Paris Hearts Bears

 

Bears still on the brain. 

Bear wanted to see Cévé’s bear sculptures at Village Royal on 25, rue Royal, even if it was gloomy and rainy. One does not have a choice in these things. 

Across rue Royal Haviland Limoges had bears on the brain too.

 Inescapable. 

In the metro station We are assaulted with Tediber incredible mattress posters. 

Paris’ empty cafes and restaurants have taken the Gobelin nounours/bears to their hearts and filled their empty windows with bears instead of people. It makes things cheerier. 

On one of my Paris stays I ended up on Bear Street/rue aux Ours. Was it karmic destiny?

 This is all before a certain Bear entered my life in 2010 and nudged me to move to his home town 2 years later.

 Did you know many top Paris cooking schools like Ritz Escoffier, Cordon Bleu and Lenotre have teddy bear mascots? Cordon Bleu’s teddy is named ‘Béchamel’. I learned a lot in this job...

Every Christmas Paris pharmacies have a penchant for polar bear in their windows. They are still up. 

All French kiddies have a doudou to drag around, usually a bear. The attachment starts early. 

My bear attachment continues 

With the January Paris Letter (in the post 📮this week). Thanks Empress E. for some news of a real bear cub, baby Giant Panda Xiao Qi Ji in his habitat at Smithsonian National Zoo c/o The Washington Post. Click for 51 seconds of the cutest thing you’ve ever seen 🐼

Paris January 21, 2013 in the 15th arron. when we first moved here. 🐼🐻❤️

Sauteed Steak - Jacques Pepin / Youtube

 

Haven’t we all made surprising changes to our lives during the Pandemic. Me, I never watched cooking videos one after the other in a trance-like state until recently. 

Certainly Jacques Pepin is one of the best out there to watch. What a terrific teacher! What a terrific guy And I rarely ate or cooked red meat (no pun intended). I never bought a steak in the US. I ate mostly veg + seafood. Moving to France changed that fast. Under Confinement I’ve developed a hankering for hunks of red meat - needing more iron maybe? 

Watching Jacques Pepin sauté a steak it was clear I was doing it all wrong. Thank you Jacques 👏👏

I’m learning the names of French cuts of meat. 

Next challenge I’ll get the nerve to visit a proper butcher like Le Boucherie Gardil on the Île. 

I used to see Jacques Pepin now and then at the James Beard House, when I was a volunteer house photographer. We shot for our supper several nights a week and I sketched the chefs as well. When I had a Chef portrait exhibit at the house, I painted the chefs on a jacket to wear to the opening. 

Guests wanted the painted chefs jacket, not the portraits = my newest profession. The top chefs offered dinner at their restaurants instead of payment. I ate very well that year.

 I’m still sketching ‘chef’ bears for the January letter.

Along with watching cooking videos, I’m obsessed silly cat videos. Are you?

And painting their portraits among other things. 

Creating December Map, Ourson Guimauve

 

We had the annual snow spritz yesterday! Bear was thrilled. 

I was thrilled to find Le Figaro’s very serious analysis of the best chocolate marshmallow bears in Paris. Perfect for the December map👏

Best Galette des Rois Ile de France

 

Bear 🐻 loves doing galette research every January. Early Saturday morning we went to find the Best Galette des Rois (King’s Cake) in Ile de France according to the soc of Boulangeries. 

I’ve done it before. Its always an adventure visiting the hinterlands of Paris where few tourists venture, me included.  

La Fabrique aux Gourmandises is in the further reaches of the 14th. Its an excellent boulangerie. The line was short at 9:30 am. Much longer when we came out. 

Bear made a big study. 

The winning boulangerie gets to keep the smaller cup. The grand trophy cup is passed on to next year’s galette winner. The golden winning decal stays forever on the window or on roof. La Fabrique won best croissant in 2019 (see facade shot). 

These feves are unusual (the hidden porcelain charm in each galette) - portraits of the boulangerie chefs.

It’s very unusual to get a feve and a crown with the smaller size galette. 

It was instant love when Bear saw Cyril Lignac’s little bear charms. Guess who gave in to 🐻. 

Back home a stop in Boulanger de la Tour to taste test galettes. 

Outside, the street cleaning guy was ‘leché vitrine’ de la Tour’s pastry window. I said,”they’re good aren’t they?” He said, “j’aime le tartelette citron ❤️“ I said I preferred Pierre Hermé’tarte, “plus de citron.” He said, “trop sucrée ici?” I nodded yes. I asked, “ever tasted de la Tour’s viennoisserie? Jamais. Stay here” I ran inside to get him a Pain aux raisin (the best in the city imho).

The last 4 days I’ve been eating, 

Sketching and painting galettes. And putting a bird on them 🐦 Back to finishing the December map💌📮 XOXO 🐻😃

Fauchon Thé et Infusions

Yesterday I continued my hunt to paint Fauchon’s rose bud tea.

They have a new shop 

At 11, Place de Madeleine. 👏 Granted its tiny and mostly teas, plus tea accessories. 

Inside endless cabinets of exotic teas. 

Inhale and choose. 

But its Fauchon. You can order way more goodies online. Do they ship overseas? No idea.

They still have those hot pink Grosgrain ribbons 👏

And their logo mugs 👏

For years I’ve flirted with their hourglass tea timer. Could it work for procrastination? 

3-4-5 minutes to get down to work. Then maybe an alarm could go off - Notre Dame’s bells? 

Mariage Frere’s Teas is a few doors down. 

A little further, red-tinned epicerie Hediard may re-open in the distant rosy future. I got home in time for curfew at 6 PM clutching my tea. Sometimes a bottle of rose buds is the best distraction from all the chaos going on.  Bonne rosy weekend PBers ❤️🐻🌹💋