Salon du Livre

Vendredi 22 Mars Salon du Livre 2013 22 - 25

Paris is a bookish town. Where else do you see signs for a book fair like Salon du Livre plastered on the fronts of all the buses. Or get the catalog attached to your free metro paper? Not in New York I can tell you. Students of all ages get in free too. The joint was jammed.
 

I hung out mostly in the Culinary Square - stand X77. I'm addicted to cooking demos since the Omnivore Festival and what better way to practice your French comprehension?

I was delighted to see my landlady, Rachel Khoo's The Little Paris Kitchen now has a French edition, so the French can learn a few tricks from a Brit.
 

The French publisher tons of novelty cookbooks focused on one subject packaged in a shaped format. Plus stacks of cooking kits with all the essential bits like molds or stamps included.
 

Of course there were real edible macarons for sale
.

And macaron-shaped recipe books. This one looks like an open box of macs. Most of these single subject books are quite cheap in the 6€ area and you can find them at Amazon.fr

On to the delectable demos - Friday I caught top star pastry chef Christolphe Felder.
 

Making financiers with a touch of strawberry embedded in them.
 

Christophe Felder has a new iPad app out with demos for 200 recipes called 'Patisserie!'. You might have to be French to download it from the Apple store. Qui sait?
 

Food scientist Hervé This is France's Harold McGee with a big helping of magician thrown in. His area of scientific research is molecular gastronomy. He put on a terrific show for a pack of school kids on how egg whites are actually yellow. If you add a touch of water to your egg 'whites' they will foam up considerably. Demonstrated by turning the bowl upside down over his head. Fortunately the egg white emulsion stayed put. Loads of fun. A real charmer.
 

On Saturday I caught top cooking blogger Pascale Weeks of cest moi qui lai fait! She was perhaps the 1st French blogger to start doing a slew of cookbooks and is hugely popular for her excellent recipes. Do take a look.
Pascale's merinque Pavlovas were to die for. I managed to grab a forkful. If you're in Paris run to Porte de Versailles for the Salon du Livre. Why not?
 

Chocolaterie Servant

Mardi 14 Mars Chocolaterie Servant

This is Dominique Autret, whose parents started Chocolaterie Servant. Even as a child she was following in their footsteps.

Chocolaterie Servant in d'Auteuil has to be one of Paris' prettiest chocolate shops

Has anything changed at Servant since they opened in 1913?

Only that they're celebrating their one hundreth birthday.

Wouldn't you just love to click your orange heels together and be here now?

Clearly they are fond of the color orange, a big favorite in Paris.

Not an Easter egg or poule in the maison is missing an orange ribbon.

Who knew chickens could be so beautiful?

Not too far from Servant you can drop in the Marie Laurencin exhibit at musee Marmottan on until June 30th. Can one doubt that Laurencin, a celebrity portrait painter, fed her sitters chocolates from Servant?

The crowd was quite elegant and looked to have just come from Chocolaterie Servant...well I did.

I tried desperately to save my praline-filled chocolate chicken and little lamb but forget about that! Do visit both Laurencin + Servant chocolates when you're in Paris.

30, d'Auteuil 75016

Jour du Macaron 2013

Mercredi 20 Mars Jour du Macaron 2013

Yesterday was the day we wait for all year - JOUR DU MACARON !
Started by patissier Pierre Hermé 7 years ago as a grand gesture to both share his fabulous macarons with the city of Paris and give a generous donation to a charity. Now all the pastry chefs of the organization Relais Desserts have joined in world wide and Jour du Macaron is an annual event everywhere you can find Relais members. And there are so many flavors to choose from!

Now that is an event I would most definitely want to attend. Next year?  Thanks so much for you posts. It is an honour to experience Paris through you and your shoes.

Whoops! These are ballerines from PrettyBallerinas.com...but just as pretty as macarons and easy to mix up don't you think?

Oh why didn't I try Pierre Herme's flavor of the month 'Celeste'/fruit de la passion, rhubarbe et fraises? Ah the best laid plans of macaron hunters...

Jean-Paul Hévin had pretty terrific flavors too. I must admit I'm saving my cache of macs to paint and I haven't tasted any yet!?
 

