David Lebovitz Archives: September 2005 Archives

A dog dèjection left on a sidewalk is a 183€ fine.
30,000 garbage cans are at your disposal in Paris"

(If you think it's icky looking at this on your computer, this sidewalk billboard faces the tables at an outdoor restaurant and cafè. Imagine looking at that while enjoying dinner!)

While strolling the Mercato Centrale in Florence a while back, I was introduced to this curious gelatina, a little pot of Beer and Chocolate Jelly.

When I told the shopkeeper I was a chocolatier, he gave me the jar as a gift (that's why I love Italy...) and told me to let him know how I liked it.

I conferred with my pal Judy and she suggested I try it with some seriously-good aged pecorino cheese which I also purchased from him.

So I finally opened the jar, and so far I've only been spooning it directly from the little jar and into my mouth!

La Gelatina di Birra e Cacao has the curious taste of yeasty beer with little nuggets of roasted cocoa beans, all suspended in each quivering spoonful of jelly.

Once you get past the aroma, a bit similar to the aftermath of a keg party, the beer and chocolate together gives me pause...I've discovered a new flavor combination, one that I never would have imagined.

Baroni Alimentari
Mercato Centrale
(Central Market)
Florence, Italy
Tel/Fax: 39-055-289576

The stinky garbage strike finally ended...phew!

We had ice cream at Dammann's on the quai Montebello...

I bought some fouque-ing seal oil to winterproof my shoes...

I found a place to swim au natural with Parisians...

...and my favorite chocolate shop in Paris gave me a nice, big bag of chocolates...for being such a good customer!

Since we're on the subject of beignets, I spotted these enticing looking pastries at one of my favorite out-of-the-way boulangeries in Paris.
It must be a global trend.

The fierce competition already managed to raise so far $2750 thanks to many of your generous donations.
This time, for Round II, it's all about beignets, those favorite deep-fried pastries from New Orleans. Melissa, my dedicated Survivor contestant, made two separate batches: due to a successful whining campaign by yours truly, in addition to caramelized-apple beignets, she whipped up a batch of chocolate-filled beignets just for me!

Melissa's baking adventures are featured on her Flickr page, which can be viewed as a hilarious slideshow. She fired up the deep-fryer, rolled out some might-fine looking dough, and re-assembled her panel of super-beignet-tasters.

Voting ends Tuesday night at 10pm (EST) so vote for Melissa to keep her in the game (and so I can stop getting intimidating messages from Derrick and the other Melissa!)

Each vote is just $5 and all proceeds go to the American Red Cross Hurricane Relief Fund which, and you can vote more than once (ie: $20=4 votes for Melissa).
(Don't you wish you could have voted more than once in a certain presidential election?)

When you vote, you MUST put in the comments field Melissa's name to keep her (and me) in the game.

(Plus I'd hate to lose, which I'd blog about incessantly for months, and if you don't want to have to wade through months of sour-grapes postings, do you?)

Beign-yay! I love fried dough in all of its forms - funnel cakes, elephant ears, donuts... (Mmmmm....donuts...)

I found two recipes: a generic fried-dough-type recipe, and one that claimed to be the beignet recipe from Cafe du Monde.
(The one that didn't involve, "Buy a box of Cafe du Monde(TM) Beignet Mix and add water!")

I gathered up all of the ingredients for two batches of dough: flour, vegetable shortening, active dry yeast, eggs, sugar, and a bit of salt. The generic recipe called for heavy cream, while the alleged Cafe du Monde recipe called for evaporated milk.

The first thing I did in both cases was to activate the yeast by sprinkling it into warm water and then leaving it alone. After settling for ten minutes, the mixture doubled in size.

I added the other ingredients as called for. I'd been hoping for a chance to break out the dough hook on my KitchenAid, but both recipes were very explicit: stir with a wooden spoon, only!

Once the mixture became too thick to stir, I finished mixing it with my hand. At this point, the generic dough was ready to be rolled out, while the CdM recipe called for the dough to set in the fridge overnight in a greased bowl covered with plastic wrap.

In each case, when it came time to start rolling, I first lightly floured the rolling surface. Next, I laid the dough on it and gently pressed and stretched it until it resembled a rectangle. I rolled it to a thickness of approximately 1/8 inch, flipping the dough and flouring the board in between passes. Next, I cut it into 2x3 inch rectangles, which I gently dropped two at a time into the hot oil.

However, the second two popped right up to the surface of the oil and turned a lovely golden brown! I was so excited, I couldn't help but taste one as soon as it was cool enough to touch.

But then, I remembered that I should leave some for the competition, and restrained myself. I ended up with about a dozen and a half beignets, which I sprinkled with powdered sugar using my grandmother's spring-loaded flour sifter while singing Jingle Bells, and then fed them to my neighbors - who made short work of them.

The next evening, I retrieved the CdM dough from the fridge, noting that it had more than doubled in size. I floured the board, and set to work rolling and cutting. This time, however, I decided to get a little creative. In addition to the traditional "plain" beignets, I decided to add some international flair. After all, the recipe (allegedly) came from Cafe du Monde.

I diced an apple and mixed it with butter, cinnamon, and brown sugar in a saucepan, and stewed it for awhile. Not only did it make a tasty dipping sauce, but it also served as a fabulous filling!

Next, inspired by the great chocolate powerhouses of Europe (as well as by a suggestion made by a certain Parisian), I put together a couple of chocolate-and-Nutella-filled beignets and drizzled them with melted dark chocolate.

Inspired by the fine Indian cuisine prepared by my British friends, I made a beignet filled with - and drizzled with - spicy hot mango chutney, and washed it down with a cup of Darjeeling.

