Paris Insights - The Blog

My partner and I went to Synapse on Sunday to taste the espresso it was brewing that day and to purchase a bag of roasted coffee beans.

The café is located about two blocks from the Jardin des Plantes in the 5th arrondissement. We go to that area from time to time to purchase fruit preparations that are made without cane sugar from an organic grocery store in the vicinity. There is also a great cheese shop nearby where we sometimes purchase whisky-flavored cheddar cheese from England.

Synapse is a small café with only a few chairs and low tables. When we entered, most of the seats were taken, so I ordered the espresso to take out. Mexican coffee from Córdoba, Veracruz was the shop’s selection of the day.

In addition to the espresso, I purchased a 250-gram bag for 11.50€ of the roasted coffee beans. Notes on the bag indicated that the coffee expressed flavors of walnut, dried fruit, and caramel. When I sipped the espresso, I thought that I detected the flavor of dried fig. My partner said that the aroma reminded her of roasted almond.

I took the bag of coffee beans home, ground a small quantity, and brewed a shot with my 9Barista. The coffee was strong and very slightly sweet, with a faint aroma of almond. I did not detect dried fig this time. There was no bitterness, so I did not add any sugar.

Synapse roasts its coffee at its coffee roasting facility on Cour Damoye at 12 place de la Bastille.

Synapse
2 rue du Fer à Moulin
75005 Paris

My partner and I entered Grains de Génie recently to taste and purchase coffee and tea. The coffee roasting facility is located next to the entrance to the Censier-Daubenton métro station (Line 7) near the popular Mouffetard market street in the 5th arrondissement.

I ordered a cup of Guatemala / Finca Brême espresso while my partner ordered a cup of Rooibos tea.

Bags of tea and roasted coffees are displayed along the wall, while outside there is a sidewalk terrace for sitting down.

I purchased a 250 gram bag of the of the Guatemala / Finca Brême and took it home, where I ground the coffee finely and brewed a cup in my 9Barista stove-top espresso machine.

Sipping the coffee carefully, I noted that its aroma was similar to almond. I did not, however, detect the other aromas that were listed on the bag: milk chocolate, orange, biscuit, and green apple.

I was pleased that the coffee was not at all bitter, which permitted me to enjoy it without adding any sugar.

Grains de Génie
45 rue Daubenton
75005 Paris

I recently purchased a 9Barista stove-top espresso machine and put it to use immediately.

From Loutsa Torréfacteur on rue Bazeilles, I purchased 250 grams of Santa Rosa roasted coffee beans from Costa Rica.  I ground 18 grams of the beans (finest grind in my De’Longhi KG520.M grinder) and brewed them with 120 grams of water (Volcania brand mountain water from Auvergne).   The result was a strong espresso with frothy crema that tasted much like the espresso I purchased the day before at Loutsa (see my blog dated October 23). 

I could not distinguish any of the aromas or flavors (clementine, honey, almond, chocolate, and caramel) that the coffee reportedly expresses, but I did enjoy the assertive coffee flavor of this strong beverage.

I enjoyed making the brew with the new machine.  There was no fuss after an initial period of learning the steps of the brewing procedure and there is minimal clean-up afterwards.  Easy and fun!

9Barista – Made in the UK

Last week, my partner and I entered Loutsa Torréfacteur, a coffee roaster and café on rue de Bazeilles, to purchase an espresso coffee.  I was curious to see if I could identify the aromas associated with one of the café’s specialty roasts.

A coffee roaster sits to the right of the entrance.  Next to it, a shelf displays 250g airtight bags of the café’s recently roasted limited edition specialty coffees.  The multi-hued colors of a package of Santa Rosa roast from the Tarrazu region of Costa Rica caught my eye.  The package label indicated that this roast is characterized by aromas and flavors of clementine, honey, almond, chocolate, and caramel.  Could I, I wondered, identify any of these intriguing elements while sipping a freshly-pulled espresso made from this bean?  I decided to order one to test my ability to distinguish them.

I ordered the coffee at the counter, found a table at which to sit, and waited while it was being prepared.

After the barista placed the espresso on the table, I took small sips, trying to determine which flavors I could recognize.  Alas, the only thing that I could identify was the very strong flavor of…coffee.  Try as I might, I could not distinguish any of the characteristics that were indicated on the package.  The only thing I could say was that the brew tasted slightly bitter and sour.  I was not greatly disappointed, though, because I do enjoy the flavor of coffee. I persuaded my partner, who does not like coffee, to take a sip, but she could go no further in the taste test than I had gone in my experience.

