Barbara Cooley's Paris Journal

Paris Journal 2013 – Barbara Joy Cooley Home: barbarajoycooley.com

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The real problem was the chairs, I finally decided. There are times when food isn’t just slow food, but rather, extremely slow food. There are times when what should be a 2-hour dinner becomes a 3-hour dinner. That can happen with French restaurants; if the food is good enough, it is worth the wait.

But sometimes the rear end cannot endure what the heart and soul (and appetite) will.

The chairs. They are a critical component of a very slow food restaurant.

My circulation was cut off to the extent that I had to get up and move around. So before dessert arrived – somewhere in the very long interval between the main course and dessert – I got up and went outside to stand and move a little on the sidewalk.

The restaurant was full. The couple at the table next to us looked bored and annoyed with the wait. Everyone else was chattering away – most tables had four or more people occupying them.

The restaurant, Cristal de Sel, was not understaffed. Not at all. There were three servers working in the dining room (one was really the maitre d’ and part owner of the restaurant, Damien Crépu).

In the kitchen, there was the chef, Karil Lopez, and what appeared to be a sous chef. In addition, a young bottle-blond heavily mascaraed woman was learning the ropes as an apprentice. Then every once in a while, I caught a glimpse of another man, who might have been the plongeur (dishwasher and guy who mops the floors).

By the way, what I wrote about the beams on the ceiling in this restaurant (September 2, 2011) was not correct. I had plenty of time to study them because of the long wait for each of our courses last night. I found particular, peculiar wood grain patterns precisely duplicated here and there. These are fake beams – for décor only. Just so you know . . . .

The chairs that I wrote about then, the Italian-deco wooden things, aren’t so wonderful after all. They have a very flat, hard seat. I can’t tell you how difficult it is to sit in one of them for three hours.

The older Windsor chairs, of which a few remain, are probably more comfortable – at least a little more comfortable.

We were greeted warmly when we arrived, and were given our choice of tables because at that point, only two tables were occupied by groups of about 4. At that point, we should have selected the table for its chairs, not for its position in the front corner of the dining room. But we didn’t know.

I orderd the escargots au beurre d’algues, polenta moelleuse et sablé parmesan for us to share. This consisted of nine snails, 8 of which were perfectly cooked, in an algae butter (a butter for special occasions) with soft polenta and round parmesan crisps.

It was delicious. After a long time, the main courses arrived: ravioles de langoustines, embeurée de choux, beurre de nage for Tom, and poitrine de chochon a la plancha, écrasée de potates douces, ail violet et jus de viande for me.

That prawn ravioli dish was on the menu back in September 2011, too, and it hasn’t changed a bit. Still delicious.

The pork belly was not on the menu back then. The problem for me was that one of my favorite chefs back home, Melissa Talmadge (Sweet Melissa’s restaurant on Sanibel Island), does an absolutely outstanding pork belly main course. I kept thinking about it as I ate the pork belly dish at Cristal de Sel. That’s just not fair. I should not do that.

I was stunned by my first bite. Somehow, I managed to make it a bite of nothing but pork cartilage. How did I do that? The rest of the piece contained no cartilage.

In fact, the dish was very good. It had more fat and cartilage than Melissa’s does (oops, there I go again!), but I adored the puréed sweet potatoes and roasted garlic that accompanied it.

The dessert to order at Cristal de Sel is the aumônière de crêpe aux pommes confits, caramel au beurre salé. It is a specialty of Cristal de Sel, and it was on the menu in September 2011. But now, the crêpe is served a bit browner, and it is a slight improvement on already just-about-perfect desert. This crêpe is an absolute delight, with its perfectly cooked and seasoned apples and its fantastic caramel sauce.

My dessert, a small tarte abricots/verveine, crème amandes/noisettes, glace vanille, was very good. Verveine is verbena, just like the flower, and it could refer to verbena tea or to a liquer made from verbena. The almond cream was just the right addition to the apricots.

Earlier in the day, I walked up to the Champ de Mars again, while Tom watched the end of the day’s stage of the Tour de France.

At the Champ’s bandstand, I enjoyed a concert by a choral group from American Music Abroad, a program that is funded, I think, by the U.S. State Department to promote American culture.

The members of the group were all 20-something adults. Their performance was outstanding. I was so proud of them!

Early in the concert, they sang a magical version of “Blackbird.” It sent chills down my spine, because it was so beautifully done.

Then of course was the quintessential American song, the most popular song in the world, according to some: “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” Priceless!

Then the chorus broke into two parts: the women’s group, and then the men’s group.

The women sang a great rendition of “Broadway Baby.” The men performed an amusing “There is Nothing Like a Dame” and “Pretty Woman.”

All together again, they finished with an arrangement that combined “When the Saints go Marching In” with “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot.” What a great combination! The soloist for part of “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” was an African-American soprano with a voice from heaven. I was so happy to have had the opportunity to hear her!

Today, a band (fanfare) called “Michigan” is supposed to perform at Parc Georges Brassens. We may or may not go to hear them, depending on the weather. The weather is starting to heat up. And it will be hot for the next week.

That’s right, I said “hot,” so in south Floridian lexicon, that means 90 degrees F or higher. That’s what it will be Sunday through Wednesday, say the forecasters. With no air conditioning, that is hot.

If the heat causes any health problems for Tom, we now know the hospital to use. Doc Salzman says the Hopital Saint-Louis has the best hematologists.

I looked it up. Located in the 10^th arrondissement, over on the right bank, it is an ancient institution. According to Wikipedia, “It was founded by King Henry IV (1553–1610) (King of France and Navarre) on May 17, 1607, to decongest the Hôtel-Dieu de Paris during the plague. He named it St. Louis in memory of Louis IX, who died of the plague that devastated Tunis in 1270.”

This insitution is in the French public hospital system. In its first 150 years or so of existance, it was only kept open during times of plague or other epidemics. It was sited to be located outside of the walls of the city, to keep the contagious people away. Near it was a scaffold used for hanging criminals.

In the middle of the 18^th century, the hospital was even used for storing wheat, during one of its fallow periods of about 9 years. After that, it was used to jail beggars and vagabonds, until the Hôtel-Dieu once again became too crowded.

Then a fire in 1773 at the Hôtel-Dieu made the Hopital Saint-Louis essential, and it wasn’t closed again after that.

The Hopital Saint-Louis became known for developing the field of dermatology in the 19^th century. The surgical and hematological specialities arrived at the Hopital Saint-Louis in the 20^th century.

Also in the 20^th century, a number of the Hopital Saint-Louis’s buildings were named historic monuments. There is even a dermatology museum on the institution’s grounds.

According to the French Wikipedia, the architecture of the Hopital Saint-Louis is a bit like that of the famous Place des Vosges, a square that we know and love. That makes sense, because both places were developed at around the same time. In fact, both places are attributed to the same architect, Claude Chastillon.

The Hopital Saint-Louis was no small endeaver; check out this 1608 engraving of its extensive grounds.

New buildings were constructed for the hospital in the 1980s, but some of the old buildings were preserved nearby.

Tom pointed out that the English language version of Wikipedia has very little information about the Hopital Saint-Louis. The French Wikipedia has much more. He suggested that I could write an article about the place for the English version, but I said, “I hope not to become such an expert on the place.”

Amen.

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Thursday, July 18, 2013