In the end, the recipe yielded about two dozen biegnets.
They were much lighter and puffier than the ones made with the generic recipe, and I'm wondering if it was the evaporated milk, the overnight stay in the fridge, or a combination of the two.

I don't like trying to pull off that stubborn and tough little dangling thing on the bottom of the meat on a chicken leg, either before or after it's cooked.

If I had to choose between a fancy Michelin 3-star restaurant and a plate of perfectly fried chicken, I would choose the perfectly fried chicken.

Chocolate is the best thing in the world.
So is foie gras, Sevruga caviar, stale candy corn, Château Y'quem, dead-ripe figs, warm sour cherrie pie, hot corned beef on rye with mustard, Comté cheese, fleur de sel, Italian espresso, Korean barbequed pork ribs, any and all chocolates from Patrick Roger in Paris, French fries correctly salted, pretzel-croissants from City Bakery in New York, and those toasted-coconut-covered marshmallows with the queen on the bag.

I don't like when I'm staying at someone's house and they don't have one decent saucepan or sharp knife.

I don't understand being particular about having, or not having, nuts in your brownies (unless it's an allergy). Is it really such a big deal?

I don't like it when people make up food allergies in restaurants. If you don't want something, just say you don't want it.

My freezer is crammed with frozen cranberries, forgotten baguette halves, and chicken stock that I neglected to put the date on. And some chocolate chocolate-chip cookie dough and two different batches of espresso granita. One is better than the other.

I refuse to go to restaurants where the reservations person is an asshole on the phone.

Waiters should only be rude to customers if the customers are rude to them first.

I like when the newest, hottest, self-important restaurant closes within two years.

I hate those cheap Turkish dried apricots. They have no taste. And I don't know why anyone uses them when the California ones are so incredible.

I can't remember the last time I spent more than 4 euros on a bottle of wine for myself.

I love the idea of organic, but I just can't bring myself to spend $5 for a beet.

I just spent $18 dollars on a farm-raised chicken this week, which was delicious.

I really don't like to eat fish, especially when there's lots of little annoying bones that you have to eat around and pick out of your mouth.

I never cook beef at home. It never tastes as good as when you order it in a restaurant.

I crave bitter, wilted, sautéed greens with olive oil, salt, and perhaps some garlic.

Other Café Malongo bars at:
-53, rue Passy
-Lafayette Gourmet 46-48, Boulevard Haussmann
-INNO, 14 rue du Départ

When I updated the site recently (which seamlessly coincided with updating my life) I reviewed some of the recipes here, which seemed like long-lost, cherished friends and I was ready to have a little reunion with one I missed the most. Since a group of us who live in Paris recently were treated to a night of German cooking and baking, it gave me the opportunity to bake one of my favorite desserts: German Chocolate Cake.

Although Germany is famous for tall, multi-layered torten with alternating layers of cream, cake, fruit, nuts, beer, sausages, etc...German Chocolate Cake is decidedly the result of good-old American ingenuity. Deep, dark chocolate cake is layered with a rich filling of toasty coconut and pecans, then glazed with a slick, bittersweet chocolate icing. It's based on a recipe using Bakers™ Chocolate, a company which was founded by Samuel German in 1852, hence the name. The first version of German's Chocolate Cake (the apostrophe was in the original name) was created in the mid 1950's.

This is the best version of this classic dessert by far. It's a slight variation of the fine recipe from my pastry pal Mary Jo Thoresen, who I worked with for many years at Chez Panisse. She now makes terrific desserts at her restaurant Jojo in Oakland, California.

For the cake:
2 ounces bittersweet or semisweet chocolate chopped
2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped
6 tablespoons water
8 ounces (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 ¼ cup + ¼ cup sugar
4 large eggs, separated
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
1 cup buttermilk, at room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the filling:
1 cup heavy cream
1 cup sugar
3 large egg yolks
3 ounces butter, cut into small pieces
½ teaspoon salt
1 cup pecans, toasted and finely chopped
1 1/3 cups unsweetened coconut, toasted

For the chocolate icing:
8 ounces bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, chopped
2 tablespoons light corn syrup
1 ½ ounces unsalted butter
1 cup heavy cream

1. Butter two 9-inch cake pans, then line the bottoms with rounds of parchment or wax paper. Preheat the oven to 350°.
2. Melt both chocolates together with the 6 tablespoons of water. Use either a double-boiler or a microwave. Stir until smooth, then set aside until room temperature.
3. In the bowl of an electric mixer, or by hand, beat the butter and 1 ¼ cup of the sugar until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Beat in the melted chocolate, then the egg yolks, one at a time.
4. Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
5. Mix in half of the dry ingredients into the creamed butter mixture, then the buttermilk and the vanilla extract, then the rest of the dry ingredients.
6. In a separate metal or glass bowl, beat the egg whites until they hold soft, droopy peaks. Beat in the ¼ cup of sugar until stiff.
7. Fold about one-third of the egg whites into the cake batter to lighten it, then fold in the remaining egg whites just until there's no trace of egg white visible.
8. Divide the batter into the 2 prepared cake pans, smooth the tops, and bake for about 45 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

To make the filling:
1. Mix the cream, sugar, and egg yolks in a medium saucepan. Put the 3 ounces butter, salt, toasted coconut, and pecan pieces in a large bowl.
2. Heat the cream mixture and cook, stirring constantly (scraping the bottom as you stir) until the mixture begins to thicken and coats the spoon (an instant-read thermometer will read 170°.)
3. Pour the hot custard immediately into the pecan-coconut mixture and stir until the butter is melted. Cool completely to room temperature. (It will thicken.)

To make the syrup:
1. In a small saucepan, heat the sugar and water until the sugar has melted. Remove from heat and stir in the dark rum.

