chez pim

L'Os à Moelle: my sentimental Paris

My bistro favorite in Paris comes and goes, but there is one constant that has been a sentimental favorite since the early 90's. I just made it back there again on this last trip.

That night, my friends Matt, Lynn and I just arrived in Paris for our Thanksgiving holiday. It was the only night in the trip that I had made no reservation, preferring to leave it open in case we were too jetlagged. After a rather mediocre lunch --with a bottle even more mediocre Beaujolais Nouveau that smelled of banana purée-- at a nameless bistro in our neighbourhood, I was determined to find a better place for dinner for our first night in Paris.

Without a reservation on Thursday night, finding a decent place for dinner can be a little difficult. Well, not as difficult as trying to get a taxi on a Saturday night, but nonetheless. I decided to take them to La Cave de L'Os à Moelle, a tiny wine bar extension of the restaurant with the same name, and a fittingly casual place for our first night in a new time zone. We couldn't get into La Cave, but luckily there was an open table at the restaurant, so that was where we settled in for dinner. Both of these are owned by the charming Thierry Faucher, one of the young chefs trained by the affable Christian Constant at the Crillon.

The man who turns me on..

...to beans that is. Who else but the Rancho Gordo himself?

No --oh gawd no-- this is not going to be that kind of story. You'll have to earn a secret pass to my girlfriends-only blog to hear that kind of story.

This one --almost equally tantalizing if you think about it, really-- is all about beans. I grew up in Asia, where beans are mostly eaten in desserts: sweet bean paste, sweet bean soups, even bean ice cream (yes, really). So, beans in a savory form have always been slightly odd to me, particularly those refried beans with the texture of cement paste that are all too common in mediocre Mexican joints. I'll eat an odd bean or two, when they came in things I love such as Cassoulet. But they have never been something that I relished, or that I could eat bowls after bowls of.

Addiction: Gianduja Cream

The last time I was in London Vanessa gave me a jar of Guido Gobino Gianduja Cream to take home with me. It has been sitting quietly in the cupboard, almost forgotten, until just this weekend. I discovered it while searching for a snack when I woke up this morning.

I used to love Nutella, I grew up eating Nutella on toast, crèpes, fingers, anything. I am not eating much Nutella anymore, especially the ones made in America, because I am trying not to have any High Fructose Corn Syrup and Partially Hydrogenated Oil in my diet.

My local Rainbow grocery carries an organic Nutella substitute called Nocciolata, which is acceptable though just a little too sweet and has a weird oily scent. So, obviously, I am not a big fan, and have been feeling deprived of my favorite hazelnut spread.

these people need to get a life

How annoying, I woke up this morning to an email from Adrian in Paris, telling me to check Clotilde's blog. Here's what I found when I went to what I thought was chocolateandzucchini.com:

[ h4ck3rsbr ] 0wn3d y0ur w3bs1t3 !!!! by Skyhell

How horrible! It looked like the lovely C&Z has been hacked. Poor Clotilde. All my best wishes to a quick blog recovery. How nasty is this! Haven't these people got better things to do with their lives than hacking into other people's blogs? Get your own bloody life, really.

Bonne chance Clotilde. I hope you get your blog back soon.

Once a geek,

...always a geek, I suppose.

Despite all the appearances to the contrary --you know, the little black dress and the Louboutins and the little hops around Paris and all that-- I am still such a geek at heart.

This morning I checked my mailbox and found an email from a Cog Sci list (Cognitive Science to all you non-geeks) I've been on since grad school, announcing a new seminar on Cognitive Modeling. Reportedly a vote had been taken and this one beat out Connectionist Psycholinguistics as a topic.

And all I could think was ooh ooh both of them sound like so much fun.

Dear me. Well, I'm off now to cook myself some nice Matsutake Gohan --a very sweet person gave me a small box full of those sublime fungi just the other day-- and yes, yes I promise I won't watch MacGyver on Stargate SG1 tonight. Promise.

Matsutake Gohan recipe, serves 2

1 cup Japanese short grain rice
1 cup dashi
1 tsp premium soy sauce
as much Matsutake as you could afford, I put about 75 g. into mine, sliced thinly (Well, actually, about 40-50 g per cup of rice will do.)

Cook everything in a rice cooker until done. Eat immediately, the amazing fragrance would not hang around forever. Itadakimatsu.

2004 Food Blog Awards

Kate over at The Accidental Hedonist --apparently upset that the Bloggies has no particular category for food blogs-- created the 2004 Food Blog Awards. I agree with her, we food bloggers are probably one of the most lively communities in blogosphere, so I don't see why we are excluded.

She taking nominations now. So far, Chez Pim has been nominated in five categories (6 now, actually, see postscripts below):
Best Overall Food Blog
Best Post (for A Perfect Paris Afternoon and the Tale of two Ispahans)
Best Food Blog Writing
Best Food Blog: City
Best Site Design (which I think I should be disqualified because I was heavily helped by Typepad Templates, to tell the truth.)

But wow, I am really touched. Thank you everyone. If you haven't had your say, by the way, get over there and check it out.