Patisseries I visited yesterday:

1. Pierre Hermé (5 different boutiques - 1 macaron each)

2. Jean-Paul Hévin

3. Sadaharu Aoki

4. Arnaud Larher (2x) 

5. Dalloyau

6. Laurent Duchêne

I was in the recovery ward last night.
 

Wouldn't you be?
 

But worth every moment of racing around.

The deserving charity this year is Vaincre la mucoviscidose/cystic fibrosis - a worthy cause.
 

 

Something new this year - an adorable Spring green tablier/apron you could buy for 10 euro donation that went totally to Vaincre la mucoviscidose. I bought one.

And there's a contest - take your pictures wearing the tablier, send it in to the Relais Desserts facebook page and pray you get enough votes to win a day of tasting in Pierre Herme's atelier.

 

No wonder Leche-vitrine/'licking the window' was invented by the French. What haven't they invented? Bear doesn't mess around with hanging outside looking in. He jumps into the fray and likes to get up close and personal to the macarons.

MERCI JOUR du MACARON!
 

The Element

Mardi 19 Mars in The Element

Yesterday Sue said the ice cream boxes look like

Pans of watercolor. It must be why I love ice cream so much - a well known essential element to joie de vivre.

Today I got my 3-month Paris swim pass.

Water is an element I can't live without (well who can?).

Certainly the chefs at the Omnivore Festival are IN their element, painting creatively with flavors and mysterious syrups.

Ken Robinson in The Element says:

The Element is the meeting point between natural aptitude and personal passion. When people are in their Element, they connect with something fundamental to their sense of identity, purpose, and well-being. Being there provides a sense of self-revelation, of defining who they really are and what they’re really meant to be doing with their lives. This is why many of the people in the book describe finding their Element as an epiphany.

How do we find the Element in ourselves and in others? There isn’t a rigid formula. The Element is different for everyone.

I just discovered Ken's The Element and bells went off. I understood that coming to Paris has put me in my Element. I'm surrounded by so much visual inspiration I can hardly keep up.

Funnily enough it wasn't even my idea. Max Rivers said I should move to Paris well over a year ago and I laughed at him.

~ 

Often we need other people to help us recognize our real talents. Often we can help other people to discover theirs.

~

I finally rationalized to myself that I would be saving hugely on all the airfare I was throwing at AirFrance.

Many people set aside their passions to pursue things they don't care about for the sake of financial security.

Paris is so where I belong.

...in this book people have identified the sweet spot for themselves. They have discovered their Element - the place where the things you love to do  and the things you are good at come together.

We need to make sure that all people have the chance to do what they should be doing, to discover the Element in themselves and in their own way.

I know this post is all over the map and I've just put a toe into The Element but it touches so many chords I wanted to share it with you. You can read a sample on Amazon. Enjoy!

Omnivore Paris 2013

Dimanche 17 mars Omnivore Paris 17 - 19 mars
~

The Omnivore festival de la Jeune Cuisine is being held at la Maison de la Mutalite 17-19 March. Hurry over and goute

First in the door grab a delicious taste of Swiss Moevenpick ice cream - I've heard so much about this ice cream and every word is true.

More squares of delight - Le Beurre Bordier - taste a 'flight' of 6-7 flavors to fine tune your taste buds.

To taste all the Fromages d'Italie you must do it in the correct order or forgetaboutit.
UNO...due..tre

The whole 3rd floor is dedicated to le tasting marche. I fell instantly in love with these hairy free near-cousins of the Kiwi grown in Sud ouest France - le Nergi.

'Bebe' kale was at Omnivore thanks to Kristen's Kale Project I'll bet. You can eat the bebe version raw. Who knew?

A plethora of exotic veggies were been transformed into an exquisite dish

By top chef Frederic Jaunault MOF, a sculptur of fruits and vegetables

Regarde.

We got to taste a mini version of this...there was ice cream on it.

In the big theatre downstairs constant food shows of international chefs creating savory dishes.

Upstairs la scene sucre will kept me glued to my seat - here master pastry chef Christophe Felder.

Hurry up on over to Omnivore Festival.

You still have time to catch the shows and goute, goute, goute!