to … Read More
The new restaurant recently opened on the Rue Oberkampf in Paris’s 11th arrondissement by Pierre-Sang Boyer, a 2011 “Top Chef” contestant, had garnered some good reviews, and I was looking forward to trying it out. Our meal there on a … Read More
I have a sad tale to tell today. Last night I went to a restaurant called Coude à Coude near the Forum des Halles. The first time I went there a couple of years ago, our table was the only … Read More
THIS RESTAURANT IS NOW CLOSED One of the friends I dined with recently at Auberge Flora proclaimed it the best restaurant meal she’d had in the 10 years she’s lived in Paris. For me that vote would still go to … Read More