To make the icing:
1. Place the 8 ounces of chopped chocolate in a bowl with the corn syrup and 1 ½ ounces of butter.
2. Heat the cream until it just begins to boil. Remove from heat and pour over the chocolate. Let stand one minute, then stir until smooth. Let sit until room temperature.

Remove the cake layers from the pans and cut both cake layers in half horizontally, using a serrated bread knife.
Set the first cake layer on a cake plate. Brush well with syrup. Spread ¾ cup of the coconut filling over the cake layer, making sure to reach to the edges. Set another cake layer on top.

Repeat, using the syrup to brush each cake layer, then spreading ¾ cup of the coconut filling over each layer, including the top.

Ice the sides with the chocolate icing, then pipe a decorative border of chocolate icing around the top, encircling the coconut topping.

(It may seem like a lot of chocolate icing, but use it all. Trust me. You won't be sorry.)

The recent issue of Elle à table reports that eating a croissant may be a healthier and more diet-friendly alternative the breakfast tartine, a split baguette spread with butter and jam.

A croissant ordinaire or croissant au beurre (made with pure butter) has 200 calories, and 25 grams of carbohydrates.

A tartine composed of one-fifth of a baguette (about 2 ounces of bread) spread with 1 tablespoon of butter and 2 tablespoons of jam has 270 calories and 42 grams of carbohydrates.

Funny, they didn't mention my preferred pain au chocolat, buttery croissant dough folder around one or two (if you're lucky) bâtons of dark chocolate, as being diet-friendly.

The best bread in Paris isn't made in any Parisian boulangerie, it's made chez Christoph, the home of an affable German fellow who stunned me at a party at Meg's a few months back when I savored more than my share of his excellent, hearty multi-grain bread.

Each saturday, he bakes just two loaves of multi-grain bread to last him through the week in his tidy Parisian kitchen in his apartment overlooking the Pantheon. A biologist during the day, I envision Christoph tinkering in the kitchen until he got his bread just right (he said it took him years). Although I offered to come by on saturday to buy bread from him, he brushed me off with a hearty laugh.
Hey, I wasn't kidding. I never joke about anything as serious as my pursuit of great bread.

But working as a pastry chef for 25 years, eating all that chocolate and butter and sugar, I crave all-things salty. And I can't think of any better vehicle for crunchy grains of coarse salt than pretzels.

Anyhow, being the non-PC bigot that I am, I assume if you're German, you know how to make good pretzels, and sure enough, I was invited to come, roll, and twist away! And I wasn't proven wrong. (Stereotypes don't just come out of nowhere, you know.)

When I arrived, he'd already made the dough (very sneaky, presumably guarding the recipe!) So we kneaded the mixture a bit, then divided up little rounds of the soft dough, rolled and pulled them into snake-like ropes, making sure to keep a moderate bulge in the middle, which he said would help them keep their shape better during baking (I didn't, and still don't, believe him, but what do I know from pretzels?)

Once the dough is rolled, he swiftly gathered the two ends, twisted them twice, then folded them over the chubby dough, creating the classic pretzel.

The dough rested for a while, then was refrigerated.
Afterwards, he told me to be careful, as he took a suspicious little vial from his cabinet, which contained milky-white little pellets.

He dissolved a handful of pellets in water by stirring briskly, then floated the unbaked twists in this solution, apparently this is what gives pretzels that familiar shiny coating.

For some reason, we had to wait a while to eat them.
I'm not sure why. Perhaps it was my American urge to have-it-all-and-have-it-now.

It was torture.
After about 30 minutes of watching them resting on the counter (and about 10 unsubtle hints from me...) he finally got the hint and let me sample one. Still slightly warm, yeasty, with that inviting little crackle of salt, they were the perfect pretzel.
Then I had another.

Soon the other guests arrives (I'd already consumed 3 pretzels beforehand, since as mentioned, I generally like to eat more than my share) and we had a big feast of German food: sauerbraten, Hax'n, Cucumber-Feta Salad (which a woman from Norway brought. It wasn't very German, but it was tasty), and Alisa's Mandelbroten.

Guess what classic, towering German torten I brought for dessert, attempting to navigate through the crowded buses and hectic sidewalks of Paris?

A few days later, I get a bill from the delivery company; 42 euros for taxes (the gift was valued at 80 euros, making the tax about 55%.)

So I head to the office of the delivery company, where they show me the official rules for gifts sent and received in France:

"If someone sends you a gift, they must write on the paperwork 'Unsolicited Gift'", they explain.

I reply, "So next time I receive a gift I should refuse it if it doesn't say 'Unsolicited Gift' on the paperwork?"

"No, by then it's too late. If someone's going to send you an unsolicited gift, you need to tell them to write 'Unsolicited Gift' on the paperwork."

I stand there for a moment, looking at them to see if they perhaps detect any bit of irony there.

In Rome, I was happy to relax a bit in my friend's apartment between eating and sightseeing. I had brought some books to read, but I was thrilled to discover on the bookshelf one book I've wanted to sit down and read for some time, but never got around to it...

In between reading, I did manage a few spare moments to find some wonderful places to eat.. steering clear of any huge ships, of course.

Little balls of risotto, rolled into neat rounds with a morsel of cheese tucked within. Called arancini, they're meant to (kind of) resemble oranges...until you cut them open, of course. Finding melted cheese in an orange would be a rather unpleasant suprise, wouldn't it?

One of the best things about eating out in Italy is there's lots of salads and vegetables, and restaurants like Campana have a huge selection, and you're welcome to help yourself (don't worry...Mangia!...eat now, and worry about the bill later...it's Italy!)

