A life of travel, shameless gluttony, hedonism and occasional enslavement

Lots of foodies were probably awaiting the opening of Philippe Conticini’s shop…..again….it is very start and stop with him, but it is so very difficult to survive in Paris when you are competing with the likes of Pierre Herme and Sadaharu Aoki.

Its on Rue de Bac, just a short walk down from Bon Marche, which carries lots of awesome foodie things and well worth a shop.  If you are looking for DelicaBar at the Bon Marche, its not there anymore and has become an Italian restaurant.  

From the outside, its really slick and the windows display all the limited offerings within.

Its got cool interiors and props for displaying the pastries, but the question you might be dying to ask is….how does it taste???

Continue reading ‘La Patisserie des Reves – Philippe Conticini’

Ispahan, probably the most copied cake in the world for the past few years and perhaps destined to go down in history as another ‘Gateau St Honore’, or “Opera” or “Black Forest Cake”.  That is, a ‘classic’ cake that everyone has their own version of.

Ask anyone which is their favourite PH cake and the answer will be Ispahan.  Marketing hype/fad or true genius?  In case you are wondering about my tone, I want to clarify that PH is probably the guy who inspired me the most and through tasting and learning everything he does, he has taught so much.  It is a disappointment of mine that I will probably never get a chance to work for him.  

Enough crap talk, on to the cakes, which were eaten in a train station on a circular bench with a cardboard tearout ’spoon’.  Oh….how I suffer for my art!  If you were the old guy next to me with the dog, I apologise for whipping out my tripod and driving Rover a bit bonkers with the cakes.  

Desire

Components:

1. Wild Strawberry Decoration
2. Lemon Cream
3. Banana and Wild Strawberry Compote
4. Biscuit Joconde
5. Pate Sablee

The wild strawberries were not really in season, so I have no idea where he got them from, but they did not pack much of a taste.  However, the Banana and strawberry compote was surprisingly nice.  Little chunks of banana that still had a bit of texture did not overpower the wild strawberry, which had lots of flavour.  They worked in harmony, one after another.  Really good!

The lemon cream was nice a light, stabilized with just the perfect amount of gelatin.  This cake had been travelling all day and other than being knocked around, it held up perfectly.  This was a really good cake that featured an unsuspecting combo of Banana and Wild Strawberry.  One of the most common, plain Jane ingredients paired with one of the most luxurious.  Incredible!

Ispahan

1. Macaron Shell
2. Raspberry and Lychee pieces
3. Rose and White Chocolate Cream

The rose flavour was subtle and balanced, unlike the horrible copies that taste like a bottle of rose extract.  The lychee pieces inside were tasteless orbs, perhaps frozen IQF lychees?  Canned lychees like those we ate in Chinese restaurants growing up would have given more flavour.

The raspberries were tasteless too.  This is an example of how commercialism trumps reason.  Due to its popularity, customers now demand that Ispahan be sold 365 days a year when the fruits are in season only for 1/4 of it.  But hey, if that brings in the money and keeps the tourists coming, it might be justifiable in my book.  Not in everyone’s book of course, but if one thinks about flavour perception on a normal human tongue/brain, taste is secondary to many other things.  

Of course this does not apply to nit-picking bastards like us who like to taste and taste and pass comments that are borne out of jealousy and envy!  Hands up how many of you pastry chefs reading this wished you had come up with Ispahan!  I can honestly say, without batting both eyelids at the same time, “Not Me!”

Money talks and bullshit walks.  What will PH tell his adoring fans who travel halfway around the world only to find Ispahan off the menu?  Those with artisan souls can flame me for all they want, but PH is a fine example of art meets commercialism.  

Conclusion

Were the cakes world class?  Of course, and I would love to try them again when all these fruits are in season.  PH probably gets a ‘get out of jail free’ card because he is still doing some of the best cakes in the world, right up there with Hidemi Sugino.

Note this road, for not only is Pierre Herme there, but Christian Constant, Jean Charles Rochoux and Sadaharu Aoki as well.   Such is the concentration of awesomeness here that every visit to Paris brings me to this area at least twice.

Glistening in the cases are his signature cakes, macarons and chocolates, but much overlooked are his other confections.  Cue his Viennoiseries, which were relegated to the bottom-est, farthest left shelf, destined to be ignored by the masses wowed by the fancy patisserie. 

Continue reading ‘Pierre Herme – Viennoiseries’

I was gobsmacked today, really really taken aback by a simple taste comparison between two chocolate bars made from the same batch of cocoa liquor from Jamaica.  Basically, we got cocoa liquor from a supplier who processes the beans into liquor, basically grinding it down into a paste.  This supplier from France also makes their own chocolate bars, but it will not be a brand name you will recognize, as they are quite under-the-radar.

This was the best example to date of how different processing techniques on the same cocoa liquor produces totally different results.  Though I’m still recovering from a cold and taste functions are quite muted, the marked difference made it all the more shocking.

Bar 1 = Artisan du Chocolat’s Jamaica Bar.  Bar 2 = French made Jamaican Bar.

Bar 1 had a slight acidity as the first note which ushered forth dried mango and tamarind paste sandwiched between dried banana chips (Yes, weird association, but it is a very very fond flavour memory of mine).  This brought me back to Talat Thai Wholesale market in Bangkok, where tropical fruits scented the aisles.

