* * *

Perhaps the Fiat Group (Fiat, Alfa Romeo, Lancia, Abarth, Maserati and Jeep) picked up on some esoteric Italian karma when they chose Paris’s Rond-Point for their showroom.  Back in the 1770s, there was an amusement park called “Le Colisée” (The Coliseum) on the site. Years later, it was the home of Meyerbeer, the German composer who loved Italy so much that he changed his name from Jacob to Giacomo.

In 2006, Fiat hired star designer Jean-Michel Wilmotte to create a spiral-centric building that bears a distinct resemblance to the toy garages of childhood dreams.  Great autos from the past make cameo appearances among the latest models. At present, the Motor Village shines the headlights on dashing Alfa Romeos like the Romeo Guilia T2 pictured below.

With Chef Vittorio Beltramelli in the kitchen, NoLita’s food is worth a detour on its own. Beltramelli trained with Gualtiero Marchesi (Italy’s first three-star chef) and with Alain Ducasse in Monaco (too many stars to count). Whether it’s a simple plate of mixed grilled vegetables, 18€, or a platter of classic vitello tonnato with capers, 22€, the execution is masterfully Michelin.

While we loved the roasted cod (or merluzzo, proving once again that everything does sound better in Italian), the dish that really wowed us was the barbietola, 22€, a can’t-be-beat beet risotto with a shot of emerald herbs and parmesan.

Aside from a few Champagnes mixed in with the Spumantes, the wine list is totally Italian, with prices that range from simpatico Toscano Ruffino, 32€, to an utterly sensazionale 1995 Tenuto San Guido, 795€.  In other words, there’s fuel for the Fiat crowd as well as for Maserati MC12 drivers.

NoLita. 2 Rond-Point des Champs-Elysées, 8th arrondissement. Metro Franklin D. Roosevelt. Tel. 01 53 75 78 78.  Open Mon.-Sat. for lunch and dinner, Sun for brunch. http://www.nolita-ristorante.fr/

© 2013, Corinne LaBalme

Corinne LaBalme, a Paris-based writer, journalist and editor, is currently developing a series of lifestyle documentaries for Muses Productions.

Fish-spawn addicts already know the drill. Sturgeon season ends in March and the last fish in the net provide deliciously low-salt caviar with a distinctive “woodsy freshness” on the palate. Astara, a company that usually deals exclusively with restaurants, is reaching out to the public, but only through June.

Yes, like the Franklin Mint, this is a limited edition offer. If you lust for a tin of seasonal proto-sturgeon, you need to hit three lucky stores. Only La Grande Epicerie at the Bon Marché, the Galéries Gourmandes at the Palais de Congrès (Porte Maillot) and the Ferme d’Hugo (Place Victor Hugo) will stock Astara’s “Sélection de Printemps” from March 21 to June 30, 2013. Prices vary from 13 € for 10 grams (barely a lick and a promise) to 162 € (125 grams) … a major investment that builds a Really Big Blini.

Of course, it’s best to have seasonal caviar served an iced platter.  When shoppers tire of browsing through the Paule K and Prada racks at Printemps, they can make their way to the sixth floor brasserie where Astara has installed an ephemeral FishBar through April 13.

Seating beneath the dome at Printemps.

It’s already serving luscious salmon salads and two plush variations of tarama (pink and white), but remember that the “Sélection de Printemps” caviar (served with a flute of Champagne) won’t light up the menu until March 21.

Printemps, 64, bd Haussmann, 9th arr. Metro Havre Caumartin. Closed Sunday.

For years, Nikita, the Russian cabaret in the 16th arrondissement, has been the classic Russkie rendezvous in Paris, with balalaika players, vast vodka resources, and red velvet banquettes that play to our White Russian, Tzarist fantasies.

IKRA, which opened on the Left Bank last October, takes a different tack.

“We wanted Russian, but not so traditional,” says owner Alain Kocer, an Istanbul-born, Macedonian architect, about his first foray into the Paris restaurant fray.

Svetlana at the red piano at Ikra.

The décor is sleekly contemporary (with a virtual fireplace) and a big red piano where artists like Moscow-via-Tashkent Svetlana hold court. Chef Clément Bouldoires provides a lighter spin on classics like koulibiac, beef stroganoff, and pear vatrouchka. And of course, there’s caviar… which is what ‘ikra’ means back in the ex-USSR.

Director Mischa Korotkov, from Saint Petersburg, doubles as barman and neatly juggles bottles à la Tom Kruzki. Not satisfied with pouring Stoli all night, Mischa invented a colorful collection of molecular (not Molotov) cocktails like vodka/manzana-based Matrechka or apricot/amaretto Russian Gigolo that get an extra taste-burst from Marx-ist (that’s Thierry, not Karl) fruit ‘pearls’.

At happy hour (every day from 3 pm to 8 pm), these adventurous cocktails cost only 5€. There’s a comrade-friendly 14.90 € lunch too. A three-course dinner for two is approximately 70€ before wine.  Last dinner orders at 11:30 pm … 365 days of the year.

IKRA, 119 Boulevard Raspail, 6th arrondissement. Tel: 01 45 48 12 33. Metro Notre Dame des Champs. Open daily from 7:30 am to 2 am.

© 2013, Corinne LaBalme

Corinne LaBalme, a Paris-based writer, journalist and editor, is currently working on development of a series lifestyle documentaries for Muses Productions.

As a favor to a French expert in gastronomy I joined him for dinner at Oth Sombath, a French-Thai restaurant where he wished to introduce me to the reputedly splendid cuisine of the Thai chef whose name graces the restaurant.

My favor in accepting the invitation was not in providing the pleasure of my company per se but rather in attending a very good meal in exchange for the even better money that he owed me.