Many guests come to Europe and are surprised there's not more vegetables served when they eat out. The reason is mostly because preparing vegetables is very expensive: cleaning and cutting them, cooking them properly, then re-cooking them to order. It's much more work than tossing a piece of meat on the grill and serving it with some frites.

The casual and rustic antipasti tradition in Italy means many small, family-owned restaurants have piles of vegetables and salads, and you just help yourself, but...be careful...there's always another course on it's way, but what a way to begin! Big platters of wilted chicory and spinach, grilled, thick slices of eggplant, sweet carrots spiced with red chili peppers, mushrooms braised in olive oil and herbs..eat...eat!

A simple pasta of freshly-rolled egg noodles and wilted radicchio. I love cooked greens, especially if they're slightly bitter and this simple bowl of pasta didn't disappoint. (Ok, radicchio isn't really a "green", so what to call it?)

Of course, I had a couple of desserts (it had been at least a few hours before hitting my first gelateria) and I had a nice, moist wedge of Ricotta Cake. Little pieces of candied citrus peel and I suspect a splash of liquor flavored this cake, and it was moist and simple. And utterly scrumptious.

Although pizza is decidedly Neapolitan, if you can find great pizza in Brooklyn and New Haven, Connecticut, you can find it in Rome. Unlike jumbo American pizza that's meant to serve a hungry mob, Italian pizzas are thin-crust and prepared individually.

My absolute favorite place to eat in Rome is Nuovo Mondo. The room has all the charm of a high-school gym: bright lights, Formica, and brusque servers who toss a few plates and forks your way along with a big pile of napkins (consider it a warning: Things Are Gonna Get Messy). Each time I ate here, I was the only non-Italian in the place.

What incredible pizza I had here! Each is hand-rolled (not dramatically tossed...this ain't the Food Network), topped with whatever's been ordered, and baked in a blistering-hot oven for about 1 minutes. Afterwards it's pulled out, slid onto a plate and the waiter rushes them to the table.

While you wait, order a Supplì or two, and you'll be rewarded with a plate of tender pellets of rice moistened with tomato then deep-fried. I didn't see one table in the place that didn't have a plate of these, and since Nuovo Mondo is also a birreria, I can't imagine anything better with a bottle of icy-cold Italian beer, can you?

A small, but nice selection of housewares.
I bought a fabulous fire-engine red espresso pot there. Features Alessi dinner and cookware.

Old-world shop selling hand-sewn linen kitchen towels, fine tablecloths, napkins, and aprons.

A tiny, delicious little chocolate emporium, featuring many of Italy's best chocolates, including Slitti and Domori. And if you're looking for some edible souvenirs of Rome, why not pick up a few made from white chocolate? (Although I can't guarantee you'll make it all the way home with them. I certainly wouldn't have.)

Amazing selection of biscotti (it's a biscottificio, after all) with an astounding selection of sweets piled everywhere. The rather brusque saleswoman at the counter wasn't very helpful (she complained about how fat Americans are... perhaps she couldn't see very well behind her...her butt was nearly as wide as a Fiat.) Still, the service was worth braving for the terrific, crispy cantucci, biscotti, and amaretti, richly-scented with aromatic bitter almonds.

Upscale housewares, you'll find espresso makers, measuring cups, pasta-making tools, and examples of contemporary Italian and European kitchen design. Think lots of stainless-steel and glass.

The man in front of me unloads his basket, then dumps his plastic basket on top of the neat stack of other shopping baskets.

But instead of nesting it snugly within the other baskets, he just drops his basket on top, askew and cock-eyed, handles facing upward.
So I need to put my basket down to re-arrange his basket so I can set mine down inside and unload it.

Obviously he set his basket in there before me, and the person before him was kind (and smart) enough to do it properly.
Right?

Or...he had to adjust the others (like I'm gonna have to) and maybe afterwards, like any normal, thinking person who walks upright and not on all fours, do you think he might realize...
"Gee, wouldn't it be nice of me to stack my basket properly for the next person, not like that idiot in front of me?"

Are you one of those people that just drops their shopping basket wherever they want and doesn't think about the person behind them?

The famous Italian "30-Second Breakfast" of a espresso and a pastry, consumed quickly at the counter, before sprinting off on your Vespa, is one of the charms of Italy. The coffee is so good no matter where you go, from small corner caffès to trattorias and pizzerias, the end of a good meal is always punctuated with a shot of espresso. Each time I sip a tiny, sweetened ristretto (a very small, or "short" espresso), I can feel the tears welling up in my eyes (yes...really, I'm a romantic).

I stand at the counter while the barista lowers the handle on the powerful espresso machine, watching the thin trickle of aromatic liquid. The bartender loudly clanks the espresso saucer on the counter with a tiny spoon and perhaps a packet of sugar, then moments later presents me with a teensy cup of very hot, toasty and deeply flavorful liquid.

And in Rome, one must make the pilgrimage to the most famous espresso in the world... Sant'Eustachio.

The espresso at Sant'Eustachio in Rome is so well-regarded that William Grimes of the New York Times advised those in the US seeking the perfect espresso, "...When the need for a real espresso becomes overpowering, buy a ticket to Rome, tell the taxi driver to head straight for the Sant'Eustachio cafe. The espresso will be perfect. A little expensive, but surely worth the trouble."

The perfect espresso requires a few factors: the pressure of the machine, the quality and grind of the coffee beans, how often the machine is cleaned and serviced, the skill of the machine operator and many feel, most critically, the water used.

(And in spite of what many people think, there is much less caffeine in espresso. Unlike drip or plunger-style coffee, the coffee extraction for espresso is so rapid and powerful, there's too little time for much caffeine to be extracted from the coffee.)

No one at Sant'Eustachio will reveal their secret for the crema that tops their espresso, which is a thick layer of frothy cream that floats on top of the espresso, which experts claim should float the sugar for exactly 3 seconds before it begins to sink in and dissolve.

