From AOL news:
PARIS (Jan. 31) - The Eiffel Tower’s 20,000 flashing lights will go dark for five minutes Thursday evening, hours before scientists and officials unveil a long-awaited report on global warming .
The darkening of the landmark in the City of Light comes at the urging of environmental activists and is timed to coincide with Friday’s release of the major report warning that Earth will keep getting warmer and presenting new evidence of humanity’s role in climate change.
L’Ami Jean is a very small, newish bistro in the residential 7th arrondissement, which happens to boast quite a number of fabulous bistros, including Maupertu, Florimond, Le P’tit Troquet, Cafe Constant, just to name a few.
So L’Ami Jean is in good company. What makes it different and stand out from the rest? Read this article from the New York Times and you’ll understand…
Bistronomy
By CHRISTINE MUHLKE
Published: January 28, 2007
If in Paris a friend tells you that he’s taking you to a Basque rugby pub in the opposite-of-bustling Seventh Arrondissement, don’t whimper about wanting to try somewhere on your list of Places to Go — Le Comptoir, say, or Le Sensing. He’s taking you to L’Ami Jean, and soon you will be grateful.
Ed Alcock for The New York Times
The four-year-old restaurant has a lot working against it: location, décor, a kitchen the size of a crèpe stand. Even the menu seems like a letdown, with its 30-euro prix fixe, seasonal additions — game in fall, stews in winter — and traditional plats that bring the daily dish tally to about 60. The wine list recently added a page of historical offerings from the dealer across the street. But who would want an 1,020-euro ’86 Pomerol to accompany her head cheese?
Once the first dish arrives, you’ll understand. Not just the smart presentation on stylish plates that don’t quite fit on the table but also the quality of detail: cream-of-cauliflower soup with horseradish — poured table side from an iron tea kettle — with microscopically precise rye croutons; a langoustine from Brittany under a translucent sheet of crisp pig skin (the world’s best potato chip) dotted with orange-infused oil; a rich gratiné of game with a timely puff of foam.
Basque rugby pub? What Basque rugby pub? The room hasn’t changed since the 1930s, but the food will silence those who claim that French cuisine has ossified and that the culinary torch took the Eurostar to Spain. Perhaps silence isn’t the right word: L’Ami Jean is boisterous. While in a starred environment this food would invite hushed attention, Stéphane Jégo, the 35-year-old chef, stokes a rollicking room where it’s common to exclaim loudly over a dish or be offered a spoonful of pork belly and lentils from a neighbor’s casserole; where tables of four order magnums, and there’s a wait for 11:30 p.m. reservations. Try that at Taillevent.
Jégo is part of the next wave of gastro-bistro chefs. The self-taught cook spent 12 years with Yves Camdeborde at La Régalade, one of the revolutionary “Why here?” bistros that brought excited diners to featureless locales. Camdeborde, who now owns the more accessibly located Le Comptoir, made his name with generous hospitality, democratic prices and reworkings of classic fare built on a base of quality ingredients and rigorous French technique — all lessons that Jégo absorbed. Along with Parisian restaurants like Chez Michel, L’Os à Moelle, L’Oursine and L’Acajou, L’Ami Jean serves food that is adventurous while sticking close to home, like an airy, deconstructed rice pudding that Tante Marie could have only dreamed of.
“We have different styles and personalities,” Jégo said of his “bistronome” confreres, “but we’re in the same esprit, the same osmosis. While other chefs say that they’re going to revolutionize gastronomy, we do one thing: we respect people. We don’t invert it and say that people should thank us because they were lucky to come to our restaurant. Those guys who catalog people like they catalog their food — it’s really stupid.”
Asked what Jégo is doing differently from his peers, Camdeborde replied via e-mail: “Nothing. He is different. He rejoices in what he’s doing, and you can feel it in the food.”
