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The Monster Bloggers’ Meet-up and Tweet-up Is Now History!

May 27th, 2011

Bloggers and Tweeps
(c) Discover Paris!

The for-the-first-time-in-all-of-human-history Monster Bloggers’ Meet-up and Tweet-up was held in Paris yesterday. A good time was had by all!

Convened at Chez Lili et Marcel, a café-restaurant located on the quai d’Austerlitz across the river from the Ministry of Finance, twelve Anglophone bloggers and tweeps came together to exchange stories and talk about this and that.

The following is a recap of some of the things that we discussed:

Robyn Blaber of A Canadian in Paris recounted the travails he endured to obtain a visitor’s visa from the French authorities so that he could move to Paris. With that agony behind him, his next challenge is to find an apartment to settle into. Lots of luck, Robyn!

Karin Bates-Snyder of An Alien Parisienne told the group that she began blogging about Paris to document her gluten-free life here and to get out and see more of the city.

Laura Collier of Context Travel stated that she came to Paris to study for a Master’s degree and talked of her interest in sustainable travel.

Jenny Sundel of Jesus Year Project told me that she decided to move to Paris in the 33rd year of her life. She doesn’t seem to have regretted this decision!

And we, Tom Reeves and Monique Y. Wells of Paris Insights and Entrée to Black Paris, talked about our “Paris Was a Woman” walk, which we will soon offer to the general public, and the soon-to-be-published abridged edition of our book Paris Insights – An Anthology.

Others in attendance were:

Sion Dayson: Paris Imperfect
Richard Nahem: Eye Prefer Paris
Ann-Marie Nolan: Like Home in Paris
Elinor Browne: Like Home in Paris
Joshua Smith: The Controversial Manual
Jenny Sundel: Jesus Year Project
Nikki Bailey: Yahoo Travel

Yetunde Oshodi of Feels Like Home in Paris has already reserved Sunday, June 19th as the date of a tweet-up to be held at the Cook’n with Class cooking school in Montmartre.

Robyn Blaber - A Canadian in Paris
Monique Y. Wells - Entrée to Black Paris
(c) Discover Paris!

Laura Collier - Context Paris
Richard Nahem - Eye Prefer Paris
Joshua Smith - The Controversial Manual
(c) Discover Paris!

Nikki Bayley - Yahoo Travel
Sion Dayson - Paris Imperfect
Karin Bates Snyder - An Alien Parisienne
(c) Discover Paris!

Elinor Browne - Feels Like Home in Paris Apartments
Ann-Marie Nolan - Feels like Home in Paris Apartments
Tom Reeves - Paris Insights
(c) Discover Paris!

Joshua Smith - The Controversial Manual
Jenny Sundel - Jesus Year Project
Robyn Blaber - A Canadian in Paris
(c) Discover Paris!

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Tasting Single-origin Coffee at the Brûlerie Artisanale

May 25th, 2011

Brûlerie Artisanale
(c) Discover Paris!

The Brûlerie Artisanale is a coffee-roasting facility located at 7, rue du Rendez-vous in the 12th arrondissement of Paris. As well as fresh-roasted coffees, the shop sells a great variety of teas, chocolates, and confections. The proprietors are a husband and wife team; their names are Jacky and Clotilde.

Clotilde, who hails from Spain, took time to tell me about their selection. Many of their coffees are single-origin, including beans from Colombia, Nicaragua, Honduras, Haiti, Hawaii, and New Guinea. I selected 250 grams of whole-bean coffee from the Dominican Republic, selling for 21.60€/kilogram. The chalkboard on which they had written descriptions of the different coffees indicated that the flavor of the Dominican Republic coffee was “intense” and “explosive,” with notes of “prune and zest of citrus.”

Back home, I brewed the coffee in my French press. Upon tasting it, I found its flavor robust and intense. The aroma of the coffee is quite sweet, and while I agree that it has the fragrance of prune, I could not detect zest of citrus. Nonetheless, it is a smooth, rich, and fully satisfying coffee.

Jacky (left) and Clotilde (right)
(c) Discover Paris!

Jackie told me that he roasts his coffees until the beans display the color of “robe de moine” (medium roast).

The Brûlerie Artisanale is a great place to shop for small gifts of chocolates and confections to take to the folks back home, as well as for single-origin coffee from different parts of the world.

Bonne dégustation!

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Big Bash on the Seine Last Sunday Night

May 24th, 2011

The Brothers Paris Spring Gala "AllStars" Band
From left to right:
Nicholas Horton, guitar; Hervé Samb, guitar
Sonny Troupé, drums; Allonymous, vocals
Mike Amoogum, bass; Toli Nameless, trombone
Jerry Leoni, keyboard
Video courtesy of Discover Paris!