I have to admit, no one at my table was very impressed with the espresso or cappuccino at Sant'Eustachio. The famed crema sat on top of the coffee like a thick, cranky layer of froth that refused to budge, rather than the delicate layer of silky bubbles that beautifully frames the rich brown, steaming liquid pressed into the tiny cup. I tend to agree with those that claim the secret of San'Eustachio's espresso is a tiny bit of bicarbonate of soda added to their water (since acid neutralizes the taste of bicarbonate of soda, the slightly-bitter espresso would indeed eradicate any trace of that 'soapy' flavor). That foam was suspiciously rich and stubborn and I had to press down on the sugar, and stir, to get it into the espresso.

And the coffee was pricey.
Most caffès charge perhaps 80 centimes (about $1) for an espresso at the counter, whereas here it almost three times the price.
But admittedly, no one here seems to stand at the counter...most opt for the tables in the lovely, placid Piazza Sant'Eustachio overlooking the church. An unusually quiet little square in the middle of Rome.

The first time I ever had gelato was about 20 years ago when it seemed to be all the rage in the 80's, that staggeringly over-the-top era of excess, when we all seemed to be fascinated by Studio 54, record-shopping at the Gap (anyone else remember that?), Bianca Jagger, ultra-suede, and Bill Blass-designed Lincoln Continentals.

There was place around the corner from Chez Panisse in Berkeley where I would stop before work.
Although it had some fancy Italian name, it was known around town as 'The Lesbian Gelato Place'.

I don't know if the women who made the gelato and scooped it up were lesbians, but since it was Berkeley and it was the 1980's, they may have been a 'womyn's-owned collective', if memory serves me right. It was the time when blending politics (Wendy Yoshimura, the SLA cohort of Patty Hearst, worked at the Juice Bar Collective next door), social change and gastronomy somehow becoming all linked together and made what you were going to have to eat a 'social statement', instead of just filling your gut.
Soon there were gelato places all over the place, but that wonderful lesbians gelato bar was a revelation to me.

(Hmmm. I wonder if I will now start getting lots of hits from lesbians Googling...)

Anyways, they eventually they closed, as some diet probably became the rage and it perhaps was time to Stop The Insanity making it forbidden to eat delicious gelato or anything except mountains of potatoes. It wasn't until years later that I realized that lesbians weren't the only ones who made good gelato. In fact, gelato is the national obsession in Italy, where you'll find everyone from sleek businessmen to groups of Vespa-driving teenagers (and lesbians) getting their licks in.

Italians just adore gelato and it's rarely consumed sitting down. It's gooey and soft, and meant to be licked and slurped while walking down the street, swirling your tongue around it and catching every little chocolate-y drip that begins its inevitable slide down the side of your cono.

Il Gelato di San Crispino (Via della Paneterria 42), has been dubbed the "laboratory" of gelato, since it's gleaming and spotless. And amazingly efficient...something that you begin to appreciate the more time you spend in Italy. You take a number and they serve you in order. And this one woman happily served everyone, without flinching, in several different languages, keeping the place spotless..and with a big smile.

You can't get an ice cream cone at Il Gelato di San Crispino, according to Maureen Fant, who's writes about Rome who I met up with. She explained that a cone is considered unhygienic. Instead you order your gelato by the cup (which I don't mind, since you don't waste any when it drips.)

I was told by several Romans to be sure to taste the meringa, which baffled me until I tried it. When I ordered cioccolata along with two meringas of hazelnut and chocolate chips, the cheerful scooper told me I had made a great selection.
Whew!

And...oh my God, was that good.
The gelato of course was excellent, but the meringa was a frozen meringue studded with crispy bits of dark, bitter chocolate, toasted Piedmontese hazelnuts and crackly, sugary meringue. Each little mouthful revealed something new to me...a whole new world of frozen desserts had expanded right in front of me.

My other favorite gelato was at Giolitti, close to the Pantheon. The place was enormous and pandemonium ensued, as tourists tried to figure out the system (or lack of) then fight their way to the front of the counter through the bustling mob of excited Italians (in Italy, it's common to pay in advance at the cashier before ordering your gelato or espresso at the counter...and in Italy it's not common to line up in any particular order!)

There were lots of fruit-flavored gelati to choose from; I loved the beautiful colors and there was every flavor you could imagine, from a dark, inky blackberry to a dreamy-pink white peach. Each server, wearing a chic jacket-and-tie, would generously smear your cono with up to three flavors then top each with a blob of panna, or whipped cream.
I saw a few non-Italian women scraping theirs off once outside, into the wastebasket.

Another counter at Giolitti featured a dizzying array of granitas, flavorful, intensely-flavored ices that are ground up into
little crystals and explode in flavor when you eat them. Usually they're topped with a flourish of panna as well: the contrast between the sweet richness of the cream and the lively flavor of the granita makes this a Roman favorite.

While they all looked delicious, I was still teetering from my granita di caffè from nearby Tazza d'Oro, which perhaps has the best espresso and was my daily stop in Rome.

There's something about all those diverse flavors going every which way in your mouth...all I want when I enjoy chocolate is to taste rich, dark, unadulterated chocolate without any distractions.

I've been meaning to write more about chocolate, and when Clotilde announced she's hosting Wine Blogging Wednesday 13, it was the perfect excuse to add some notes here about chocolate.

I asked two friends and chocolate experts (I love having chocolatiers as friends)from two of my favorite chocolate companies how they felt about pairing chocolate with wine. You may not know this, but most chocolate is a blend of various roasted beans, plucked from pods and roasted to achieve a certain flavor and profile that the chocolate-maker is seeking. Like wine, chocolate is often blended from various beans, which of course can vary. Depending on variety, origin, fermentation, and roasting, cacao beans can have amazingly different flavors, so often they're blended.

