PARIS. FOOD.

It's amazing how you can go from waking up on a hot Sunday morning in Chicago with vitamin gut and projectile carrot juice to eating snails and drinking rosé at a tiny French Bistro in Paris. Handfuls of valerian root, melatonin, and a magical little blue pill can do wonders for blurring the clutches of time zones and jetlag.  Besides, where's the fun in being tired for a full 24 hours of eating and drinking in Paris with good friends ahead of you? Before I get into my Paris eating adventures I'll brief you on what brings me to Paris in the first place.  I work at Webster's Wine Bar in Chicago, IL... the greatest winebar in the world (yeah i said it). Every year we take a trip to a specific viticultural region in search of knowledge, inspiration, understanding, and mostly great times with great friends.  We think it's essential to truly understanding wines of a region by immersing ourselves in the culture and the people.  After an epic winetrip to Austria (Kamptal, Wachau) visiting some 13 estates last fall, I learned how things are done on Websters trips which the following posts and pictures of this trip will illustrate.  They may manifest feelings of envy & wonder yet, keep in mind, these trips are WORK!  Tasting 100+ wines a day takes STAMINA.  Eating foie gras more than twice a day takes FOCUS!  Ping pong, eau de vie, riesling, killer ducks, cremant, hill climbs, asperges, 1976 pinot gris, more eau de vie, charcoutre, riesling, storks (!), tart flambée, riesling, VT... SGN... MUNSTER... this is no WALK IN THE PARK people! That being said, I hope you enjoy the next few posts about our trip to Alsace!  I'll be talking about terroir, wine laws, lots about biodynamics, ha grown vs production, foudres, acidity, and more.  I thought I'd start things off with 2 (3) places I fell in love with in Paris.

GLOU!

Jeremy, our wine director and trip planner extraordinaire was raving about this place all afternoon. Last time he was in Paris he wandered into the tiny storefront and found an amazing meal with simple delicious organic (and bio-d) food, some serious stuff by the glass, and a super friendly staff.  Despite some reluctance amongst our group of 11 (groups 1 & 2) we called ahead, fingers crossed, to reserve a table.  There is something to be said about how everything just seems to work out in our favor on these trips because Glou agreed they could accommodate!  It took me about 5 seconds to fall completely in love with this place. Two quaint tables sit outside on the sidewalk in front of tall skinny windows and a chalkboard featuring the days glass pours. 

We're greeted by a Berkel hand crank meat slicer consorting amongst a few small 2 & 4 top tables.  The long narrow room leads us to our tall curved communal table beside a wall of a hi-tech tap system keeping the esteemed wines fresh.  Three candy red drum lamps above us add a splash of color to the exposed brick wall with a black chalkboard showing more of today's features. 

We settle in and jump right into a bottle of Serge Batard Muscadet... is there a better way to start a meal? Fino, maybe.  A few bottles of 2009 Domaine de Fondreche Rosé get poured out as the food starts arriving. I purposely didn't document every morsel on the table because I was almost overwhelmed with how happy I was. 

The pictures should give you the idea. '07 Vincent Gaudry Sancerre (pn) tastes AMAZING with the orecchiette & morels, oh... and w/the lamb leg & tomatoes, dorade w/veg.. mmmhmmm. 

After the meal we had them put together a quick tasting of some of the wines in the case.  Sancerre, Meursault, Huet Vouvray, Ostertag Riesling, Condrieu (!)... Côte de Nuits, Côte du Beaune, St. Joseph, Côte Rôtie, St. Estèphe. What an experience!  I was totally blown away, not to mention lost complete track of when I had slept last. This shit is Matty fuel.  I could eat and drink like this forever (and we kinda did! for another 10 days).

and oh yes... they had this ridiculous olive oil that I wrote down so I could hunt it down when I got home.  HERE.