A fantastic party took place last Sunday night in the French capital on the Seine River. Organized by The Brothers Paris, a group of African-American men who live in the City of Light, the event lived up to its high hopes and expectations.

Called “The Brothers Paris Spring Gala,” the party took place on a barge located directly across the river from the new Fashion and Design Center. It began shortly after 8:00 p.m. as guests arrived to take their places around dinner tables for a delicious three-course meal. Live music started almost immediately, with top-level bands and singers belting out rhythms until around midnight. After that hour, recorded music took over for dancing until 2:00 a.m.

Long-time Paris resident Tannie Stoval was inspired to organize The Brothers Paris shortly after the Million Man March that was held in Washington, D.C. in 1995. He began inviting African-American men who live in Paris to his place for dinner and conversation, and this private, weekly event has become a tradition. Many years later, the group is still going strong, and it recently decided to organize an open event to celebrate African-American culture.

And celebrate it did, in art, poetry, and music!

Master of Ceremonies Christopher Nisperos
(c) Discover Paris!

Guitarist Nicholas Horton
Singers Nat Jones and Joseph Langley
(c) Discover Paris!

Artist Ealy Mays
(c) Discover Paris!

Singer Enricque d'Shawn
(c) Discover Paris!

Trumpet Player Rasul Siddik
(c) Discover Paris!

Writer and Film Maker David Burke
and Gospel Singer Linda Lee Hopkins
(c) Discover Paris!

Bluesman Juju Child
(c) Discover Paris!

Left to Right: Gospel Singers Tori Robinson,
Unknown, Linda Lee Hopkins, Alex Sanders,
Richard Allen, and Sylvia Howard
(c) Discover Paris!

Watch the 36 minute video produced by Joseph Langley:

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Chef Tsukasa Fukuyama of A & M Restaurant

May 18th, 2011

Chef Tsukasa Fukuyama
(c) Discover Paris!

Chef Tsukasa Fukuyama hails from Osaka, the third largest city in Japan. At the age of thirteen, he became aware of French cuisine while watching a television show on the subject. This became his passion, and after formal training in a cooking school in Japan, he traveled to France, seeking work in the restaurant trade.

After working at a number of restaurants in Paris, he was eventually asked to join two other chefs in a partnership to open A & M restaurant. Chef Fukuyama has been the head chef there since the year 2000.

We recently enjoyed dining at his restaurant and have written an extensive review of our experience there.

Access to the review is by paid subscription to our newsletter Paris Insights. Click here to read a brief summary of the April edition, and here to enter a subscription.

Bonne lecture!

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Visit to a Chocolate Shop

May 11th, 2011

We stopped by Mococha, a chocolate shop located at 89, rue Mouffetard, and made a short video about the owner, Marie, and the chocolates that she sells there.

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We participate in Wanderfood Wednesdays. Head over there to explore food from around the world!

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Tasting Tapas at La Table des Anges

May 4th, 2011

La Table des Anges
(c) Discover Paris!

One of the advantages of writing about restaurants is that I occasionally get invited to restaurant openings. On the evening of Friday, April 29, La Table des Anges hosted such an event for journalists and my partner and I attended.

Although the formal opening took place that night, the restaurant has already been open for about five weeks. At the opening, we had the occasion to speak with Jacques-Henri Strauss, one of the partners in the enterprise. He told us that the restaurant plans to serve three types of cuisine: vegetarian (inspired by Indian and southern French foods), traditional French (leg of lamb, beef-carrot stew, and eventually ham on the bone from Eric Ospital, whose company is renowned for its pork products), and what he called “discovery” (food from the Middle Ages and earlier times, molecular cuisine, foreign cuisines such as Indian curry…).

Inside, the restaurant displays bare-stone walls; a light-toned wooden-plank floor and wooden tables; figurative, semi-abstract art on the walls; and fabric-covered benches. The dining room and bar are located on the ground floor. An open kitchen and two large tables for dining are located downstairs. Jacques-Henri told us that tapas will be served downstairs, whereas traditional dining will take place on the ground floor.

The Kitchen of La Table des Anges
(c) Discover Paris!

While we conversed with Jacques-Henri, we were served four kinds of tapas. One was a triangular-shaped brick pastry folded over goat cheese and spinach. Another was a crescent-shaped pastry that contained sweetened ground meat. The third was a breaded ball containing cod and potato; and the fourth was a cube of Spanish tortilla containing egg and potato. All of the tapas were appetizing. We noted, in particular, that the cod in the breaded ball did not have a fishy taste, attesting to its freshness.

For the wine accompaniment, we were served first a glass of Picpoul de Pinet – Domaine Val Grieux, a white wine from the Languedoc region. Following this, we were served a glass of red Zinfandel from Agnes’ Vineyards in Lodi, California.

