Matthew's mom's Paris garden is one of the most peaceful and pretty places in the world, I'm quite certain of it.
Ah, Paris. It's so quiet at Matthew's mom's house (actually, the boyhood home Matthew grew up in) that I can hear my heart beating as I'm typing this post. It's a large, winding apartment filled with precarious stairs and has an equally expansive garden (for an urban setting, anyway) that sits firmly in the center of a gated courtyard, entirely removed from the footsteps and traffic that buzzes just outside. I'm happy to be here and even more pleased that it's silent. Manhattan's buzz not only gets to me, but I'm convinced it's not good for me, being as easily distracted and unable to focus as I am and constantly being drawn away from whatever I'm doing to spend energy getting annoyed at city intrusions. So, I'm feeling relatively calm now.
The trip here was pure fucking hell. We left Manhattan in the middle of a record heat wave that left us sweaty, irritable messes as we stumbled down the elevator with the mutt in tow and made our way to JFK with looming dark clouds rumbling in the distance. After arriving a bit on the early side, we sat with Ella until it was time to drop her off at security -- they don't allow her to be checked in much more than an hour before the scheduled flight, a fact we somehow always forget and arrive early with her anyway. We eventually dropped her off, made our way through security and did the usual strip show of shoes, belts and laptops before plopping ourselves down near the gate and discovering that our flight was delayed by an hour. I hate that, but at least there was a bar near the gate that we escaped to and temporarily ditched the immense groups of screaming children crowding our gate. I had honestly never seen so many of them, and initially feared that they would all be on our flight, but thankfully most of them were headed to Casablanca ... I've never been, but have heard that it's not nearly as romantic as the movie (which I've never seen, believe it or not) and hardly worth a visit. And based on the crying, screaming babies everywhere, I'm inclined to immediately agree. Yikes.
Well, we pushed our way through the crowd to the bar, a typically crowded airport hangout, and even more so given the delays due to lightening storms and such. I ordered a margarita that arrived dressed with Maraschino cherries and Matthew had a bloody mary. About a third of the way through my drink, I noticed a medium sizes object in my drink caught between the side of the glass and crushed ice, and upon closer inspection I quickly realized it was a cockroach! I couldn't believe it. How could they not have noticed it? After going up to the server, who was a very sweet Hispanic woman, she practically squealed at the sight of the six-legged insect floating motionless in my cocktail, grabbed it from my hand and immediately called a manager before bringing me a new drink ... which I inspected very, very carefully before the first sip. The manager knocked off the price of my drink and took half off of M's. As well she should have ... Eek! I'm not squeamish about those kinds of things and it really didn't bother me that much, but I have several friends who would have considered bagging the whole trip and heading home after suffering the most embarrassing public outburst of the heebie jeebies ever seen, perhaps even going so far as to run through the airport while screeching, "The bugs! Get them off me!" before being held for observation by airport security.
Roach-arita, anyone?
After finally boarding the plane and being stuffed into ridiculously cramped seats, we sat there for literally hours on the tarmac while the pilot kept us up-to-date on the weather, ground delays, blah blah blah ... it was such an up and down series of announcements, where he would tell us one minute that we were leaving immediately and the next would tack on another hour or two of sitting, that I found myself uncontrollably annoyed. Between the screaming babies, lack of oxygen, coughing and sneezing passengers all around me, I finally just put on my headphones and went to sleep until the plane finally took off. I felt for several stuffy, claustrophobic moments on the plane that I was being held captive while strapped into a tiny box in some P.O.W. camp. The only upside is that there was a mildly scruffy and cute guy next to me, which in a way also added to my jangling nerves because I was fearful that, in my slumber on the plane, I would try to curl up to him instead of Matthew. He seemed laid back enough that he wouldn't have cared, but still ... imagine the uncomfortable incident for a moment ...
And getting back to the cramped seats that Air France offers its coach passengers -- the difference between first, business, and coach class seats are so vast that I felt as if I was traveling in steerage on the Titanic. If Air France weren't the only ones that handled dogs, we'd skip them altogether. Plus, no matter how often we fly, they have yet to give us an upgrade. What gives? The saddest part of all is that even Ella, stewing somewhere in cargo in her stinky plastic container, had more room and comfort than we did.
