FINDING MY WAY

Forget that body clock adjustment thing, I got up at 10:30. Little progress. I wanted to be organized and have a plan on my first day of the masters culinary program, so after a little shopping, I headed to metro station Sevres/Babylone. I needed to go to the Madeleine stop to get the final "411" on school. In the station, a man was playing American "show tunes" on the accordian.  He was pretty good, actually.  No, he was just terrific.  Sorry it's blurry.  I was running to catch the train.  When I arrived at Madeleine, I exited and went the wrong direction. Along the way, however, I happened upon my precious daughter Raquel's favorite Paris restaurant, Le Souffle.  My memory of Le Souffle is a lunch with my family where we enjoyed souffle for lunch and souffle for dessert.  Talk about butter!  Immediately from there I went to E'cole Escoffier for a half-day cooking class while the kids hit the Louvre.  I couldn't eat anything prepared in the cooking demonstration. I was beyond full.  Lot's more butter!  As a matter of fact, it may be a felony in the US to feed your husband that much butter at one time.  Trust me, there were no cardiologists in the crowd.  I've since made peace with all that butter in cooking.  Graduating from a French culinary program will do that to you.   All of that said, Raquel truly loves Le Souffle.  Go there.  The food is delicious.  The calories are truly worth it; not something one does every day.  I didn't take note of the exact address, but it's a stone's throw from Place Vendome.  So, back to the trek to Escoffier.   I went the wrong way for a LONG time. Finally, a woman who works at the Paris Westin gave me some legitimate directions. Made it.  I’ve got the school thing handled, except for the fact that I thought my classes started at 9 a.m. They start at 5:30 p.m. I carried my knives (HEAVY) across the ocean for this course. No one is allowed to use their own knives. Why I didn’t ask about that is beyond me.

                                  

The E’cole Escoffier is on the Right Bank. My apartment is on the Left Bank, and that is by design. The Left Bank is really my hood. (The Left Bank and Right Bank are separated by the Seine.) As soon as I found a suitable route to school, I made a bee line back to my side of the river. The Right Bank is beautiful, don’t get me wrong. It’s swarming with businessmen and women, chic people working in the fashion industry, bankers, and certainly, wealthy shoppers. The window shopping was overwhelming. Really, I don’t know that if I could afford it, I would know where to start. There’s a lot of stuff. I saw a shearling coat for Lulu (my min pin)  in the Cavalli store, but it was more than I would spend on a coat for myself. (And I'm very good to myself.)  Sorry Lulu. It's all sparkling and gorgeous, but to me the real Paris, the one that I love, is on the other side of the river. Everything feels more real; students, galleries, bistros, small businesses, and the like all together in one great mix. On the way home I decided to take the advice of my dear friend Karen and relax, have a glass of wine, and read. That’s what I did. I sat on Rue Raspail at Brasserie Lutecia, drank a glass of sancerre, and read. While reading, I was distracted by the opportunity for some serious people watching. I'm sure that I heard at least five or six different languages being spoken by passers by.  A flower shop on my way home, tiny and charming, with stone walls and floor, pulled me right off the street.  My description can't do it justice.  I bought those red dahlias.

After coming back to the apartment for a while, I checked email, did some laundry, and so on. Wanting to head to dinner a little too early for the French, I stopped at a local wine bistro to kill some time. A woman sitting beside me asked me if I could watch her things while she used the ladies’ room and bought a magazine. No problem there. When she returned we struck up a conversation. I complemented her on her English, and she said, “My English is good, because I’m not French, I’m Lebanese”. She went on to bash the French for not wanting to speak English and so on. She told me her name was Colette.  That name fit her like a glove.  Smoking Dunhill cigarettes, her long platinum hair, red nails, scarlet boucle jacket and lot's of real jewelry, made her seem like a character from a movie.  She was altogether fascinating.  We talked for a while. She told me that she was visiting her brother living in Paris, but that she owned a successful baking business in Lebanon.  When Colette discovered that I was in Paris for chef training, (here we go) she asked me to be her guest in Lebanon to help create a light menu for her restaurant/bakery. What the heck? Of course I said, “I’d love to”. Really, what else do you say?  Oh, by the way, apparently she's part of the royal family or some aristocracy or something.  It's all too much.  I know what you're thinking.  "Sherry can't go to Lebanon!"  You're absolutely right.

I spied a captivating little bistro down the street from my apartment. I love a chalkboard menu. It didn't appear to be a tourist spot, buy they gave me a table next to a couple from Suffolk, England.  We began a friendly conversation and they too took issue with the subject of speaking French.  They said that the French are rude because they want to speak English to English speakers, not French.  Thus far, I've not met any rude French folks, but I now have a theory on why the French are so nice to me.  I just go with whatever.

On to more important things: the food.  I ordered a green salad and the cassoulet.  Frederick, the owner of the bistro, said that he couldn't allow it.  To him it was just too much food.  How refreshing, and how right he was. The cassoulet was exactly as it should be; a slow cooked, hearty white bean stew with duck and sausage; right on the money.  The duck fell off the bone and the homemade sausage was perfectly seasoned.  To top it all off, there was a piece of "fat back" floating in the dish.  My grandmother Lula Bell Greer was from Chattanooga, Tennessee.  As a woman with southern roots, I credit Grandma with teaching me that "everything tastes better with bacon in it".  Just ask my mom Betty Lou, or my sisters Pamela Sue and Cindy Lou.  (no southern flair in those names, yeah right!)  I have promised to go back for dinner on Monday, so I will give you all the address and more details then.

Finally, I've met one of my immediate neighbors.  A polite young Frenchman named Matt followed me in the door.  (Believe me, he's quite harmless.)  Matt lives on the fifth floor of my walk-up. He's a banker.  (Thank goodness, I live on the first)  Tomorrow night is dinner with Pierre and Veronique at a French-Spanish fusion restaurant.  I can't wait!