PS. As of now, 12/10 9am PST, Chez Pim has been nominated in the sixth category, Best Food Blog: Restaurant Reviews. Now I am really floored. Thanks again.

Not Flogs: a list of Food Blogs

Here is where I keep an active list of food blogs I know. And if you had one, you would know it's not called a flog, simply food blog will do. My sidebar was getting quite a bit long and unwieldy so I moved the list over here in a post. If you don't see yours here, let me and I will check it out. I'll keep adding good ones to this list here.

Happy blogging.

The Accidental Hedonist
A La Cuisine!
Amateur Gourmet
Arthur Hungry
At Our Table
Banlieusardises.com
Becks and Posh
Bourrez votre visage
C'est moi qui l'ai fait!
Chocolate & Zucchini

"Where in Paris is Pim?" guessing contest winner

drum roll......

is.....

Pascale, of C'est moi qui l'ai fait.

The prize, a box of tea Esprit de Noël from Mariage Frères which --oddly enough-- will have to be shipped back to Paris where I got it in the first place. How funny? I wrote down each name of the person who guessed correctly in a little bitty piece of paper, one for each correct guess, and all of them went into a little pot. In I reached and out came the name of the winner, none other than our very own Pascale, with whom I just had dinner a few days ago at the very restaurant in one of the photos. How very funny.

And for those who are still curious, the correct answers are, from the earliest to the last photo chronologically:
Centre Pompidou
The dining room at the Hotel Meurice
The photo exhibit by Yann Layman at the Jardins du Luxembourg
Delicabar (or Le Bon Marché will do too)
The Ladies at the Ritz, downstairs from the Hemingway
The muffin man at the bio market on Blvd.Raspail
Restaurant Pierre Gagnaire
St.Sulpice (and yes, on the way to Pierre Hermé)
The exhibit, 1000 faces of AIDS, at the Pont des Arts
A pole on the courtyard of the Louvre
La Table du Lucullus (I counted for both Pascale and Alissa, since no one else got it right.)
Bé, Boulangépicier (I was surprised no one got this right, this is the little place that is a collaboration between Eric Keysar and Alain Ducasse.)
On United, on the way back to San Francisco

This was so much fun I might do it again on my upcoming trip to Thailand in a few days.

Wine Blogging Wednesday 5: Wacky-name wines

What is in a name? That which we call a wine, by any other name would taste as good.

Our old friend Willie would perhaps claim as much, but would it really? Reading the name on wine labels often makes me wonder. The French --as one would expect-- is masterful at giving wines poetic names, Les Amoureuses from the hamlet of Chambolle-Musigny in Burgundy is one. Something would have to taste rather good to have a name like that, wouldn't you think? But then, would you want to taste a red wine from Chateau de l'Hospital? Hmm, not entirely sure are you? How about Chateau le Gay? I suppose that one wouldn't sell much in Ohio.

When Lenn asked me to host one of his brilliant Wine Blogging Wednesdays, following in the successful footsteps of Alder, Viv, and Derrick, this idea of doing one with wackily named wines came to me. Wouldn't it be fun? Instead of following a type, a varietal, or an appellation, I would ask people to review wines with weird, strange, ironic, or funny --or all of the above for that matter-- names. It would at least be a good laugh to ring in the new year I thought, our dear ring leader Lenn even agreed to indulged me.

So, that's it people, WBW 5, the first one of 2005, will be for wacky-name wines. All the normal rules apply, --except for the one on the price limit, go ahead, review a $500 wine, see if I care-- please choose a wine, any color, any varietal, any appellation --any whatever, really-- as long as it has got a wacky name. The wackier the better, in any language, even, do translate the name into English for us though, pretty please.

Come Wednesday January 26th, please post the review on your blog and send me a trackback, drop a comment, or even email me to let me know. If you haven't a blog, emailing me your entry is fine (chezpim at gmail dot com), I will post the blogless entries here chez moi.

Start looking now as you begin your holiday shopping, come next year and next Wine Blogging Wednesday, you will not want your wine blog to be the least wacky of them all, will you?

Not too late to be thankful?

A week after Thanksgiving, I hope this is not too late to be thankful for my life, and mostly, for this little sand box I have called Chez Pim.

Oh, and sap-alert by the way, if you are allergic to sweet sappiness, you might want to just skip over to the next post where I will be announcing the Where in Paris is Pim? contest winner, I am going to get rather sappy over here for about a few minutes. And if you didn't like it, heh, bite me.

Quite a few things have been happening in the past weeks that make me so happy I have this silly little food blog Chez Pim. It really had never occurred to me that the blog I started just so I didn't have to write 20 identical emails to friends in different countries would turn out to be what it has become today. The turning point was, certainly, when I began writing about my true obsession, food. That Chez Pim receives so many hits every day is completely astonishing to me. Not anywhere near Chocolate & Zucchini, mind you, but then again Clotilde is far more interesting than I would ever be.

Besides continuing to be amazed by the sheer number of people who are somehow interested in the silly things I have to say, it is always an extra treat when the people I admire and wrote about found their ways to the blog.