A glimpse in the kitchen window will silence any New Yorker who whines about his or her kitchen. At lunch and dinner, the wild-eyed Jégo and three cooks send out 60 entrees using just four burners, a grill, a salamander and a “piano” cook top. The menu is often tweaked and reprinted between seatings. The key, Jégo said, is the mise en place. “It’s an organized mess,” he said. “The mise en place started four years ago, and it never stops. If it does, we’re dead.”
On a November morning, the other side of the 12-foot-long cooking area featured metal organizers filled with endive, bread crumbs, almond butter, mushrooms, shallots, chorizo, chives, purée of purple potatoes, parsley pistou, chestnuts, dried tomatoes and other items that allow the chef to riff at high speed. A fish soup à l’ancienne simmered on a burner, while suckling pig braised its way toward tomorrow’s boudin, at which point it would top an apple slice spread with almond butter and be heated under the salamander. In another room, rabbits soaked in their blood, ducks underwent a 15-day preparation and live langoustines passed their final hours.
Any first-time diner will wonder how he does it. And why. He could be a star, but according to Jégo, most customers who see him in the kitchen say, “Is that L’Ami Jean?” That makes him happy.
“Hey, Néné,” he yelled to the regular drinking at the bar at 11 a.m. “Is what I do for fame or to please my friends and meet people?”
“Ah,” the old man said, putting down his slice of sausage. “The second answer!”
For anyone who swears by their Michelin Red Guide when dining in Paris, this is noteworthy news. There have been promotions to 3 stars, and demotions to 2 and 1 stars among Paris’s finest restaurants. Here’s the scoop:
New three-stars:
L’Astrance, Pascal Barbot and Christophe Rohat
Le Meurice, Yannick Alléno
Le Pré Catelan, Frédéric Anton
Pic, Anne Sophie Pic
Hélène Darroze, Hélène Darroze
Lameloise, Jacques Lameloise (regained the third star they lost few years ago)
Demoted to 2 Stars:
Le Beurehiesel (The chef Antoine Westermann has stepped down and his son took over the kitchen.)
Le Cinq, Philippe Legendre
Le Taillevent (Previously thought to be untouchable, but I guess Michelin is on a mission to prove nothing is.)
La Ferme de mon père (Marc Veyrat sold the restaurant)
The ones in Paris are in bold, with a link provided if possible:
1 El Bulli Spain The World’s Best Restaurant / Best Restaurant in Europe
2 The Fat Duck UK
3 Pierre Gagnaire France Chefs’ Choice
4 The French Laundry USA Best Restaurant in the Americas
5 Tetsuya’s Australia Best Restaurant in Australasia
6 Bras France
7 Le Louis XV Monaco
8 Per Se USA
9 Arzak Spain
10 Mugaritz Spain Highest New Entrant
11 Can Fabes Spain
12 Nobu UK
13 Gambero Rosso Italy Highest Climber
14 Gordon Ramsay (Ryl Hosp Rd) UK
15 Alain Ducasse - Plaza Athenee France
16 Jean Georges USA
17 Le Cinq France
18 Daniel USA
19 Oud Sluis Holland
20 Chez Panisse USA
21 El Celler de Can Roca Spain
22 L’Astrance France (rue Beethoven, 16th arr.)
23 Hof van Cleve Belgium
24 La Maison Troisgros France
25 L’Atelier France
26 Charlie Trotter’s USA
27 Le Gavroche UK Outstanding Value
28 La Colombe South Africa Best Restaurant in the Middle East & Africa
29 Enoteca Pinchiorri Italy
30 Rockpool Australia
31 Le Calandre Italy
32 Le Bernardin USA
33 Noma Denmark
34 Restaurant Dieter Muller Germany
35 St John UK
36 Hakkasan UK
37 Martin Berasategui Spain
38 Le Quartier Francais South Africa
39 Chez Dominique Finland
40 L’Ambroisie France (Place des Vosges, 4th arrondissement)
41 Die Schwarzwaldstube Germany
42 Dal Pescatore Italy
43 Bocuse France
44 L’Arpege France
45 Gramercy Tavern USA
46 Bukhara India Best Restaurant in Asia
47 De Karmeliet Belgium
48 Oaxen Skargardskrog Sweden
49 Comme Chez Soi Belgium
50 D.O.M Brazil
For more information on all of the restaurants listed, go to the 50 Best Web site.