And in spite of what you'll read and hear, there's often no advantage to single-origin chocolates over blended chocolates, unless it's really important to you that your chocolate is only made from one particular kind of cocoa bean.
A few chocolate companies make excellent single-bean chocolate, such as Amadei, E. Guittard, and Domori; all are extraordinary and well worth eating, but I find other single-bean chocolates a result of good marketing and no more exceptional than some of the blended chocolates.

As a former winemaker, chocolate-expert John Scharffenberger transitioned from sparkling winemaker to mastering the art of blending fine chocolate. During his explorations and tastings, he was intrigued by discovering similar flavor components in wine and chocolate, finding nuances that both had in common.

He describes a similar finish when tasting wine and chocolate "defined by tannins, sometimes long and soft, sometimes short and harsh."

Chocolate and wine both have tannins, which can makes them remarkably similar, and I agree with John Scharffenberger (although Hershey's ain't making any offers to buy my business!)
The problem arises when those tannins compete with each other. That's why I prefer a sweet, smooth, rounded ruby port wine with chocolate, rather than a bracingly intense wine, like Cabernet or Zinfandel.
Often the two just obliterate each other and cancel out each others fine qualities.

So I admit that for this chocolate and wine pairing, I fudged a but.
(Sorry, bad pun...)
I opted to pair chocolate with something unusual: Spiritueux de Cacao, a clear, distilled liquor made by steeping and heating cocoa beans then capturing the essence by collecting the aroma and bottling the liquid created by the steam.

Sounds difficult?
That's why good eau-de-vie is rather pricey. Jörg Rupf of St. Georges told me he uses 60 pounds of Bartlett pears to make just one bottle of Pear William (pear eau-de-vie).

I discovered my Spiritueux de Cacao at Lavinia, the 3-story wine emporium here in Paris. At Lavinia, there's a roomful of eaux-de-vie made from every flavor possible: quince, thyme, sour cherries, honey, lime, and...chocolate. I recommend visiting the 3-story wine emporium if you come to Paris, located near the historic Place Madeleine and visit the collection of open bottles. You're welcome to take a good sniff and sample from their selection. (Now that's my kind of wine store...)
Naturally I chose the chocolate one, and left the garlic one behind!

Frederick Schilling, the 'alchemist' of Dagoba, one of my favorite organic chocolates (his Dagoba Xocolatl bar with chilis, cacao nibs, maca, and a hint of nutmeg is simply amazing), finds that the nuances of some of his exotically-flavored chocolates pair well with wine. Frederick loves pairing his floral lavender chocolate with a pinot noir and his delicious lime-scented milk chocolate with a crisp pinot gris.

But when I pressed him for tasting specifics, Frederick replied that he thinks that chocolate tasting comes down to "there are no rights or wrongs. Taste is a subjective art ... If it tastes good, you're having fun, and are surrounded with people you love, it must be the right pairing."

So here's my 'wine' and chocolate pairing for Wine Blogging Wednesday 13: little rich, individual chocolate cakes.
I make one for each person because I don't like to share my chocolate! Each is studded with liquor-soaked prunes, adding soft, sweet little bites that meld perfectly with intense dark chocolate. These petits gâteaux can be made in advance and the flavor improves as they sit. (Trust me, I ate all four cakes over the course of the day I made them. They kept getting better and better and better).

If you don't happen to have a bottle of chocolate eau-de-vie in your liquor cabinet, either come to Paris and pick one up (sorry, I don't deliver)...or macerate the prunes in port wine or dark rum.

For the prunes
6 medium-sized pitted prunes, cut into little-bitty, bite-sized pieces
2 tablespoons Metté cacao eau-de-vie

For the cakes
4 ½ ounces (125 gr) bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
¼ cup (50 ml) heavy or light cream
2 large eggs, at room temperature
2 tablespoons sugar
pinch of salt

In a small bowl, mix the prunes in the eau-de-vie.
Cover, and let macerate for a few hours.
Butter four 2 3/4-inch (7 cm) paper cake molds and set them on a baking sheet. (See note.)

2. In a medium bowl set over simmering water, melt together the chocolate and cream. Remove from heat.
Mix in the prunes and any liquor in the bowl remaining, then let cool to room temperature.

3. In the bowl of a standing electric mixer, at high speed, beat the eggs and sugar with a pinch of salt until thick, about 5 minutes.

4. Fold one-third of the beaten egg mixture into the chocolate, then fold in the remaining egg foam.

5. Divide batter between each cake mold.
Bake for 30 minutes, until cakes are tender and still soft when you touch the top. Each will rise, then gently sigh down a bit.

Remove from oven and cool a few minutes before removing the paper cake mold (use a scissors to cut it away).

Serve warm or at room temperature with very cold crème anglaise and perhaps a scattering of crisp-toasted sliced almonds.

Note: If you can't get paper cake cups, you can use paper muffin liners in a muffin tin.

Ok, how's that for a nice, rich little chocolate dessert?
I'm so wiped out from all that chocolate, I need a break.
Let's see, where should I go this weekend?

I took someone into a fromagerie the other day and he was asking me to describe a perfectly ripe, oozing camembert cheese. "Musty gym socks", "funky undies", and "barnyard-like" don't exactly sound appealing, but were the most accurate descriptions that came to mind at the time (looking back now, however, perhaps next time I need to do some pre-editing in my head). The trick to is to make something as special as a perfectly-ripened wedge of cheese sound so good that you can't believe it will taste better than it smells.
Conveying an exact sensation is the difficulty of food writing. How do you describe something that you think tastes good, and make it sound good enough for someone else to want to taste as well? (and if you think "musty gym socks" or "funky undies" taste good, you're at the wrong web site).

