France Archives - Food, Booze, & Baggage

Let’s Fly Away~Paris The Food

February 5, 2014 by Mariah 17 Comments

L’Arpege
This was our second 3 Michelin Star restaurant of the trip, and I was less than impressed. We picked this one after booking Paul Bocuse because I thought it would offer us a different experience and a more innovative/creative menu. It was an experience and there were lot of neat dishes to try, but the execution fell flat. Many of the dishes served were out of balance flavor-wise, some being too acidic, some bland, and some with components that were too strong. I cannot say I would recommend this one, particularly because there is so many other 3 Michelin restaurants to choose from in Paris. The service was good but nothing special at Paul Bocuse the service was like a ballet, at L’Arpege it felt more robotic. The conclusion of the meal also bothered me a bit, as you are presented with your knife you used for the meal to take home. It made no sense particularly because they promote themselves as a vegetable forward restaurant. I felt it did not fit their image at all, plus now I have to take this dirty knife with me through the Metro. These were all of the courses.

Au Passage
A hipster paradise with 5 star food. This place had a completely different feel than your traditional french dining, much more relaxed and informal. Their menu changes daily and is written on a board (no paper menus), but it was spectacular. I have very few pictures of our experience here, I kept eating without thinking about it and half the plate would be finished before I remembered. The food was that good! The oysters below, were so good, we ordered a second plate ..and so I have a picture of the second serving 🙂 We tried pigeon for the first time here and I was impressed; I was so proud of P for trying it without even batting an eye. Au Passage is about 2 blocks from Le Fine Mousse (the beer bar); a beer there and a table here makes for a perfect evening.

Semilla
Order the ceviche. That’s it, that’s my advice on the topic of Semilla. Kidding, of course I have more to say 🙂 but seriously order the ceviche! The ceviche was in the top three dishes of the whole trip. The food was amazing here and I loved the feel of the place, very high energy. All the staff spoke English and there was a very mixed crowd of patrons. Semilla features an open kitchen concept so you can see them in action. I would recommend booking your reservation for an earlier time, maybe 7:00 because they pretty much close up the kitchen at 10 (we watched them cleaning it).

The Rest (well most):

L’Avant Comptoir: I feel we got the true french bistro experience here, we ate at one of the tiny tables out front. The food was great, I had a divine steak tartare dish there. It was a good experience overall, and all of the patrons were very friendly.

La Palette: Stopped in for lunch at this seemingly popular bistro. Great service and we enjoyed the croque madame here, had to have it a least once.

Le Schmuck: I DO NOT RECOMMEND! It was one of those last-minute decisions, and it was getting late. This just proves my point of needing to pre-select all eating venues.

Grom: Gelato and it was incredible, it was near our hotel and the concierge virtually forced us into going 🙂 We went twice actually.

Recommended But Not Tested:

Reed

Les Fils de la Ferme: I experienced this on a prior trip to Paris, very small, husband and wife team, but that was over 5 years ago. It was closed for holiday this trip or it would have been a stop.

Let’s Fly Away~Paris The Beer

January 29, 2014 by Mariah 5 Comments

When you think of Paris, I’m sure you don’t think beer but I’m here to tell you beer can be found 🙂 Don’t worry we had plenty of wine but that was reserved for dinners (and lunches)!

Brasserie la Goutte d’Or is the one of the few, if not only, craft breweries in Paris, so of course we had to find it. This is a brewery, NOT a brewpub and they do not serve on premises except for samples. We did not realize this when we went but it was still worth the trek. This is also in the sketchiest neighborhood I have ever visited in Paris, I would not go at night. That being said, the locals seemed friendly enough and there were other “tourists” that came in after us. I just want others to be aware and go doing daylight hours. We bought several bottles and carried them all back to the States with us.

I love the neighborhood that Brewberry is in and SO want to go back to explore it better. Brewberry is a beer store and bar. Had excellent service and a wide (as you can see) selection of bottled beer. They had a good mix of beers from all over the world. If you are an expat looking for a good American craft beer selection this is a good stop. The funny thing is they had beers from the U.S. we can’t get where we live. They offered a great free bar snack of bread and soft cheese. The Fleurac (pictured) was one of my favorite beers we tried in France..very unique taste and hard to describe, dark but not heavy, hop notes but not bitter or floral-more earthy. This shop also featured their own Mikkeller brew…which is pretty cool.

La fine Mousse is a bar you want to hang out in. The bartender is incredibly friendly and helpful, and so are the patrons. P and I both said if we lived in Paris this would be our neighborhood beer bar. Someone else also wrote that same statement on Trip Advisor so it was not just us with that feeling. This is a bar (not restaurant) though they did have an amazing looking charcuterie plate. I would have insisted on ordering that if we had not had dinner reservations in a hour. This bar had a great selection of draft beers, with more than six from France on draft. This was the most draft beers from France we were able to find. If I had to go to only one of the places listed here it would be La fine Mousse.

The Beer Academy is Belgium beer focused, no French beers but a great selection. It is a funky little place, and was a good stop to get us out of the rain. Great if you are looking for a wide variety of Belgium brews.

Another recommended beer destination in Paris is Le Supercoin, unfortunately we did not get to try this establishment, but maybe you can.

Let’s Fly Away~Paris The Views

January 22, 2014 by Mariah 20 Comments

Paris is Paris..there is no place like it and there is never enough time.

Pont de l’Archevêché

Luxembourg Gardens

Basilica of Sacre-Coeur, Montmartre, Paris

Montmartre Cemetery (Cimetiere Montmartre), Paris

Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel

Louvre

Arc de Triomphe

Eiffel Tower

Next Week, is Paris~Booze (in this case booze=beer).

Let’s Fly Away~Macon

January 15, 2014 by Mariah 6 Comments

Macon, France was our second reason for choosing Lyon as a destinations. Macon is about 30 minutes by train outside of Lyon. It is also where P’s paternal grandmother is from and since we were making the trip to France we thought it would be neat to see her hometown. Macon was larger than expected and more metropolitan. There were tons of shops and restaurants, it was very charming. Take a look:

It is like being in a Monet painting.

This bridge is the Pont Saint-Laurent, and was one of the few bridges in the area that was not destroyed during the Second World War. I took tons of pictures of this bridge. P’s parents gave us a plate with a painting of this bridge done by his grandmother, so I really wanted a good picture.

The Cathedral

Lunch in Macon at Le Bouchacourt

The small white fish were wonderful…you just eat them whole. We also had frog legs which came out steaming hot, in a garlicky butter sauce…amazing and you get as many servings as you want. I also learned the proper way to eat frog legs is with your fingers…as so instructed by our table of translators. This was the only time that language was a barrier, but the table beside us was more than helpful. Our gracious translators happened to own a hotel in the area-Hostellerie Chateau de la Barge. I would highly recommend looking it up if you want to stay in the area. Considering how helpful they were to strangers interrupting their lunch, I can’t image the service you would get at the hotel. We did not plan ahead for lunch, we decided we wanted to eat by the river and Le Bouchacourt stood out because when we passed earlier the owner along with her granddaughter was setting the tables . I think we made a great choice.

We could not have asked for a better day, it was just perfect.