Or perhaps I misunderstood. Perhaps the favor was in exchange for the possibility that I would like the restaurant well enough to write about it.

In that case, he was doing me the favor by inviting me to a restaurant that I would otherwise not think of testing on my own and allowing me to do so without cost. But then would it be fair to recommend the restaurant, assuming I though it worthwhile, to readers who would have to pay to eat here whereas I didn’t?

This is all very complicated, which is why this is not a restaurant review.

A review of the restaurant Oth Sombath, I can well imagine, would speak of the décor signed Patrick Jouin and refer to it as a comfortable 60s futurism with seating for 80 spread over three levels. It would speak at length about Chef Sombath, born in 1965, who spent 14 years preparing refined traditional Thai cuisine at Blue Elephant restaurants in Brussels, London, Liege, and Copenhagen before becoming executive chef at Paris’s Blue Elephant from 1991 (its opening) until 1997, and who then lorded over the kitchen in several other restaurants in Paris before spreading his wings with the creation of his namesake restaurant in 2008.

But I don’t have the mind for a review right now.

Perhaps there were no favors at all in my accepting a free meal at a noteworthy restaurant but rather a simple exchange, a contract of sorts: I in the role of a journalist get to know a restaurant that is otherwise off my radar but that may be worth knowing, while the organizer of the dinner gets paid or some other form of credit and the restaurant itself gets reviewed or, better yet, plugged, and in any case examined.

Does it matter whether or not the inviting expert in gastronomy owes the journalist money when what the reader would rather know is whether Oth Sombath is or is not a noteworthy adventure in the savory marriage of French and Thai cuisines? Come to think of it, he expert might well claim that the journalist actually owed him more and would explain that when the journalist paid for the expert’s 4-star hotel room and a good meal during a gastronomic trip outside of Paris during which the expert was suffering from an empty wallet he was in fact making scant compensation for the expert’s expertise and his capacity to arrange culinary discoveries. Anyway, aren’t friend supposed to help each other? How about colleagues?

Given all that, would you trust me if I said that I liked the restaurant Oth Sombath? That last question is hypothetical since this not a restaurant review.

The question remains: what will I do when someone next asks, as happens, “What do you know about Thai food in Paris?” or “Do you know of any good gluten-free restaurants?”

Will I tell that person about Oth Sombath’s new Thai or French-Thai cuisine? How it’s gluten free, attractively presented, well served? After all, this is a more central, upscale, tourist-friendly area than the venue I covered the last time I wrote about a Thai restaurant. People staying in this area might actually appreciate it. Would I withhold? I certainly can’t see myself saying that there’s anything special about the Mme Shawn chain of decent (yawn), moderately-priced Thai restaurants that have sprouted up in Paris over the past few years.

I mean, I can’t just delete from my mind the knowledge that I know have. And I don’t have a bone to pick with Oth Sombath, nor, time having passed, with the gastronomy expert who may or may not owe me money.

I could certainly, should the occasion present itself, speak of Chef Sombath’s hoy shell or roast scallops with a coriander sauce, a direct, fresh Thaified French dish, on the one hand, and his pet tom ka or coconut soup with slices of duck steak, a well-balanced Frenchified Thai vélouté, on the other. I could speak of his pla yang or gilthead baked in a banana leaf with Thai herbs and spices, a dish both delicate and simple, and of his neua luk wa or fillet of beef flavored with banana and cumin. Of course, if I were to write a review I would have to say that the latter dish lacked harmony since the banana overwhelmed the veal.

Would anyone trust me if I disclosed how I came to know such a restaurant? Would it be honest to recommend that someone pay 100€ for a meal (tasting menu plus wines) that I found laudable (with especially attentive chef and staff) while paying 0€? Unless it was actually an exchange for the money I may or may not have been owed, in case it would have to have laudable at 155€, which would get me rethinking the meaning of “laudable,” not to mention “friend” and “colleague.”

I’m unable to write a review of Oth Sombath not because of contractual implications or petty quarrels but because, as I sit here this evening, I’m quite disturbed by the question of the ethics of food writing.

Does ethical food writing preclude a free meal? Is receiving a free meal as a way of testing the restaurant any different from receiving a free bottle of wine or an ipad as a way of testing them? Do things only become complicated when a person at one end of the invitation arrives at the table being owed something, or believing that he’s owed something, or being told that he owes something, by/to someone footing (or arranging for the footing) of the bill?

I don’t know. This is all very complicated. Who can write an earnest review with those questions in mind? I certainly can’t.

I’ll just reset the counter to zero and not even attempt a restaurant review today.

Oth Sombath, 184 rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré, 8th arr. Metro Saint-Philippe-du-Roule. Tel. 01 42 56 55 55. Closed Sun. Lunch menus 28 and 35€, count about 63€ for 3 course à la carte + wine. Tasting menu 70€.

© 2012, Gary Lee Kraut

There were various other Fourth of July parties in Paris, of course, but I didn’t get invited to any of them either. I could have gone to the Franco-American Fourth of July ceremony at Lafayette’s tomb, but I’d been there last year (if you missed the article I wrote about that last year you can read it by clicking here or watch my audio slide-show of the event by clicking here.)

Still, I was feeling a bit red-white-and-bluish (not to be confused with the colors of the French flag which is blue, white, and red) today, so I accepted an invitation to Cupcake Camp.

Cupcake Camp was organized in Bistrot Vivienne, an otherwise pleasant bistro in the 2nd arrondissement that had been cleared of its pleasantness for the occasion, by Cat Beurnier, a cupcake baker who operates Sugar Daze, and Bryan Pirolli, a master’s student and part-time cook (photo left).

