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Cobb Salad

The first avocado I ever had was at Scandia restaurant in Los Angeles and I hated it. The slippery little green cubes avoided my fork, until finally, I managed to spear one. Once I did, I swallowed it – reluctantly, then avoided the rest of them on my plate. I’m not sure how I came to eventually love avocados, but the city of Los Angeles is…

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Giant Gougeres

Every summer, we head to Burgundy to visit French friends who live abroad, but who return for the summer. They quickly get reacquainted with the more leisurely lifestyle in the French countryside, which include enjoying Chablis and visiting the small town markets. Because we’re such top-notch guests, pitching on with the cooking and making sure their pool gets used, we always get an invite and jump at…

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Gastrique

I don’t regularly watch American cooking programs and competitions, although occasionally I come across them on TV here in France, dubbed (Version Française, or VF), which makes them less interesting to watch. And I don’t go to those cooking vacations where chefs come and cook for guests on tropical islands because, frankly, I’m never asked. (Although unbelievably, I did just get an email from a…

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Salon de l’Agriculture

Every year, beginning in mid-February, thousands of farmers, wine makers, cheese makers, sausage makers, and an arks’-worth of animals, makes it way to Paris for the annual Salon de l’Agriculture. The salon began in 1870 in a country that was, and still is, justly fond of its agriculture, which is celebrated on tables, in steaming cauldrons, on picnic blankets, in restaurants, and ready-to-slice on cutting…

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Split Pea Soup

We don’t always get snow in Paris in the winter. But when we do, it blankets the city with a brilliant layer of snow. It illuminates what can be gray and drab, and brightens things up when everyone’s spirits are beginning to sag. People tend to stay indoors or huddle in cafés, drinking hot chocolate or vin chaud, hot mulled wine.

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Chopped Vegetable Salad with Lemon-Garlic Dressing

Americans have a reputation for not eating very well which is disputed by the fact that whenever I have a group of guests come to Paris, everyone is always craving fresh vegetables. Another interesting paradox is that portions in America are huge, yet Americans who come to France (where the portions are more reasonable) find themselves quickly full when dining out. And after a couple…

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Potato and Blue Cheese Pizza

One of my biggest, deepest-darkest secrets is that a few times a year, I buy a frozen pizza. I used to do it on the sly, but lately I’ve even got so brazen that I’ll go out and do it in broad daylight. I am sure after my goings on about the popularity of frozen foods in France that I was going to get busted…

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Bleu de Gex

The last time Peggy Smith, co-owner of Cowgirl Creamery, came to Paris, we did some cheese tasting and shopping. We’d worked together at Chez Panisse for many years and she’s one of my favorite people—ever, and I wish she’d come visit more often. As we roamed a salon de dégustation of cheese, looking around at all the astounding cheeses from France (as well as a…

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