Dianne Jacob, a seasoned culinary journalist and instructor with a long string of success behind her, shares her secrets and suggestions while explaining what food writing is all about: how to succeed, how to get published, and what you can do to make your food writing more evocative and compelling.

Will Write For Food is one of the best and most comprehensive workbooks I've read on this topic and if you've fantasized about writing about food or wanted to know what it was like to write a review restaurant or well-loved cookbook, read the suggestions she culled from experienced food writers like Russ Parsons, Anthony Bourdain, Deborah Madison, and Alice Medrich.
Heck, I'm even in there too!

I was tapped to do this meme back in July, by Shuna, and I began to write it up.

Then I stopped, and began writing much about my culinary travels. So the file got moved somewhere on my desktop, obliterated amongst the mess of files and folders here at chez Dave. As Kate mentioned when she got tagged for the meme, it's kinda like getting a homework assignment.
And who wants homework when you live in Paris?

Then last month Clotilde, who effortlessly manages to both live in Paris and respond to food memes, and she tagged me again, so I felt guilty and decided I'd better sit down and do this.

The meme asks Food Bloggers what 5 Favorite Childhood Food Memories they remember most. Here are mine. I suppose I should be taking only about things like usual suspects like 'comfort food', but frankly, these are the things I remember (and miss) the most...so, ok...there's one 'comfort food' entry tossed in...

I love sprinkles, or as we called them, "ants", since they resembled everyone's favroite picnic critters swarming all over your ice cream. I remember going to Friendly's Ice Cream in Connecticut and ordering Chocolate-Marshmallow Swirl Ice Cream and once it was scooped, the server dipped the whole she-bang in the container of sprinkles, covering everything. A few years later, soft-serve ice cream made its was to New England and I discovered Rainbow Sprinkles, which are almost as good as their darker cousins, when smushed into pillow-y soft-serve ice cream once it emerged from the swirling machine at Foster Freeze.
(I wonder what they would say if I asked for sprinkles at Berthillon?)

My mother was a great cook.
And I never appreciated it fully until I got to college and other guys told me what lousy cooks their mother's had been. My mother was an artist who specialized in weaving and spinning. And she was kind of a character and very well put-together . She had a remarkably strong resemblance to Mary Tyler Moore (before Mare's Joker-From-Batman-like face lifts) and Jacqueline Susann...both were very well put-together, and mom and Jack's shared a penchant for stiff, high hair, opulent jewellery, and swirly Emilio Pucci outfits.

I remember her stepping into her shiny Mercedes, with her Louis Vuitton handbag and a bag lunch (her Yankee thrift prohibited her from stopping at Howard Johnson's for lunch), and driving up to Vermont where puffy bags of fresh wool from the hippies and beatniks who sheared it off their sheep for her. Somehow she managed to fit right in.
Another time I came home from school with friends and my mother was sitting in the front yard, wearing her bra, shorts and Frye boots, and spinning wool on one of her spinning wheels.

Anyhow, my mother made the best Chicken and Rice with Apricots. Her father was Arabic (her mom was Danish) and this dish has roots, I think, in his culinary tradition.
You take a whole chicken and simmer it in water with a sliced carrot or two, and a stalk of celery, until it's falling-off-the-bone soft. Then you make a pot of long-grain rice and use the chicken stock to cook it, replacing the water. In a small saucepan, she poached some tangy California dried apricots in some water with a bit of sugar to serve atop the chicken and rice.
YUM! This is the best dish ever, and really simple too. I make it any time during the winter months when I'm not feeling very healthy: it instant restores me.

This was my first lesson in disappointment (unfortunately, there were many others to follow...), since the television ads showed the popcorn rosing up in a big, bulbous aluminum balloon in about 5 seconds much to the happy delight of the kids clustered around the stove.The bag just rose and rose until it was practically bursting open by itself. Then the steaming bag was ripped open with a fork and everyone squeeled with joy and hapiness.
Well, we bought Jiffy Pop, and it took about 5 or 10 minutes to rise and pop, and was very underwhelming and boring. And the popcorn sucked too...not as much fun to make, as it was to eat.
(Hey, who said this meme supposed to only be about good-tasting food memories?)

I used to eat dried pasta by the box. I don't know why. I would grab a box of Mueller's dried elbows and crunch on them all day long. It was very satisfying, even though my father would warn me that all that pasta was going to expand in my stomach.

I hate black licorice.
It's gross. There's nothing worse than having the taste of black licorice stuck in your mouth. It's like licking gooey tar off of hot pavement. It's disgusting...and yes, I know that there's all this supposed great gourmet licorice out there that's just divine and I just haven't tried it yet. Well, some people eat dogs and monkey brains and you might think that's disgusting...so stop trying to convince me to try black licorice. I don't like it.

But what I loved was red licorice. It's gummy, like those vibrant, jelled Orange Slices covered with lots of crunchy granulated sugar (...which I loved almost as much, which would be #6) and chewy all at the same time, with a red cherry-like sweetness. I now enjoy Panda bars from Finland, where they're naturally-flavored and apparently good for you, since they sell them in health food stores in the US. So I don't feel too bad eating one once in a while even though now I'm a more sensible adult.

The hardest thing about living in France (aside from speaking French) is that most of us Americans here expect things to be like 'back home'; corn-on-the-cob, Office Max open on sundays, and cheery customer service.

I tried explaining that uniquely American concept of, "The customer is always right" to a French friend, and he just kept giving me this blank look as if I was explaining how aliens were impregnating Republicans in an effort to achieve global domination through procreation.