So we eventually landed at the Paris airport, and immediately things turned around for the better. Paris is beautiful (well, avoid the suburbs!), public transportation and airports are well thought out and designed. Even the conveyor belts that the luggage is dropped onto has a certain, eye-pleasing quality -- instead of the squeaky, rusty systems that New York has installed in all of their airports, Paris has opted for a sleek, connecting series of bending black slats that seamlessly weave around multiple corners to accommodate the largest number of waiting travelers as possible. Why does everything in New York City have to be so dumpy and dirty looking in comparison with just about every other city in the modern world? The NY subways, airports, streets, parks ... everything is covered in grime, trash, graffiti ... I love New York, really I do, but I'd love it even more if it tried to be even half as clean, pretty and well-designed as Paris (again, avoid the suburbs!).
We arrived here to Sarath's (M's mom's wonderful, sweet and amazing caretaker of her Paris home) delicious version of Pasta with Pancetta (see my version and video HERE!), and a second after I had the first bite I knew I was in Paris and all was well in the world. There are several people around me who make this recipe -- a very simple recipe -- the exact same way, but it's the small changes -- the way one cuts the onion, how thinly the pancetta is sliced -- that makes the dish sing, and Sarath has it down in a way that nobody else has been able to attain; it's delectably good!!
One of the most spectacular things about Paris is not only how each building is lit up artificially at night in dramatic, gorgeous ways, but also how the natural light during the day interacts with the water and structures of the city. I'm convinced that Paris can't be badly lit in any weather condition, although sunset is usually a winner for me if I had to pick.
Well, the past couple days in Paris have been spent walking around in mostly good weather. We were stuck in the middle of a torrential downpour yesterday, but mostly it's been pretty good out for walking around. June in Paris is typically cloudy and cool, and this one is no different...Paris is no Sun City...
I finally checked out the Grand Palais since its restoration several years back, being lured there to see Richard Serra's installation. It's funny how I tend to envision the way I want things to look before seeing them -- I was picturing in my mind the installation piece he did for the Bilbao Guggenheim, a work of giant, labyrinthine-like steel structures that stand with no supports and fit beautifully into the vast space, allowing museum guests to weave in and around the installation and feel the "crush" of the work as each piece appears that it could almost come crashing down on a visitor. Well, the Grand Palais installation didn't prove as successful for me. I loved the five tall, thin slabs of steel "bacon" that towered precariously above onlookers, seemingly balancing and threatening to smoosh Parisian museum goers just as Serra's Guggenheim and other works have done ... but the space didn't work right for me. There was just too much said space between each gynormous piece and I felt like something was missing. The Grand Palais is an enormous space and I think, even though Serra's pieces were huge as well, there still could have been more of his sculptures to fill the space. I wanted something I could walk around and feel as if I was going through a steel canyon of sorts. Basically, I envisioned what his work should have looked like and ended up ruining the experience for myself. Not completely ruined really, but I did expect more to experience and look at.
I thought for sure I was going to witness a mass smooshing of hyperactive children as they energetically pressed against Serra's latest smashing piece that ends its run at Paris' Grand Palais June 15th.
Barbara's flambéd chicken and laurel leaves was a delicioso success!
We spent last night at Henry & Barbara's fabulous Paris pad. It has a real New Yorky feel to it, which is fitting because it sits in a hip neighborhood that reminds me so much of the Village. Barbara cooked a wonderful dinner that started with an orange dish of onion, black pepper, fennel orange segments tossed in olive oil and a bit of salt that was surprisingly refreshing and delicious. We had a roast chicken that was flambéd with laurel leaves before serving that was succulent and flavorful and finished with panna cotta and fresh strawberries.
This morning I woke with a craving for my favorite Parisian pastry ... almond croissants from Pierre Herme. So off we went with the mutt to pick up a few goodies from there, but surprisingly, and I'm hoping this was a just fluke, something wasn't quite right with my almond croissant. I never thought I'd be having to type this about the pastry master of the universe, but they were a bit flat and was drowned by too much almond cream filling. Such a shame, as the taste of a truly perfect one makes me want to shout out and dance in the streets. No, really. I'm trying again tomorrow.