I’d hoped to learn more about Cat and Bryan during Cupcake Camp but they were quite the busy camp leaders since the bistro was a-swarm with people trying to make the best out of the 10-euro entrance fee which allowed for all the cupcakes you can eat plus one drink.

From the looks of things this afternoon it appears that if you give a couple hundred Americans (and assorted French friends) a choice of any beverage with their cupcake the majority will pick Diet Coke—or Coke Light as it’s called in France where no one will ever admit that she’s on a diet but where everyone wants to feel light.

“Proceeds from the event,” to quote Cat and Bryan’s press release, “will support a group spearheaded by friends of Cupcake Camp Paris, Rebuilding Haiti Now.” I’m not sure what the group actually does but I must say that only Americans are capable of using cupcakes to raise funds for earthquake victims, just one more thing we can be proud of.

The press release also states that “Cupcake Camp is a tradition that hails from California, created by Ariel Waldman” and that “the cupcake can be considered the US’ defining culinary contribution to the world.”

I know nothing about Ariel Waldman and won’t bother Googling the name because as far as I could tell Cupcake Camp Paris was simply an occasion to bake and eat cupcakes with proceeds going to charity. It didn’t feel like something that would “hail” from anywhere, let alone California, or need to be “created,” let alone by someone named Ariel Waldman!

Nevertheless, today’s Cupcake Camp was a rousing success to judge by the donations/entrance fees, the crowds, the general good cheer, and the quantity of cupcakes and Coke Light consumed.

Still, I’m a bit concerned about that “defining culinary contribution to the world” line. I only tried three cupcakes of the 30 or so varieties that I saw in the boxes, and there may have been many more that I didn’t see, so I can’t judge overall quality from my small sampling; I nevertheless came away with a vision of a dozen young women baking through the night while getting slaphappy on sugar and going heavy on the icing. Some things just weren’t meant to define us abroad.

Even as out-of-the-loop as I am regarding American baking trends, I have naturally been aware for a number of years now of the cupcake fad back home. When in the U.S. I can’t visit anyone with children under 25 without being offered a cupcake. At one party in New Jersey last year, ostensibly a Thanksgiving gathering, the oohs and ahs came not with the presentation of the turkey but with that of the cupcakes. A half-dozen tweens and teens stood around the dessert table waiting to see whose creations the guests would choose, each one smudging the icing of the competition so that hers would stand out as the prettiest. They were so disappointed when I didn’t pick one that I nearly felt unpatriotic for going for the pumpkin pie.

Oddly enough, going to Cupcake Camp on the Fourth of July didn’t make me feel any more patriotic. In fact, I was surprised to see how little effort was made to make the connection between our “defining culinary contribution” and Independence Day.

Entries to the “Most Patriotic Cupcake” competition (above) were so scant that I wondered if Cupcake Camp founder Ariel Waldman might have disallowed the combination of red, white, and blue icing in the camp rules. Either that or blue icing is hard to come by in Paris and no one realized that blueberry season has just begun.

Anyway, as you can see from the photos above, the entries to the various competitions did look quite good, and I’m sure there were some true winners among them.

The judges also looked quite good, as you can see below.

On the right is travel writer Heather Stimmler-Hall. Click here to read an interview with her on France Revisited following the release of her book “Naughty Paris: A Ladies Guide to a Sexy City.”

In the middle is Synie Georgulas, a professional baker, owner of the bakery-tea room Synie’s Cupcakes, whom I’ll be interviewing later this month in further explorations into cupcakes.

On the left is Lindsey Tramuta, whose cupcake credentials include her musings on the blog Lost In Cheeseland.

I should note that the photo above was taking prior to the start of their judging duties, which may explain why they look so happy to be there.

Just kidding, Cat. It was a great event, just lacked a bit of Fourth of July spirit.

Speaking of cats: the Fourth of July, also known as July 4, is also my cat’s birthday. He’s now 11. Happy birthday, Moumoon!

Cameroonian cuisine is inspired by both the sea and the land, and Massaï Mara widens the palate to the cuisines of African neighbors, some of which will be familiar to those who know Creole cooking.

Not knowing where to start I was happy to try the chef’s assortment as an appetizer: beef samosa, crayfish and banana beignets, shrimp acras (fritters), plantain bananas. Plaintains, firmer and more starch-like than the fruity bananas we mostly consume, often accompanies dishes in central Africa, as well as in South America and the West Indies.

As main course there are brochettes (beef or prawns) and fish (e.g. tilapia), but I went for unfamiliar Cameroonian territory with beef ndolé. Ndolé is a long-simmered dish with a spinach-like leaf and a peanut-based sauce. It’s served here with golden-brown plaintains and rice. Shrip ndolé or beef and shrimp ndolé are also available.

The food was pleasant, I especially enjoyed the variety of appetizers, but what would lead me to return is the warm atmosphere of Massaï Mara, a gathering place for the Cameroonian (and wider central African) community in Paris, led by the bright and joyful smile of owner Alice Abeng.

Alice Abeng, owner of Massai Mara, and Victor Sosso, chef. Photo GLK

Cameroon was a German colony from 1884 to 1919 and a mostly French (partly British) territory after WWI, French Cameroun (with a u) became independent in 1960, and British Cameroon in 1961, leading to the birth of the Republic of Cameroon, now with a population of about 20 million. Its 20th-century ties with France mean that the Cameroon community in Paris well established. Encounter the community and the cuisine at Massaï Mara.

Massaï Mara, 66 rue Armand Carrel, 19th arrondissement, Paris. Tel. 01 42 08 00 65. Metro Jaurès.www.massaimara.fr. Closed Saturday lunch and Sunday. Open late. Massaï Mara often has live African music on Thursday, when there’s an all-you-can-eat buffet.

See where the Republic of Cameroon is on the map by clicking here.

