u m a m i

Oscar, Nemrod and Josephine

                   

Goat cheese on brioche toast, the dish gives away the fact that this photo was taken when the weather was a lot lot warmer than the current chill we are inundated with. Oscar (6, Rue Chaillot, 75016 Paris Tel : 01 47 20 26 92 - Fax : 01 47 20 27 93) is a small brasserie that we should have discovered earlier because for one, it is a sweet 5 minute walk away from our apartment, two it is already designated with status of "bib gourmand" i.e. tasty and good value, by the Michelin guide, three, it serves good, honest food and four, the service is personable and efficient.

We visited as soon as they reopened after the summer holidays. As husband waited for me, they offered him a newspaper to read. The friendly proprieter took my jacker off and hung it up, then came back quickly with the huge blackboard-menu. The daily set menu is less than 20 euros for 3 courses. Fellow diners were mainly locals- lone men with their papers, cliques of salarypeople and well, us, the office worker having a lunch date with his housewife.

                  

Husband's grilled breast of duck was very delicious, the meat seared and basted with dark jus outside and very juicy and full-flavoured throughout. The dauphinois potatoes were really good too, and I helped him to finish quite a bit of it.

                  

Dessert: Pain perdu, which is what the French call their French toast (hahaha) with vanilla ice cream and creme anglaise. Well that really neutralises the salad effect but definitely worth all the calories, just look at the honey still dripping from the corner of the toast.

                  

Husband had the apple crumble. The French do makes their crumbles ever so elegant don't they?

Speaking of duck, well, this had been a rather bizarre week. See, I bought a weekly metro pass and have been using that to take the buses 84 and 89 almost every day. Strictly speaking one does not have to buy a weekly pass to take the bus but since I had one I thought I may as well travel the public transport more frequently. Bus 84 from the Pantheon near my language school building takes one to, among other places, rue Bonaparte and rue St Germain. Bus 89, on the other hand, though passing the Pantheon, branches off and turns a little south-west to rue Vaugiraud and kind of deposits one near rue de Cherche-Midi.

On Monday I took the 89 because I needed to go to rue Huysman, or thought I did because later on I discovered the venue was actually along Quai D'orsay and I had to fork out 10 euros to take a taxi there in order not to be late for a glorified housewifey event. Before that fiasco happened however, I thought I had time for lunch and because it had started to rain, I ducked into the first promising looking eaterie along my path which turned out to be Le Nemrod. This corner bistro at 51 rue de Cherche-Midi was busy and very crowded. I ordered their confit de canard, something I've been wanting to eat of now that the weather has turned so very frosty. The duck was decent enough but overly salted but the redeeming point was the super-yummy sauteed potatoes that came with the duck, redolent with loads of parsley and a truckload of garlic. Seriously for the following six hours I was exhaling garlic fumes so strong it could melt paint. Damn but those taters were fantastic!

This afternoon, I found myself on the other end of rue de Cherche-Midi again, and radar ever alert, at no 117, I came across Josephine 'Chez Dumonet', a restaurant with voile-screened windows. They have confit de canard maison, and the word 'maison' did me in, I just had to see what their house speciality is. So I pushed down on the door handle, and peeped in, and inside, it was oozing old-fashionedness, down to its zinc bartop, beyond-retro tiles, mirrors, marroon banquettes and lots of woods all hacked with wear and tear but still charming, of course. The light illuminates and flatters. Tables are spaced nicely apart. The screened entrance and front windows helped perpetuate the illusion that we are in the 1930s, the cloudy skies and harried pedestrians outside worlds away. The waiters wear long white aprons and white shirts, and everyone was sweet yet professional. I believe I was their only customer below the age of 40 today.

They gave me a big basket of baguette chunks with a separate dish of cold salted butter, and I was very happy for a while because it is a small thing really but so few restaurants bother with the butter bit and I love me my bread -with-butter very much. And a tiny bowl of gazpacho which is more like a cold sauce of tomatoes with olive oil, like that seriously good sauce they give you at Bellota-Bellota when you sit down and order yourself some unbelievably tasty (and expensive) Iberico ham. Two reasons to love them already. With bread, butter, oil, tomatoes in my stomach and a glass of house red on hand, I settled into my seat and propped my book on the white-linen covered table.

It was a rather long wait for my duck but worth it. The duck was fried to perfection, all crackly skinned and the meat tasting very ducky instead of salty. The garlicky herbed potatoes were unfortunately not as tasty as Le Nemrod's, it would be great it they could both sit down in a neighbourly fashion and trash it out....