One of the four partners in this enterprise is Denis Robin, CEO of the restaurant chain Pain Quotidien, a restaurant at which we have had the pleasure to dine on several occasions. Based upon what we saw and experienced Friday evening, we believe that La Table des Anges has great potential for becoming a restaurant for informal dining on fine fare.

The restaurant is located at 66, rue des Martyrs (metro: Pigalle, lines 2 and 12) and is open from Monday to Saturday from 9:00 a.m. until midnight. Open for brunch on Sunday.

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We participate in Wanderfood Wednesdays. Head over there to explore food from around the world!

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Big Tweet-up Under Sunny Skies Last Sunday

May 3rd, 2011

Last Sunday more than twenty persons met on the upper terrace of the café 25° Est to enjoy mild weather, sunny skies, and scintillating company!

Here are photos of the event:

Lindsey Tramuta, Kathryn Reichert, and Lisa Gironda
(c) Discover Paris!

Elinor, Milla Msa, and Leila Florentino
(c) Discover Paris!

Lelia Florentino, Marlys Schürmann, Karin Bates Snyder
(c) Discover Paris!

Lisa and Nikki
(c) Discover Paris!

Forest Collins and Erin Czarra
(c) Discover Paris!

The following Tweeps enjoyed the beautiful day on the terrace:

Monique Y. Wells – Entrée to Black Paris
Lisa Gironda – @BunnyTheCat
Kathryn Reichert – @KNReichert
Lindsey Tramuta – Lost in Cheeseland
Yetunde Oshodi – Like Home in Paris
Forest Collins – 52 Martinis
Emma Bentley – liberté, égalité, crème brûlée!
Eric Fraudeau – Cook’n with Class
Karin Bates Snyder – An Alien Parisienne
Marlys Schürmann – Paris Movie Walks
Leila Florentino – Leila’s Photos & Stuff
Nikki Bayley – @nikkibayley
Jennifer Geraghty Jennyphoria
Linda Donahue – Parisien Salon
Jody Israelshy – @jodyparis
Gail Boisclair – Perfectly Paris
Erin Czarra – @ecinparis
Milla Msa – Not Just Another Milla
Stephanie – La Belle in France

Thanks to Kathryn Reichert and Forest Collins for organizing this magnificent Tweet-up!

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Finally Getting 15 Minutes of Fame

April 28th, 2011

I received a profuse message of thanks from journalist David Jaggard for helping him research material for his column C’est Ironique! that appears in the on-line weekly guide called Paris Update. To view this nugget of gratitude, click here and scroll down the central column of the Web page to the end of the article. Oh yes, and take a moment to read his material—he’s got some interesting things to say!

Now, I wonder if Obama needs some help with his research…

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A Visit to a Cheese Shop

April 27th, 2011

Jérôme Boulestreau
Manager of Fromagerie Beillevaire
(c) Discover Paris!

Last month, members of the Paris Alumnae/i Network met Jérôme Boulestreau, manager of the cheese shop Fromagerie Beillevaire on rue de Belleville in Paris. He opened his shop to us for a private visit.

The shop is one of ten that the company Beillevaire has opened in Paris. The company began with founder Pascal Beillevaire’s love for dairy products, a passion that developed while growing up on the family farm “La Vacheresse,” located in the Pays de la Loire region near Nantes. Today the company specializes in receiving, fabricating, and aging cheeses, which it distributes through 73 shops and markets in western France and Paris.

Crayeux de Roncq
Photo from La Ferme du Vinage Web site

At the end of Mr. Boulestreau’s presentation, we tasted eight different cheeses. The most memorable was the Crayeux de Roncq (also called Carré du Vinage), a brine-washed, raw cow’s-milk cheese with soft, almost runny, texture. It was smooth, creamy, and had a—whew!—strong flavor. It is produced by fromagère Thérèse-Marie Couvreur at a farm that lies in the north of France, near Lille called “La Ferme du Vinage.”

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The full article describing Mr. Boulestreau’s presentation is available to the subscribers of our monthly newsletter Paris Insights.

Access to the newsletter is by paid subscription. Click here to view the announcement of the newsletter that features the article. Click here to enter a subscription.

Bonne lecture!

* * * * * * *

We participate in Wanderfood Wednesdays. Head over there to explore food from around the world!

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Paris Insights - The Blog

The Monster Bloggers’ Meet-up and Tweet-up Is Now History!

Tasting Single-origin Coffee at the Brûlerie Artisanale

Big Bash on the Seine Last Sunday Night

Chef Tsukasa Fukuyama of A & M Restaurant

Visit to a Chocolate Shop

Tasting Tapas at La Table des Anges

Big Tweet-up Under Sunny Skies Last Sunday

Finally Getting 15 Minutes of Fame

A Visit to a Cheese Shop

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