(c) 2010, Gary Lee Kraut

-The attack may be frustration at having gotten lost, relief at having arrived, apology for having gotten laid up, and irritation at having been led so far off track.
-The evolution is hopefully good humor, copious servings, conviviality, kind service, a meal well earned.
-The finish is satisfaction, amusement, a sense that at least there’s a story to tell (the best way to savor a meal), and any apprehension of the journey home tempered by a general sense of well-being.

In the case of the suburban adventures for this article, those dinners also have the taste of samosa, badji, dall, curry, tikka, kormas, vindaloo, tandoori, nan, massala, biryani, lassi, and other Indian offerings for which I claim no expertise, only appetite.

The expertise I left to Fabien Nègre, the gastronomic philosopher and all-round loquacious bon vivant whom I frequently turn to regarding restaurant-related matters. Fabien recently suggested that I join him at two Indian restaurants, the first in Paris’s southern suburb of Le Plessis Robinson, the second in the northern suburb of Asnières. Visitors to Paris are unlikely to have heard of either suburb because they have no known sights or notable riots there.

If seeking Indian adventures within the city limits, skip directly to the second part of this article since the first part concerns restaurants that require some logistical effort if journeying from the center of Paris.

Part I: Suburban Adventures

Rajasthan

I don’t want to discourage anyone from enjoying a decent lamb tikka massala, but it took me 90 minutes by public transportation (metro, suburban train, bus) from the center of Paris to get to Rajasthan in the southern suburb of Le Plessis Robinson. Furthermore, I was late getting started (well, Fabien had told me he’d be in the area all evening and could show up at any time).

Admittedly, there was a limited bus schedule that evening; it should be possible to arrive in less than an hour with good connections. Still, the attack had a distinct taste of “this better be good.” Fabien greeted me with an “I’ve been here since 7” (it was now 10) to which I responded, “We only have an hour before the last bus.”

Having got out of the way, Fabien then introduced me to Chaudhary Maqsood, the owner, whose warm welcome is the kind that one always hopes for after a long journey.

Rather than take the time to survey the menu Fabien and I simply ordered everything and instructed the waiter to keep it coming. For 55 minutes he did. I think that some of it was quite good and some of it was more ordinary and that we were kindly served in a comfortable setting of suburban ease, and I have vaguely fond memories of a lamb tikka massala, or was it a biryani (possibly both), but I was so focused on trying a dozen dishes in record time while listening to Fabien describe the difference between Indian regional cuisine and the state of contemporary French cuisine that I didn’t bother to take notes. Occasionally I had to warn Fabien to cut down on the commentary of the whos and whats the kitchen so that he would eat and we could get out in time.

The fact that our meal was one hour too short is no reflection on the restaurant itself, and in retrospect we could have had an additional 20 minutes if the bus schedule had been correct. I nevertheless include waiting on the street as part of the attraction of this restaurant adventure since it gave us a chance to learn about the origins and Fancilian life of the members of the kitchen staff who were also waiting for the last bus. To hear Fabien discuss Delhi with the dishwasher you’d think they actually grew up in the same neighborhood, but I don’t know if Fabien has ever been further east than Venice.

In short, if you have a long-distance desire for honorable Indian food, a hankering for a glimpse of a relatively peaceable southern suburb, and a good book to read (or Fabien to listen to) on the train, then put Rajasthan on the list.

Rajasthan, 11 Grande Rue, 92350 Le Plessis Robinson. Tel. 01 40 83 09 51. www.restorajasthan.com. Open daily. Take RER B to Robinson then Bus 179, 195, 390 or 395 to the Coeur de Ville stop. The restaurant is then 100 yards away. With waiting time for RER and bus the trip will ideally take about 1 hour from the center of Paris.

Kaveri

Kaveri, named for a river in western India, sits across the highway from a northern whip of the Seine in the working-class suburb of Asnières. The restaurant’s immediate surroundings are actually more given over to middle-class apartments with a view of the Seine, and Loreal has offices nearby. Nevertheless, one doesn’t typically go to Asnières for quality, other than to go to the well-reputed Théâtre de Gennevilliers, which one passes when walking from the metro to the restaurant. Nevertheless, Kaveri is a more polished and slightly pricier restaurant than Rajasthan. It isn’t a high-end restaurant but its spacious, purified décor, relatively devoid of Indian clichés, does lend itself to business lunches and genteel dinners.

Reaching Kaveri by public transportation from the center of Paris should take less than 45 minutes. It’s a straight if bifurcated shot on metro line 13, direction Asnières-Gennevilliers, to the Gabriel Péri stop. The restaurant is then a 15-minute walk (1/2 mile) from the station (have GPS or a map).

Those 45 minutes don’t take into account the haphazard schedule of northbound line 13, whose infamous delays and crowding have led users to accuse the subway system of ignoring their plight in favor of lines servicing wealthier suburbs. (Plans are underway to gradually improve service on the line beginning in 2011.) Once again it took me 90 minutes to get there—again no fault of the restaurant.

This time I hooked up with Fabien while we were both waiting for the metro at Place de Clichy. It was a long, crowded, annoying wait of about 30 minutes, after which we let a few packed trains go by before stepping on, but there is never dead air with Fabien. By the time we arrived at the restaurant I knew a thousand fascinating and forgettable facts about the River Kaveri, the history of line 13, and the life of Didier Gobardhan, the French-Indian owner of the restaurant we were going to test, along with a few things about Younis Mohammad, the Pakistani chef.

Once arrived, Fabien and I again ordered everything on the menu but this time settled in for the long run. All and all it was very good and well spiced though slightly uneven meal (some dishes overcooked). As a starter, the bara kabab (lamb) won out over the tandoori quail, with chicken tikki winning the bronze. For a main course, the butter chicken and the eggplant with prawn were both excellent, and the dal sag added good spinach-and-lentil variety to the meal. I enjoyed a mango lassi and appreciated getting to know Grover Vineyards’ ripe Bordeaux-leaning Indian cabernet sauvignon La Reserve (not that I’m planning on ordering a case).