It seems like everything that I look for, I can't find. Whatever I'm looking for, will surely elude me.

But I wanted to make Meg's Pickled Onions a few weeks back. I couldn't find white wine vinegar at any grocer. Last night's risotto almost didn't happen either...I couldn't find Arborio rice and, naturally, the local Italian épicerie was (still) closed for vacation.

For the past few months, I've been considering an all-out search for a Cake Carrier.
Now, that's not something that one searches for everyday. Perhaps you've never searched for one. Maybe you have.
But I knew it would take a bit of work; I began to gather my strength and prepare myself.
Sometimes takes me hours to prepare myself to do simple daily tasks, like going to the bank here. It's exhausting. Or having a key made. Or choosing just the right baguette.
And never mind the amount of mental preparation it takes me to enter a French department store...the frenzy!...the jostling!...les resquilleurs who the cut in line!...(although when I try to do it, I always seem to get nailed.)

And just in case you think I'm picking on the French (I'll leave that for the US government), it's a chore to find exactly what you're looking for, no matter where you live.

Don't believe me?
Quick!
Where can you find a Cake Carrier where you live? You probably wouldn't know where to look either, whether it's Portland or Peoria (and searching the internet doesn't count. No cheating.)
Now imagine me mètro-ing around Paris, frantically searching for something that I didn't even know the name for in French.
(And for some unknown reason, my otherwise excellent French dictionary doesn't provide a translation for something so important, so vital to one's existence, as a 'Cake Carrier'.)

So imagine my surprise when snooping around the enormous BHV department store and finding this cloche de gâteau!
And to top it off, it was only 9 euros!
(If Emile Zola referred to Les Halles as; "The Belly of Paris", I'd dub the BHV; "The Digestive Tract of Paris" since everyone in Paris needs to go through it at one point or another. And no one comes out exactly the same way as they went in.)

But a Cake Carrier is not something one can easily do without, thank you very much.
If you think it's not an essential item, you try schlepping a carefully-frosted cake on the steamy mètro, dodging the crush of Parisians during rush hour and see how your cake (and you) fare.

And speaking of baking essentials, here's something I've re-discovered that I tucked into my suitcase at the last-minute when I returned last winter from the US...and you should discover them too:

These are the best!
Oxo tools don't have a lot of bells-and-whistles: they just work.

These are the best measuring spoons I've found. They're affordable, well-designed, and...if you put liquid ingredients in them, you can rest them on the countertop without them spilling or tipping over.
See above?

Sometimes it's the small things in life that make a baker happy, and these measuring spoons are one of them.
And sometimes it's the bigger things, like my new cloche de gâteau .

Now I gotta scour Paris looking for corn syrup and pecans in preparation for "Celebrity Foodblogger Survivor" for Katrina disaster relief.

Franglais is the curious and unlikely (but perhaps inevitable) invasion of English into the French language.

Not since the un-easy (but remarkably convenient) alliance of Franco-American culture, as found in Franco-American 'Spaghetti-O's™' (whose relationship seems more Italian-American...if you ask me), has there been such a near-fatal collision of two diverse cultures and languages.

Here's some of the more popular Franglais words that I hear on the streets and in cafés;

Très People: Very celebrity-conscious, in reference to People magazine, which curiously isn't available here.

Le Jogging: Jogging (like that's something you see a lot in Paris!...)

Les Baskets: Sneakers...which Parisians wear for style, not comfort. Très chic.

Les Thongs: Plastic Flip-flops (in French, the 'h' is silent, so it's not 'thongs', like G-strings, you say, "Les Tongs"). And 'thongs' (the underwear kind...for both sexes) as well as the plastic ones (for your feet) are quite popular in Europe. I almost bought a thong by accident (you know which kind...) when buying undies a few months ago.
Ouch! Those things look painful.

Les Preservatifs: Male contraception (aka; condoms), Don't ask a chef is he uses preservatifs unless you're prepared to get romantically involved.

Le Weekend: The weekend.
(This is interesting since there are only a 23 words in my French dictionary that begin with "W", and all of them originated from other languages; Walkman, Water polo, W-C, Weekend, Wagon, etc...and when I play Scrabble in French, I always seem to get stuck with the "W", which is like a cruel joke. It's such a high-value letter, but I can never find a way to use it. Could that be why I always lose when playing Scrabble in French?... or could it be the unending fountain of points found in French verbs, which French Scrabble players have to their advantage...with 14 different verb tenses to pick and choose from, no wonder they always win!)

Le Shopping: Shopping (ok, that's another no-brainer, but Americans are better at shopping so it seems fitting that they use an English word when there's plenty of words they have already in their massive vocabularies.)

McDo's: McDonald's (Did you know the French are the largest consumers of McDonald's in Europe?)

Les Emails: There's lively controversy whether this is supposed to be plural around here.
We say in English, "I have a hundred emails to read." but we also say "I can't get to all of my email today.". or, "I have a hundred pieces of email to read."
Or...
"I could sure go for a nice, big slab of chocolate cake.", and we also say (or at least I say), "I've could eat chocolate cake all day.", but also, "Hmmm, look at all those delicious chocolate cakes."
(Boy, am I glad to be a native-English speaker. Imagine if I'd had to learn to read and write in English...you might not read my blog if I spoke, say, Latvian or Estonian...would you!...unless you were Latvian, or Estonian, I supposed, but then you wouldn't know who I was. But wait a minute, how do you know who I am??)

Les Top Models: Supermodels (however in America they're revered, and here no one understands our fascination with them.)

Le Snack: A relatively new concept, and the reason that the French are getting rounder.

Le Fast Food: Another relatively new concept, and Reason #2 the French are getting rounder

Who remembers the good old days when if you saw someone walking down the street talking to themselves, you'