At the end, the flavour of civet cat poo coffee from Vietnam unveiled itself (Actually, my flavour bank’s civet cat poo coffee is from Chiang Rai in Thailand, but everyone associates it with Vietnam).  

Perhaps the cold virus was playing mind tricks on me, but it was that unmistakable flavour of coffee with a fruity/nutty bouquet and a bit of acidity without any bitterness.

Bar 2 on the other hand was lifeless and flat, no ups or downs, just the horizontal stroke of a corpse hooked up to an ECG machine.   Apparently, copious amounts of vanilla was added, but I could not really taste it clearly, other than the very familiar taste of el cheapo supermarket branded chocolate bars.  

The classical belief that long conching develops flavour and adding more fat creates beautiful mouthfeel is just old fashioned rubbish.  How many chefs still believe that you have to sear/brown your steak to seal in the juices when you are actually doing the opposite?  

2 makers, same cocoa, different results.  Making chocolate indeed is an art and a science, and I am forever indebted to my bosses at Artisan du Chocolat for sharing their knowledge whole heartedly and giving me the chance to experience REALLY making chocolate as opposed to just melting it.

With a name like that, you’d be expecting a place serving dishes lovingly created from the most delectable parts of the pig.  Not to be confused with Au Pied de Cochon in Montreal, Canada, which is a foodie’s paradise, or so I heard.  This Au Pied de Cochon in Paris, a short walk from Forum Les Halles, is seriously bad.  Now, why would you want to read a blog post about bad Parisian food?

Continue reading ‘Gourmet Tourist Trap Paris – Au Pied de Cochon’

Fate must have aligned our paths once again as I returned to Artisan du Chocolat’s production ‘Atelier’ just in time for the Sloe Season.  These wild plums grow abundantly in the ‘bush’ behind the fences and last year, they escaped me, as it was late October when I noticed these sloes and it was the season’s end.

This year, in mid-September, they tasted awful, with a mouth puckering astringency and bitterness that laid “eat ‘em all” dares and bets around the lunch table.  Tasting them every other day, it wasn’t until now, early October that they tasted ‘right’.  The astringency was there, but tamer, the plum flavour more pronounced and most importantly, the previously starchy centre bits have now turned into plump, juicy flesh.  

40 minutes of picking during the lunch break yielded 4kgs worth of tiny sloes and probably 200g of assorted spiders, wood lice and other creepy crawlies that probably now inhabit my kitchen!  So, how do you tell a sloe from a damson from a bullace and from a plum?

Continue reading ‘Sloe Jam – A different kind of plum…..’

If readers are getting bored of the ‘best this and best that’, thats too bad, because so often in Paris, just because IT IS PARISIAN does not make it oh so damn delicious and awesome.  The search for this ‘No.1 List of Stuff’ is a personal benchmark as references for my own stuff, and as the adage goes, one man’s tea is another’s poison.

Thats how I came across Ble Sucre, owned by Chef Fabrice Le Bourdat, who took some time out to have a chat and reminisce about the hawker food in Singapore.  He spent 3 months at the Oriental Hotel in Singapore and remembers his time there fondly.

Yes, I was in Paris searching for the perfect Croissant, which up till now, had the top spot taken by the croissants we used to make at Pasteleria Totel in Spain.  Here at Ble Sucre, they had 3…hmmm no, maybe 4 items that occupy top positions in ‘The List of Best Stuff’.  It is all thanks to this man, Chef Fabrice Le Bourdat.

Continue reading ‘Ble Sucre – My Paris No.1 for Croissants, Madeleines and Financiers’

Philippe Gosselin………..who?  Yes yes, another one of these lame introductions.  Philippe Gosselin, he of the delayed cold fermentation Baguette a l’Ancienne.  Thin, knobbly baguette sticks with huge airy holes that tastes and feels in the mouth unlike any other baguette I have eaten.  What is cold fermentation you ask?  And how the devil do I know so much about his methods?  First, we have to start from the beginning.

Continue reading ‘Best Baguette? Philippe Gosselin makes my list.’

Just who is Jacques Genin?  For many many years, he had a small little studio of a production space which, when I visited him, had 2 enrobing machines and barely enough space for two people to pass each other sideways.  Today, he finally has his own shop on Rue de Turenne near the metro station Filles du Calvaire.

Having originally been a chef and owning his own restaurant, he fell in love with chocolates and switched to the dark side.  Prior to having his shop, he made chocolates for the best restaurants in Paris and the occasional foodie who knocked on his window.  Finally, after so many years of hearing about him, I finally got to taste his chocolates.  Even though we had spoken a year before at his old production studio, he declined my offer to buy a kilo of caramels and a kilo of chocolates.  This is not a problem now!

10 Euros for a box of 9 chocolates from Jacques Genin seems a little cheap, compared to the prices charged by other ‘big names’.  Packaged in a slick, modern-looking aluminum box with a minimalist design, you wonder if he makes any money at all.  I would have gladly paid 15 Euros for this, considering it is Jacques Genin.

Continue reading ‘Jacques Genin Chocolate Tasting – Part 1′