In short, location, location, location Kaveri has not, but if looking to venture into an unknown suburb with the promise of good butter chicken at the end of the road then it’s well worth considering.

Kaveri, 3-5 quai Aulagnier, 92600 Asnières. Tel. 01 40 86 10 11. www.kaveri.fr. Open daily. Take line 13, direction Asnières-Gennevilliers, to the Gabriel Péri stop. The restaurant is then a 15-minute walk (1/2 mile) from the station (have GPS or a map). Kaveri opened in 2009.

Part II: Urban adventures

Passage Brady, Rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis, La Chapelle

There are two main areas for Indian restaurants in Paris. They’re in separate neighborhoods in the 10th arrondissement but are actually connected as you’ll see below. The more central of the two is Passage Brady, a covered alley that goes from Rue du Faubourg Saint-Martin to Boulevard de Strasbourg and then more picturesquely from Boulevard de Strasbourg to Rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis. Metro stop Strasbourg-Saint-Denis is the point of entry to explore this neighborhood.

I’ve no particular recommendation for Indian restaurants in the passage, which is a polite way of saying that none of them is noteworthy, or as the friend whose office is nearby said when I asked him to he recommended one so that we could have lunch there, “They’re all the same, let’s go somewhere else.”

That shouldn’t deter you from visiting this area because the area surrounding Passage Brady on Rue du Fbg St-Denis is truly one of the most remarkable food streets in Paris. Every return traveler curious about food or ethnic mixes or neighborhood life should put it on his list under the itinerary heading “6:30pm-7:30pm: Wander in unknown neighborhood to work up appetite.”

Here, Indian shops and restaurants coexist in ethnic vibrancy with Black African and North African and otherwise Parisian shops. Easy directions: Start at the arch at the beginning of Rue du Fbg St-Denis and walk north.

The heart of Indian/Pakistani/Sri Lankan commerce in Paris is a 15-minute walk beyond Passage Brady on Fbg St-Denis toward the La Chapelle metro stop, which is why I say that the two Indian areas are actually connected. If out to explore Indian Paris and have a meal, I suggest—for the full rewards of this urban ethnic adventure—visiting Passage Brady and Faubourg St-Denis then walking north, passing scenes of street life (e.g. men gathering by ethnicity outside telephone businesses) and the Gare du Nord train station along the way to the La Chapelle quarter.

The intense subcontinentness of the La Chapelle quarter begins right behind the train station at about #180 rue du Faubourg St-Denis and continues on neighboring Rue Cail, Rue Perdonnet, and Rue Louis Blanc. Somewhat surprisingly there’s a very pretty very French bakery at the corner where Cail meets Louis Blanc, a clear sign that one neighborhood ends and another begins.

The La Chapelle is chock full of inexpensive Indian restaurants, “Indian” being shorthand for Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, and/or Sri Lankan. For what it’s worth, I note that when I asked a Sri Lankan friend (living in the aforementioned suburb of Asnières) to have lunch with me in the area at the restaurant of his choice, he suggested the Sri Lankan restaurant Bharath, and I trust his choice in the matter because I know that his Sri Lankan wife is a very good cook.

Bharath, 51 rue Louis Blanc, 75010 Paris. Tel. 01 42 09 35 84. Metro La Chapelle. At #67 on the same street there’s also a Café Bharath, which is also a restaurant, where I’ve never eaten.

Elsewhere in Paris

Maharaja is a kindly Indian/Sri Lankan find in the Batignolles quarter of the 17th arrondissement. Batignollesis an old-fashion middle-class neighborhood of special attraction to the curious traveler.

Maharaja, 48 rue La Condamine, 17th arr. Tel. 01 43 87 08 22. Metro Place de Clichy, La Fourche, or Rome.www.maharaja-restaurant.com. Open daily.

More bourgeois settings for Indian cuisine are naturally found in upscale areas such as the two following selections on the Left Bank near the river:

New Jawad, 12 avenue Rapp, 7th arr. Tel. 01 47 05 91 37. Metro/RER Pont de l’Alma. Open daily.

Yugaraj, 14 rue Dauphine, 6th arr. Tel. 01 43 26 44 91. Metro Pont Neuf. Closed Mon. all day and Thurs. lunch.

Both are nice, easily accessible, and spiced for French and international taste bud. Where’s the adventure in that?

© 2010, Gary Lee Kraut

I don’t mean to be sexist about this but there’s something sad and unseemly about grown women endlessly tweeting, FBing, blogging, and otherwise texting about what they ate, are eating, and will eat. And it is indeed mostly bloggeuses who operate these chew blogs—their male counterparts at least throw in some wine, perhaps a few beers, before going off to playing with their Wii.

But it isn’t the sex of a food blogger that’s the problem rather the lack thereof. The libido of these wannabe Julies (or is it Julias?) is exclusively and obsessively directed toward what can be bought, prepared, and swallowed. Other than that there’s no there there.

Blogs are of course obsessive by nature. But the better blogs, whether about food or travel or anything else, manage to attach to their chosen obsession some analysis or contemplation or reflection or conviviality surrounding their subject—in short, some humanity, something to share. These aren’t geek blogs about “Mafia Wars” or iPhones, these are supposed to be about food and all that involves: earth, life, culture, exchange, breaking bread, shared conversation, a personal and collective quest for substance and sustenance.

The author enjoys eating local specialties when he travels.