So after Glou we went out and blazed the town.  Found a local hip bar and chugged blanche bière then, I think... I don't even remember which one came first (ha), wandered into a charming winebar slash bookstore.  We found our sanctuary in the small back room where we drank Sancerre like it was Bud Light and raised ruckus like a bunch of loud Americans.  At one point a [tipsy] local came back with a huge smile on his face only to sit next to Dylan and just act like he was one of us.  Quite humorous to say the least.  After everything closed down we headed back to the hotel to tug off of some Mettè wild plum eau de vie and play in the street.  The night kept getting longer and the antics ensued... yes, even some Tai Chi.

"I still haven't slept yet," I say to myself, snapping photos of the Colonne de Juillet. "Saturday?.. Friday?.. Chicago..?  Didn't I close at the winebar? Is it Tuesday?... ah jeez."   The sun coming up in the Bastille still didn't phase my "pumped-up" meter still pinned to "F."  After some very much needed croque madames we finally kick back (haha, Dylan) to the hotel.  I managed to grab a few zzz's and wake up to the beginning of our Alsace trip!

fast forward 10 days...

back in Paris.

falafel.

Really, you have no idea.  My friend Katherine (yay, monkey!), and her fiance David assured me it was a good bet.  The kind gentleman who took my money assured me it was a good bet.  "Best falafel on EARTH" were his words actually.  Not only was it the best falafel on earth but quite possibly one of my single favorite things I've ever eaten.  I tend to get in trouble with my friends rattling off that kinda stuff... "favorite this, best ever that."  I mean it this time guys, I do!  Thank you Monkey.  Thank you David.  Even my guy Jared in Cincinnati knows what's up.  If you are in Paris, go.

Despite the slightly rainy afternoon, it doesn't stop us from running around town staring at the endless supermodels.  Absinthe shop here, cider bar there.  More supermodels.  I'm not sure if I could handle living in Paris.  Maybe there are Parisian women who dig Americans, you know, kinda like the way we dig accents here?  Maybe just a fantasy.  I resist a few impulse buys for the sake of my pocketbook but enjoy the afternoon boppin' around town with Spencer.

Cul de Poule

We jump over to the 9th for our next, and one of our last, meals of the trip.  The name literally translates to "hen's ass" (chicken butt, haha lowen!) although I just recently came across another meaning that it is basically slang for "mixing bowl."  Pretty clever.  The food?  Clever indeed.  I'll get to that in a second, but first, check out this room.  When we walked in they asked us if we wanted to sit upstairs.  Not having any idea we walk up a super narrow set of stairs along a wildly hilarious, and sometimes phallic, mural along the wall.  The whole room was a freaking bed!  That's right, tv trays as tables, pillows, small lamps along the back wall with a word search wallpaper that most have turned into playful graffiti.

Not to be outdone by Glou, we dove straight into the also humble, yet playful winelist. Cheverny Blanc, TROUSSEAU (JURA!), a life-altering low alcohol bio-d sparkling cab franc, and more delight from Corsica!  I'm fucking spoiled.

The food here was SO simple, most of the time each dish having only 3 elements to it. People always say that the simplest food is always the hardest to execute well.  Nothing here seemed hard, complicated, or overthought.  Smoked chicken with a paprika mousse and greens.  Cauliflower soup. Bayonne ham, melt in your mouth chorizo.  Smoked haddock, purée of yam, dill.  There was a huge pork shank on the table too that had some sort of orange zest glaze & polenta, that was out of control good.  At first I thought things were under-seasoned being the salt monster that I am, but after rethinking the flavors and tasting everything I realized that it was intended that way and ended up making the flavors a little more delicate.  Comfort food in a comfortable room made this extremely memorable for me.  There was a "tapiocaaaaaaaaaa" dessert w/whisky & caramel that was just  ______.  I'm just going to leave that blank for now.  A most satisfying calvados, paired with a smoke while peering out our own personal window on to the cool rainy streets of Paris allowed me to reflect on everything.  I'm truly grateful for this trip, these friends, and the ability to appreciate the most important things in life: food, wine, and people! When all of these things are good, it sure is a powerful thing.  à santé!