Too full for dessert, I ordered coffee, it cost 5 euros and was not great as usual, but wait a minute, it is accompanied by mignardises all of which were very good. Coconutty macaroon with toasty peaks, a tiny financier all rich yet light, fresh-grape enrobed in chocolate, and a nut-crusted lacey cookie. The bill was only slightly higher than that at Le Nemrod, but I was also more pampered and felt ever so relaxed. Le Nemrod did not even bother to give me bread, though other customers got some, also I was packed into my corner table like a piece of sardine. Both are different type of establishments to be sure, but if one is in the neighbourhood and for some reason or other need or desire to eat confit de canard, well it may just pay off to walk a bit further away from the high-traffic Bon Marche vicinity.

P.S: Last week I had houseguests, one of them bought quite a few handbags. This week I was infected with her leather fet*sh, and in a haze of duck induced madness, I fell in love with a "Club 1930" armchair from Le Grenier Anglais (no. 73 rue de Cherche-Midi) and ordered myself one in 'ancienne' leather. Bad girl! Feeling a bit guilty, I sent an sms to husband who is in Hamburg and he was so sweet, he agreed it is a good idea. Everyone get ready now to say, awww....

Nodaiwa Paris

                        

Nodaiwa specialises in unagi kabayaki (grilled eel). When we passed the restaurant on one of our weekend jaunts my curiosity was immediately piqued by their focus on one dish, so we waited outside until opening time. When the doors opened, we managed to secure ourselves a table. Fifteen minutes later the restaurant was filled up, mostly by Japanese customers. Obviously the name means something to these devotees, the Paris outlet is the only one outside Tokyo.

The menu offered a handful of options, but in summary one could choose to have the eel with rice in a bowl (unadon) or a lacquered box (unaju). The various sets differ mainly according to the weight of the fish 130g-3200g); accompaniments are pretty standard. The recipe for the grilled eel and the special accompanying source is a closely guarded secret, according to the website. I couldn't contain my curiosity and asked if the fish came from Japan. Alas no, they source them from European waters. I remember eating some of the Japanese imports at Chikuyotei restaurant in Singapore (highly delicious actually), so was quite curious to see how this would play out.

                        

My Unadon (280g) came in a rather large bowl, of circumference wider than a child's face. Do not be fooled by the simple appearance, underneath the rice was another piece of unagi and underneath that, more rice. Accompaniments: clear dashi soup, grated radish and pickles. The fish had that requisite luscious melt-in-the-mouth tenderness, but lacked the particular combination of sweetness and depth of flavour of their Japanese cousins. Far far better than eels raised in China, but not 'wow'. Plus there was a lot of fish and rice, two layers was too much, and I had to sprinkle quite a bit of the lemony salty condiment provided on the side to even manage half of my portion.

                        

Husband's Unaju came in a lacquered box, 320g is also a lot of eel, so much so that the rice was practically invisible. The presentation is more elegant, the red may even have an appetite-stimulating effect, and he enjoyed his share more than me.

                        

We liked it enough to probably come back, but not so soon, perhaps when the weather gets colder. In Japan they typically eat unagi in the height of summer, but I prefer it in cooler weather. And if we do return, I'll opt for the unaju which has a more favourable fish:rice ratio. They do takeaways too.

Update 30 September: We returned, because my visiting sister C wished it, and this time we enjoyed our experience a great deal more. Their Sakura and Ran menus offered a more balanced composition of side dishes, eel and rice which are delicious but not too excessive. The fish too, was a lot more pleasing, not so fatty, and grilled so that it it's top is just a little crisp for better texture. The special sauce was indeed quite special, savoury enough to moisten and flavour without being dominantly sweet as it can get in lesser hands. All in, a superb and most enjoyable experience.

Also, my friend ttc asked about the liver of eel. This time I noticed that they include a few small morsels in the accompanying clear soups which are by the way, delectable and delicately perfumed so it stands out brightly in its own right.

Nodaiwa Paris-Tokyo :
272, rue Saint-Honoré - 75001 Paris
Tel : 01 42 86 03 42 / Fax : 01 42 86 59 97
Email : info@nodaiwa.com /
Mondays-Saturdays 12h-14h30 & 19h-22h. Closed Sundays

                  

Coffee break

                  

The leaves are turning yellow, the light soften to a warm evening glow earlier and earlier every day, and though the sun shines bright the air feels cooler. Cherries are but a beautiful and delicious memory, the white peaches too are past their best, but there are still plenty of good tomatoes, aubergines and peppers in the market. Grapes are being harvested right now, and there are wine fairs all over the city, a sort of 'sales' to make room for the new stock. This is what September feel like, somewhat poignant yet purposeful.