The majority of food bloggers, however, offer neither substance nor sustenance. Even when they present recipes they aren’t really sharing so much as letting you know how they kept busy before sitting down to eat. And there’s never a surprise ending since every mouthful ends with a self-congratulatory “Mmmm!!!”

You can tell a blogger’s at a complete loss for words when there’s a post that contains five close-up images of an éclair in various states of consumption, with the heading “Stopped at Chez Madeleine on the way home. Mmmm!!!” I wish they’d put even a tenth of the time they spend thinking about what goes into their mouth into what comes out of it.

Don’t get me wrong, I have great respect for food writing. There are some very palatable, informative, and entertaining food blogs out there, though I can’t think of any offhand. Perhaps readers can tell me some so that I might present as the plat de résistance. (Disclaimer: Food writing is also a part of my work, though I am more a travel writer and advisor than a food writer.)

Good food writers manage to talk about food while showing some connection between a given food/product/restaurant and people, place, culture, history, geography, economics, even themselves.

Bad food bloggers try to give themselves kitchen cred by dropping names:
“I ate at that bistro that Mark Bittman wrote about in the NY Times and it’s as good as he says it is. Here’s the link to his article.”
“Michelin gives it three stars but I’d only give it two.”
“I started with the Barefoot Contessa recipe but gave it my own personal twist because my favorite vegetable seller Claude had THE BEST avocadoes at the market today.”

They would have us believe that they spend their time hobnobbing with farmers, fishmongers, butchers, produce sellers, and chefs of all kinds, but, like an actor trying to learn acting by watching sitcoms, their characters inevitably come directly from central casting.

Read enough such food blogs and you realize how much of it is food porn, only instead of penetration and bad acting they show engorgement and bad writing, with an apron as protection instead of a condom. “Eat it, baby, eat it… Yeh, lick that hot emulsified sauce, you know you like it! Go ahead, fork it.” Go down on a few of these blogs and your gag reflex kicks in within a few inches.

No wonder “Gourmet” magazine folded. Their readers were too busy blogging about everything they ate to want to cut out and save actual articles. (On the other hand, “Gourmet” had become a hyped up version of those same blogs.)

Bad food blogs are irrepressibly cheery. That might sound like a good thing. Indeed, initially the image they present of the happy, venturesome foodie seems sweet and appealing enough. But follow them for three or four posts as they go about their daily search of multiple Mmmm!!! food orgasms and you’ll find that these food bloggers have created a disturbingly manic food persona for themselves. They are constantly applauding themselves for having a kitchen, an appetite, and a camera. The bad food blogger’s syllogism goes as follows: I love food. You love food. So you love me.

I think I’m going to be sick.

(c) 2010, Gary Lee Kraut
Recipe for this article

Servings: Self
Calories: 0
Preparation time: 24-36 hours
Temperature: May be served hot or cold

Ingredients: 6-10 food blogs, 1 keyboard, 1 website

1. Select 6-10 food blogs. You can get these through your local “food blog” search but I prefer the peppery expression of those available in specialty searches such as “French food blog” or “Italian food blog” or “Southern food blog” or “lonely foodie wants the world to know she exists” or “wealthy traveler finds purpose in life in food.”

Blog posts should be fresh, frequent, and colorful. Look for large gaps of 2 months of blogging as this may be a sign of nervous breakdown. Be wary of a series of blog posts that consist of unformatted images showing close-ups éclairs and cupcakes as these contain few textual nutrients. Avoid blogs that make excessive use of links to articles and videos that are not their own as they contain large quantities of free radicals.

2. Once you have selected food blogs of sufficient self-indulgence, eliminate skin of attitude. Read each for 10 minutes.

3. (optional) Brown slightly by posting one-line comment on Facebook or other social networking site. This may cause loss of some amigos and followers but will bring out the flavor in others.

4. Let simmer for 12-22 hours. Some rant may spill well before then, but personally I like to wait. My own method is to begin this recipe between midnight and 2 a.m. then let simmer until the following evening, however that schedule may be impractical for some. Stir occasionally. Avoid further blog searches as that will dampen spontaneity of rant.

5. When ready, quickly stir until all blogs are fully blended, then place rant layer by layer without allowing previous layer to cool.

6. (optional) I also like to add a glass of whiskey at this point, but other beverages are also possible. Alternately, coffee may be used, but I suggest adding that well before midnight so as to avoid ranting through the night.

7. Limit rant to 2 hours and 800 words. Larger quantities tend to dilute the original flavor of the blended blogs.

8. Select and format photo. Any image showing the author enjoying local food will do.

9. Let sit on desktop overnight or at least 3 hours.

10. Reread, eliminate excess fat, and smooth transitions without seeking perfection as this is intended for relaxed consumption.

11. Serve. I like to use fine France Revisited dishware for this.

In the search for some of the best authentic Southeast Asian cuisine I asked Christian Tan, a private chef specializing in Thai, Cambodian, and Vietnamese cuisine, to join me on a series of lunchtime investigations in the quarter.

The three restaurants noted here—no more expensive and no less decoratively nondescript than most others in the neighborhood—are the fruits of those investigations. Chef Tan considers them good representations of their respective cuisines: Thai, Vietnamese, and Cantonese Chinese. And I thoroughly enjoyed the rare and confident pleasure of having a connoisseur order for me.

Belleville, at the juncture of the 11th, 12, 19th, and 20th arrondissements, has long been a traditional landing point for immigrants and home to financial hardship. Bearing the memory of Edith Piaf, born in 1915 at 72 rue de Belleville, and of the immigration of Jews and Arabs from North Africa in the 1950s and 1960s, the crossroads of the quarter at the Belleville metro station have since the late 1980s been defined as Paris’s second major Asian quarter, after the city’s dominant Chinatown in the areas surrounding avenue de Choisy and avenue d’Ivry in the 13th arrondissement. The enriching of the Paris’s eastern arrondissements has mapped the surrounding neighborhoods on the route to Parisian gentrification, yet Southeast Asia dominates at the crossroads and North Africa holds firm in some of the neighboring streets and boulevards.