The American Ballet Theatre company was founded in 1940, and will be performing five programs alternating between classical and contemporary danse. The work of this ballet company has drawn universal acclaim. If you are in Paris in February, don’t miss it!
THEATRE DU CHATELET
1, place du Châtelet 75001 PARIS
Metro : Châtelet
RER : Châtelet Les Halles
Information : 0140282840
Price Range: 10 - 80 euros
From today’s Yahoo news:
ROME (AFP) - An expert on the “Mona Lisa” says he has ascertained with certainty that the symbol of feminine mystique died on July 15, 1542, and was buried at the convent in central Florence where she spent her final days.
Giuseppe Pallanti found a death notice in the archives of a church in Florence that referred to “the wife of Francesco del Giocondo, deceased July 15, 1542, and buried at Sant’Orsola,” the Italian press reported Friday.
Born Lisa Gherardini in May 1479, she is thought to have been the second wife of Del Giocondo, a wealthy silk merchant, with whom she had five children.
While intrigue has surrounded the identity of the woman in the famous unsigned, undated Leonardo da Vinci painting housed at the Louvre in Paris, Lisa Gherardini is widely accepted to have been the subject.
Sant’Orsola, where she died at age 63, now disused and in ruins, is near the San Lorenzo basilica.
“It was in this convent that Mona Lisa placed her youngest daughter Marietta, who later became a nun. And it was there that Lisa, as stipulated in the will of her husband who died four years before her, ended her life,” Pallanti told the daily La Repubblica on Friday.
Pallanti, author of “Mona Lisa Revealed: The True Identity of Leonardo’s Model,” has spent nearly three decades combing Florence’s archives.
Another researcher, Da Vinci expert Carlo Pedretti, praised Pallanti for the discovery and urged a search at the site for Lisa Gherardini’s remains.
“Thanks to modern techniques, scientists can determine her physical aspect, maybe even her face and thereby make an important contribution” to establishing her identity, he told the ANSA news agency.
I’ve been wondering about the Jules Verne restaurant under Alain Ducasse: Will the prices go up? Will the menu change much? Decor?
In today’s New York Times, there was a blurb about some of what is projected for the swanky eatery:
“LE JULES VERNE This restaurant opened in 1983 on the second floor of the Eiffel Tower. It is owned by the city of Paris and will now be run by Alain Ducasse. He has a nine-year contract in partnership with L’Affiche, a subsidiary of Sodexho, an international food service company. Mr. Ducasse plans to close the restaurant this summer for a month or more, to refurbish it. He has not decided on a chef. Sodexho will run Altitude 95 (named for its height in meters above sea level) on the first floor of the tower, in cooperation with Mr. Ducasse: Eiffel Tower, 011-33-1-45-55-20-04.”
Air France is having a great winter sale, with fares at around $214. Fly by March 31, 2007and take advantage of these fantastic prices!
Good airfares are hard to come by these days, or so it seems. But some Web sites out there have made the task of going through all the options so much easier for us. Try these for your next trip:
Mobissimo.com This site shows you all available flights and all prices, from various sources (Travelocity, Cheap Tickets, Expedia, and so many more).
ITASoftware.com Why not use the same software the travel agents use? That’s what you get on ITA Software. Only catch, you can only research the multitudes of flights available, but you can’t book on the site. You have to book with the airline.
FareCompare.com This site is fantastic. It works within your parameters and gives you the absolute lowest fares available in both Coach and Business Class.
I hope these help in preparing your next trip. Bon voyage!