Our daily rhythms change too, life's pretty hectic these days. Wake up at 7.30 a.m. Stretch. Toilette. Breakfast. Make sure V goes to childcare. Catch bus. Run from class to class. Lunch. Homework. Dinner. Homework. (The teacher even make us learn passages by heart, I am definitely way too old to be doing this). TV. Sleep. Oh, sneak in some internet time too.

Next week it should ease up a little. Until then, we're on a little break from blogging. Cheers!

Grab the Sardines!

Two nights ago I happened to watch Soleil, a French movie starring Sophia Loren as an impoverished mother of 5 children and theif life in  Algiers during WWII. The plot was predictable and not half as engaging as say, Agnes Brown, but still worth watching, for me at least, because of the Sardine-Dinner scenes.

In the movie, the camera follows Sophia as she dipped butterflied fresh sardines into egg and flour, the following shots are of eager hands grabbing the sardines from the platter. Another platter appeared, and the sardines were devoured just as quickly. Scene repeats until everybody collapsed in sardine esctasy.

                  

I can so understand their passion. Whenever I see fresh sardines on menus, I'll automatically order it. The other day we saw some plump specimens in the market and brought home, it cost only 3.30 euros for 10 pieces. Back home GG fried half and the other half, she rubbed with a spicy mix and grilled. The kitchen got a little oily while aroma of fried fish lingered in the air for quite a bit of time which drove the dogs a bit nuts.     

                  

Both versions were delicious, but the fried fish got more votes because frying made the bones crispy and edible. We served the fish with a dip of soya sauce zinged up with some chopped coriander leaves and bird eye chillies. So next time you see some in your market, go get some!

Laksa: Highly Improvised Version

                        

Two weekends ago I received an email from my kind friend A the winelearner who informed me that her husband had left behind a package of hae bee in our designated drop-off spot. Andrew had bought it and passed it on to A. All the way from Singapore! Contrary to what some people believe, we do not receive a goodie bag of stuff from home every month, so a small bag of dried shrimps can definitely make us deliriously happy. So excited I was that the following Monday I decided that we should celebrate with laksa.

But we ran into some obstacles. First the markets are closed on Mondays, so we had to use whatever we had at home, which wasn't a lot. Second, some of the traditional ingredients  like daun kesom and fresh santan (coconut cream) are simply not available and there were no acceptable substitutes. Looking at cookbooks did not help, we didn't have half the ingredients specified. In the end I recalled a recipe in our Home Economics class that could be adapted  though it did call for some dried ikan bilis which is even harder to find.

Still, we were undeterred. After all, I still had a stash of Chan-Che's rempah paste in the freezer. The paste provided a robust base to work from, and together with the pounded roasted hae-bee and some unorthodox seasoning such as chicken jus, GG and I cobbled together quite a deliciously spicy and umamilicious laksa gravy. It tasted like a cross between mee-siam and Sarawak laksa, and only needed a squirt of lime juice to pair with the briny flavours. The dried shrimps were ground finely but still retained enough body and bite to the gravy. In Malaysia each of the 13 states have their own laksa, perhaps this can qualify as the Paris "outstation" version.

                        

It was fun. The bird next door was thrilling and singing his little heart out too, there's a few seconds of it in the video. I was wearing a light blue apron, GG a green one, and for once I actually did some cooking instead of her.

Thanks again, A and A!

Bang!

This post is not related to food, save for the fact that the event happened in front of a Noura restaurant.

                        

About ten nights ago, Mimi and I were woken up by a loud bang at around 4 a.m. A Smart car had lost control, spun and landed on its side, managing to avoid being upended by crashing into the back of a bystander Ford. The driver was conscious and able to wiggle his hand to show he was OK. A total of 7 fire engines came on scene, although one was actually the ambulance service. And 4 police cars. The next day I told everyone but they could not picture the excitement. They probably didn't believe me.

Well, today a more spectacular accident happened at the corner of our building. A red Ferrari collided with a motorcycle. Lots of noise, and traffic had to be diverted. There were also 2 army jeeps, 4 police vans/cars and an ambulance. We had a good view from our balcony, so I took some pictures to show to husband.

                      

Examining the damages. I don't understand why they could not drive the car to a quieter place and unblock the traffic congestion. Maybe the Ferrari conked out? Nobody paid much attention to poor motorcycle.