The curious traveler can set out to discover all of these aspects of the area on a walk between, say, Père Lachaise Cemetery and Canal Saint-Martin… with lunch in one of these restaurants recommended by Chef Tan.

1. New Nioullaville (Chinese and mixed southeast Asian)

New Niouallaville serves mixed Southeast Asian fare but is included in here for its Cantonese offerings. More specifically, it’s included here because Christian’s mother was Vietnamese of Cantonese origin and his father was Cambodian of Cantonese origin, and having arrived in France from Phnom Penh, Cambodia, in 1970 when Christian was five, they settled in Grenoble where they ran a Chinese restaurant, so Chef Tan has an ancestral appreciation for dim sum, canard laqué (Peking duck), and lightly spiced beef with celery and carrots, which is precisely what we ordered here. ,

The hefty, oversized pork dim sum were an unwise addition to our feast simply because they could have made for a meal in themselves. Otherwise this vast restaurant is a wonderful place to lounge around for a long, talky, shared meal despite the risk of the food getting cold (just ask for a heat-up). New Nioullaville, with its seating for 300 and its dim sum carts pushing by like tired traffic, can feel like a banquet hall on a crowded evening or like an empty diner after the lunchtime rush.

New Nioullaville, 32 rue de l’Orillon, 11th arr. 100 yards south of metro Belleville.
Tel. 01.40.21.96.18. www.nioullaville.com

2. Lao Siam (Thai)

“Smell that?” Christian said, taking a whiff of the steamy, spicy air as we entered Lao Siam. “That’s the real thing.”

The pleasure in this unassuming restaurant is indeed that mix of spices; they don’t attack the palate in crescendo but rather flow through in piquant (or less piquant) harmony. The harmony, of the piquant variety, played in our starter, a spicy rice noodle and mashed fish dish (the fact that it looks like runny spaghetti needn’t dissuade you) with a seminal taste of fleshy fish, moderate spices, coconut milk, and basil. It continued on a similar but less piquant theme with amok, a fish dish with light spice and coconut milk served in a steamed banana leaf.

Lao Siam, 49 rue de Belleville, 19th arr. 300 yards east of metro Belleville. Tel. 01.40.40.09.68.

[Note to dress-up and business travelers: The gracious international chain restaurant L’Elephant Bleu offers a highly polished Thai cuisine near Place de la Bastille at 43/45 rue de la Roquette, 11th arrondissement. Tel. 01.47.00.42.00. Site www.blueelephant.com.]

3. Hawaienne (Vietnamese)

“One thing I like about this restaurant,” Christian said, “is that you’d never pick it out of the lot.”

Less fish and spice oriented than its Thai neighbors, the Vietnamese cuisine practiced in Paris is bobun territory, as I’ve written about in another article in this section, Friends and Phos: An Adventure in Vietnamese Cuisine in Paris. Bobun may be an anything-goes stew-soup but as Christian pointed out that it’s also a carefree balancing act of beef (bo), rice noodles (bun), mint, grilled shallots, crushed peanuts, soy sprouts and fish sauce, with, in our case, a few fried spring rolls (nems) thrown in for good measure. Consider fried shrimp for a starter here.

Hawaienne, 15 rue Louis Bonnet, 11th arr. 100 yards south of metro Belleville. Tel. 01.43.57.15.64.

Christian Tan
For more information about Christian Tan’s work as a private chef (dinner parties, special events, etc.) see www.siphutan.fr, siphu meaning chef in Chinese.

© 2007, Gary Lee Kraut — Restaurant retest and approved 2009, 2010

Tony introduced the other man as “a Greek friend”; he introduced me as “an American friend.” We shook hands. The Greek friend was drinking tsikoudia, a smooth and bitter Cretan brandy. The clear Varvaki bottle was front of him on the table. In front of Tony were a pack of Gitanes and a glass of red wine beside a bottle of Nemea, a Greek wine that is a staple at the back table.

I nodded to Miah in the kitchen and he nodded back—the usual extent of our contact. Miah is a short, round-faced Indian, a man with a murky spirit and a cautious smile. He speaks little, a result of both language and temperament. I like seeing him there because he adds depth to the scene, like the woman in the pond in Manet’s Déjeuner sur l’Herbe, but we rarely speak.

“Get yourself a glass and join us for a drink,” said Tony
“Too early for me.”
“Coffee?”
“Yes, thanks.”

It was a cold and rainy day with little coming through the clouds. I’d stopped by that afternoon on my way home from interviewing a woman who offers cooking classes in a kitchen-studio on rue Oberkampf. She had given me a bag of freshly made sugar cookies as I left, so I opened the bag, set it on the table and invited Tony and his friend to have some. The Greek friend spoke no French. He shook his head No. “You bake now?” Tony said with a chuckle. He has the thick chest and tender demeanor of an old boxer. Dark grey hair sweeps across his forehead. He got up to make coffee.

Just then the door opened. Looking over I saw that night had already fallen. It was barely 4 o’clock. A woman shook a tin can and said, “Collecting money for associations for the blind.”

Tony went over to her. I thought he was going to tell her that the restaurant was closed, but he reached into his pocket and put some change into her box.

“Thank you,” she said.

I expected him now to lead her out, but instead he returned to the espresso machine behind the brick bar in the corner. Without turning to her he asked, “Would you like something to drink?”

“It is cold out,” she said.
“Would you like something to eat?”
“It’s true, I haven’t eaten today. But I will later.”
“Sit down,” he said.