Not ready to abandon my quest, I purchased a 250g bag of Santa Rosa coffee and took it home to try my hand at making espresso with a  9Barista stove-top coffee maker that I had recently purchased. Would I be able to capture those illusive aromas and flavors at home with my new espresso machine?

Santa Rosa Pure Origin Limited Coffee – 16.20€/250g – Loutsa Torréfacteur – 1 rue de Bazeilles – 75005 Paris

On Saturday, October 12th, I had the occasion to attend an open house at a photo studio located in the Boissière quarter of the Paris suburb of Montreuil.

The studio was founded in 1951 by an Arminian refugee, Varastade Kasparian, and has been operated by his family ever since. One of the sons of the elder Kasparian, Roger, went on to become a celebrated photographer, renowned for his images of popular singers and bands that performed in Paris during the 1960s. Today, the studio is operated by Maccha, the daughter of the second-generation Kasparian, and her daughter, Nelta, who divides her time between Paris and London.

It was fascinating to watch the mother-daughter team work together. Nelta took portrait photographs of open house attendees and Maccha developed the film.

Studio Boissière
265 boulevard Aristide-Briande
93100 Montreuil
studioboissiere.com

View of the Ecole des Mines from the Luxembourg Garden
The sculpture commemorating the abolition of slavery stands to the right.

Visitors to the Luxembourg Garden sometimes wonder what the building is that overlooks the edge of the garden near the three-link chain sculpture (on the right in the photo between the path and the sign) that commemorates the abolition of slavery.  It is the “Luxembourg” wing of the Ecole des Mines, an engineering school that was founded in 1783 and initially located on quai de Conti. 

Since 1816, the school has been located on boulevard Saint-Michel next to the garden. The “Luxembourg” wing that can be viewed from the garden was constructed in 1861-1866 to house laboratories during a period of physical expansion of the school.

Place Edmond Rostand

Place Edmond Rostand is a roundabout located at the intersections of four streets in front of the Luxembourg Garden:  Rue de Médicis, Boulevard Saint-Michel, Rue Soufflot, and Rue Gay-Lussac.  The roundabout was created between 1860 to 1870 during Baron Haussmann’s urban renewal project, a colossal campaign that tore down old Parisian neighborhoods and replaced them with wide streets and boulevards.

To the left in the photograph stands Rue de Médicis.  To permit the construction of this street in 1860, a portion of the Luxembourg Garden was appropriated despite resistance from Parisians who wanted to preserve that section of the park. 

The buildings that stand today around Place Edmond Rostand were constructed during this period of massive urban transformation.  Called “Haussmannian” buildings, they reflect the architectural style that Baron Haussmann imposed on the city during the demolition and rebuilding that took place in Paris under his authority from 1853 to 1870.

The French Senate, which is tasked with the maintenance of the Luxembourg Garden, assigns the mission of trimming its tall hedges to a landscaping company.

The trimming is carried out by a specially-designed machine, mounted on a wheeled vehicle, whose cutter can reach a height of 21 meters.  Assisted by a laser guidance system, a circular saw placed at the end of a telescopic arm ensures precise cutting.  An operator, sitting in a cabin at the top of the aerial lift, guides the trimming process.

Photograph by Entrée to Black Paris

Just inside the Luxembourg Garden at the entrance called Porte Médicis stands a sculpture of a dancing faun, a half-man, half-goat deity from Roman antiquity.  Sculpted by French artist Eugène Louis Lequesne (1815 – 1887), the creature dances stark naked, balancing precariously with one foot on an overfilled wineskin and playing a trumpet.  A close look at the subject reveals that its only animal-like feature is a short tail.

During Antiquity, fauns represented inebriated gaiety.  They were associated with Bacchus, the god of wine.  Here, the intoxicated faun demonstrates his prowess at balancing on a wine-filled animal skin, an unstable surface, while playing a musical instrument.

At the base of the sculpture, one can see the following objects around the wineskin:  a tambourine, a bunch of grapes, a wine cup, and a thyrsus (a pine-cone tipped staff tied with ribbon that was carried by devotees of Dionysus and Bacchus).

Lequesne started a career as a jurist, but abandoned the trade and entered the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris in 1840.  He gained acceptance into the Villa Médicis in Rome, where he studied classical art for five years.  Inspired by an antique dancing faun that was discovered in Pompei in 1830, he created a plaster sculpture depicting his own rendering of the subject.  It was cast in bronze in 1850.  This metallic sculpture is the one that we admire today.