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Fri, 08 Apr 2005

Paris (1)

As it happened, I made it onto the TGV by literally 8 seconds. (I counted.) That's the time from when I jumped on, after tossing my luggage aboard, past the platform guard yelling "Allez! Allez!", just like in the movies, until the time the door was slammed shut. OK, allow another 3 or 4 seconds for the train to start moving. This was the result of a wrong turn inside the Geneva train station caused by poor signage. (My instinct, and Eliot's advice, was to go the other way, but I decided to rely on the sign. Berch on Food's advice is to go with your instincts in matters of food and travel.)

So... the TGV. Frankly, compared to the Swiss ICN, it was not all that. At least I got a non-smoking car, and it was not initially full, leaving an empty seat across from me and one next to me, but they all filled up around Mâcon. It was not mealtime, and I had a big dinner planned for Paris, but I did want coffee, so I made my way many, many, cars to the dining car, which was... a snack bar. The coffee was good (not as good as on the Swiss train) but as I watched the food come out of the tiny kitchenette, I was glad I'd lunched in the Elvetino. It was not bad-looking, in the sense of unappetizing, but I has expected more from the SNCF's premium train service. (Presumably other, newer trains, on different routes, have better food service.)

The TGV is, at least, very fast, on the Mâcon to Paris segment, and we arrived at Gare de Lyon in plenty of time, in fact about 3 minutes early. I found the nearest ATM, hailed a taxi, and found a delightful driver who wanted to chat in English, and had no problem getting me through the beginnings of rush-hour traffic to my apartment. Taking my cue from the London portion of the trip, and on the advice of some friends on The Well, I found a lovely weekly-rental apartment from RothRay Apartments. The apartment was on rue Bernard Palissy, which is a small street just a short block from St-Germain des Prés (the intersection of boulevard St-Germain and rue de Rennes), adjacent to the Metro, as well as Left Bank fixtures Cafe Flore, Les Deux Magots, and Brasserie Lipp. It's hard to conceive of a better location to stay in Paris if you want to be in the heart of everything.

I was greeted by Mr. Ray Lampard, the proprietor, at the corner and welcomed to the apartment and shown the ropes. (I give RothRay my highest recommendation, and really hope to stay in one of their apartments again on future trips.) The apartment was large and comfortable, and I had time to unpack before setting out.

As it happened, my week in Paris coincided with visits from other friends from The Well, so we decided to meet up for dinner on my first night there. The choice was Chez Paul, on rue de Charonne, in the 11th arrondissement, near the Opera Bastille. The six of us were escorted to the upstairs dining room, cozy on a chilly night, and perused the lengthy menu. Chez Paul has a pretty good range of cuisine traditionelle, and though almost everyone opted for pot au feu, I started with a terrine of chicken livers with armagnac and sweet red cabbage, and proceeded to a main course of rolled stuffed rabbit breast with chevre and white sauce. Both were quite tasty. To my great delight, a couple of my fellow diners decided to forego the os de moelle (marrow bones) from their pot au feu, and I greedily accepted them and spread the slow-cooked beef marrow on crusts of bread. Kathleen selected the wine based on a previous visit to Chez Paul -- an interesting Rhone, Coteaux de Tricastrin, from Domaine Saint-Luc (2001).

I was a little tired from traveling, but managed to stop by the Monoprix near my apartment to pick up some provisions. Amazingly, the Parisian supermarkets exceed even the Tesco/Sainsbury branches mentioned below in quality and variety. They're no match for Paris's specialty stores and open markets for freshness and unusual items, but I'd love to live next door to a Monoprix or Francprix anywhere. After the day's travels, I slept in, and prepared some strong coffee, and brunched on a croissant, terrine of duck with armagnac, some freshly-smoked salmon lox, and some Greek taramasalata.

Thus fortified, I set out for a day of touring, including wandering all over the Left Bank, including the little side streets of the Quartier Latin, remembering yet again how small and accessible a scale Paris is set in, and with a good pair of legs and a Metro pass you can be anywhere pretty quickly if need be. I returned to change for dinner, and after deciding to stay on the Left Bank, picked out the Polidor for an informal dinner. The Crémerie-Restaurant Polidor, on rue Monsieur-le-Prince near Odéon in the 6th, has been around since the middle of the 19th century, and in fact started out as a creamery and sweet bakery. It was said to have been André Gide's favorite place, and James Joyce and Ernest Hemingway also put in appearances over the years.

Nothing is cheap in Paris in 2005, but it's among the more reasonably-priced traditional bistros, and is full of students, notional artists and writers, and so forth. (I shared a table with two American students who ended up in a faux pas involving credit cards, but it was sorted out eventually.)

The service at Le Polidor is friendly, and the waitress recommended the pumpkin soup, which was delicious. My main course was an entrecôte of beef, known to Americans as a rib-eye steak. (In some Anglo-American usages, an "entrecote" is a strip-loin steak, but the true entrecôte is cut from the rib.) My steak was no better than average, although prepared with care, and I recalled that I had been warned that except in the very best places, French beef is no match for American (or South American) beef. C'est la vie. It was accompanied by the ubiquitous frites, and they're better in Paris than anywhere else except maybe Belgium. Le Polidor still makes exceptional desserts, though, and my tarte tatin was wonderful. The prix-fixe menu included a glass of house wine, which was a well-rounded Bordeaux. As always when I eat sugar, especially with wine or other alcohol, I got an amazing burst of energy, and after paying the bill I set off, at 10 or 11 pm, for a brisk walk all over the neighborhood, until I was wound down enough to hit the sack.

Posted at 22:31 | permanent link

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