She came over to the table and sat down across from me. She said, “If it isn’t any trouble.”

I said, “Hello.” The Greek man nodded.

The woman looked me in the eye—rather, one of her eyes looked into one of my eyes, the other seemed to be watching the hallway to the WC—and she said, “Thank you.”

She was about 40, with a soft, expressionless face. She seemed polite but slightly off. She took off her black wool cap and held it on her lap. She smoothed down the hair on one side of her head. I said something about the weather. She concurred. She smiled to the Greek man.

Tony set the coffee in front of me then went into the kitchen. In a minute he brought out a full plate of meat and salad. He handed her a knife and fork and a napkin. He brought her a glass, poured her some red wine then returned to the kitchen.

The woman stared down at the plate, moving her head to see the different components of the dish she’d been served, then raised her head to me and said, “Thank you.”

I said, “It’s not me, it’s him.”

Tony now returned to the table with some warm bread in a basket that he set in front of her. Then he went back into the kitchen.

The woman faced me once again and said, “Thank you.”

I said, “He’s the one to thank. I’m just a pilgrim here like you.”

The woman held the fork in her hand for a minute without taking a bite. Finally she turned to the Tony’s Greek friend, who’s been sitting silently beside her, and she said, “Some people you meet when you’re collecting money for a good cause are very nice. Others don’t pay attention to you. But that isn’t a problem. Not everyone has to give to every cause. Some causes don’t touch people. People can be kind but not give. But some people are very kind. It is cold out.”

The Greek looked at me for help since he didn’t understand what she was saying.

I said, “You’re the nice one for being out in weather like this collecting for your cause.”

“It isn’t easy,” she told the Greek, “but it’s worth it.” She concluded, “December,” before looking down close to the plate and forking a slice of tomato.

Tony returned to the table and sat down just as the woman was lifting the fork to her mouth. She immediately set it down without taking a bite. Instead she lifted her glass and, looking at me, she said, “Thank you.”

I said, “Thank him.”

As she ate Tony told me that there had been a short circuit in the restaurant toward the end of the evening service yesterday. Luckily almost everyone had been served, he said, so they lit candles and made it through the evening. But they hadn’t been able to correct the problem and so couldn’t open for lunch today. He pointed over to the bar in the corner.

There was an open tool box there. A disheveled array of wires poured out of the electrical box by the espresso machine.

Just then a man entered and Tony got up to greet him. They shook hands. It was the electrician. He came over to the table and shook hands with me, with the Greek man, and with the woman. Tony introduced us: “Friends.” The electrician said “Bon appetite” to the woman. I offered him a cookie and he said “Thank you” as he reached into the bag. The woman raised her head from her plate just then and also said “Thank you,” so I held the bag out to her, too. She said, “After I finish. This is very good.”

The electrician went to work behind the bar. Tony returned to the table. He told his friend in Greek to serve himself some more tsikoudia. He filled the woman’s glass with wine. Holding the bottle to me he said, “Are you sure?” I told him the coffee was fine. He served himself. The woman raised her eyes from the plate and said, “Thank you.”

I pointed to Tony and said, “He’s the one.”

Before long another man entered. He shook a tin can and said, “Collecting money for associations for the blind.”

“I’m here,” the woman called out without looking toward the door.
“Oh,” he said. “There you are. What are you doing here?”
“They kindly offered me something to eat.”
Tony said to the man, “Would you like something yourself?”
“No,” he said, “but that’s very kind of you. She hasn’t eaten all day. She’s been out since 10 this morning.”
“How about a glass of something?” asked Tony.
“I don’t drink.”
“Some coffee then.”
“That would be very nice. It’s cold out. Thank you for giving her something to eat.”

The woman looked up to me and said, “Thank you.”

It was only then that I realized that she wasn’t looking at me at all even though her face was turned to me. Each time that I’d been refusing her thanks, she’d actually been training a good eye on Tony.

Tony fixed her colleague a cup of coffee. As it dripped in the espresso machine by the electrician, Tony took some change out of his pocket and put it in the man’s tin cup. Then the electrician, who hadn’t seemed to be paying attention, came over to the table. He pulled changed out of his pocket. He put some in the woman’s box then some in the man’s box. Then he went back to the electrical box.

Miah emerged from the kitchen into the foreground to fill a drawer by the kitchen with knives and forks.

I was amazed and embarrassed by everyone’s generosity. I asked Miah if he wanted a cookie. He shook his head.

The electrician was pulling at wire, his back to us, when he said, “My wife’s blind.”

“Was she at the demonstration yesterday?” said the man with the tin cup. He was a small, slim man dressed in brown and grey. He came across as both meek and confident.

“Yes,” said the electrician.

“That was very nice of her,” said the man. “It’s important. We were there.”

“Yes we were,” said the woman.

“It wasn’t very nice weather,” said the man, “but we had a good turnout.”

“By the time my wife got home she was exhausted,” said the electrician. “Then she fell in the apartment and I had to take her to the hospital.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” said the man.

“We were at the hospital most of the night, but I think she’s alright now.”

The woman lifted her head, her eyes aimed somewhere over my shoulder, listening to the conversation. She said, “They can be slow at the hospital, especially when it’s an emergency. But that was nice of her to go to the demonstration.”

The electrician continued working.

The man drinking coffee said to the woman, “When you’re finished we’ll go.”

She set down her fork. She said, “I’ll take that cookie now.”

I pushed the bag on the table closer to her. I said, “Take several.”

She faced Tony’s Greek friend and said, “Thank you.”

The Greek friend nodded.

Then the electrician said, “Attention, everyone, I’m going to have to cut off the lights.”

And he did.

© 2006, Gary Lee Kraut

Note: Kasaphani closed in 2008 upon the retirement of the owners.