Enter the Era of the Quiet Chef

San Francisco --- We are, at last, entering the era of the "quiet' chef. Thank goodness, all that stacking and fireworks and dishes with 1,000 misplaced ingredients are beginning to be behind us. This is the day of food that is sensible, subtle, understated. And when it is done well, it is simply delicious.

A recent dinner at the two-year old Gary Danko restaurant in San Francisco solidified that trend for me. The meal was superb, from beginning to end. And what's more, service was in line with the finest you will find in the world: attentive, intelligent, grown-up.

A native of New York state, Danko grew up with a food-loving mother from Louisiana and an architect father. Restaurants played a role in his life from and early age, and by 1977 he was graduated from the country's respected Culinary Institute of American in New York state.

Soon he found himself in California, distinguishing himself with awards, accolades and top jobs up and down the state. His name was always mentioned when one asked where to dine in California.

Two years ago he opened his very own elegant, classic, wood-toned restaurant near the Wharf in San Francisco. Wisely, Danko serves no more than 65 diners. Tables are hard to come by, and the food is not given away, but that's the price diners pay for a top restaurant.

I always judge a restaurant menu by the number of dishes I would LOVE to eat. On Danko's dinner menu, there were too many to count. Shall it be glazed oysters with leeks, salsify and osestra caviar? Or a risotto of Maine lobster, rock shrimp, winter vegetables and rosemary oil? And what about the Vegetarian artichoke, tomato and chickpea stew? (And while I was making the final decision, two glorious cheese carts came rolling past, making the decision all that much more difficult.)

I was in comfort food mode and that meant risotto won out. And was I delighted. A perfectly tooth-tender risotto bathed in a soothing rosemary oil-infused sauce, studded with the truly sweetest of rock shrimp and lobster. Elegant, satisfying, a perfect start to a cool fall evening.

As a main course, my cravings for spice won out, and so it was the Moroccan-spiced squab with Chermoula, orange-cumin carrot. Like a perfect color palette the dish had everything: the richness of the meaty squab, the hit or Moroccan spices, the color or carrots with a fine hint of cumin.

Danko's sommeliers have done him proud, with a world class wine list. I devoured it, as I did the menu, and came up with two true winners from California. By all means try the 1998 100 percent Roussanne from Qupé vineyards in the Edna Valley north of Santa Barbara. The white wine has all the qualities of a pure Roussanne: fresh-tasting, with perfect balance of fruits and acidity, bone dry with overtones of pineapple and honey.

For a red, I turned again to the Santa Barbara neighborhood for a Zaca Mesa syrah, full of flavors of peppers, berries, and spice.

Danko offers a brilliant dining formula: Choose three, four or five courses, and the quantity of each course will be altered according to your tastes. And if you can't wait for reservations, the full menu is available at the lovely bar without reservations.

Gary Danko
800 North Point at Hyde
San Francisco, CA 94109
Tel: 415 749 2060
Fax: 415 775 1805
www.garydanko.com
Open daily, dinner only. All major credit cards. Three-course menu, $55; Four-course menu, $64; Five-course menu $74. Five course tasting menu, $74, with wines, an additional $35.

The Raw Revolution

Larkspur, California – Take a look at the menu at the year-old Roxanne’s –one of the hottest new restaurant in America – and you might well be dining anywhere in the modern world. The ever-popular gastronomic hits are all there: Sushi rolls, hearts of Romaine Caesar, Thai curry, lasagne terrine, Mediterranean platter.

But comparisons to any place you have ever eaten, or ever will, stop right there. For Roxanne’s – situated in Marin County, just north of San Francisco -- is a totally revolutionary new world concept. The owner, Roxanne Klein, goes beyond vegetarian, beyond anything you might have sampled before. She and fellow devotees call it “living food,” for no ingredient is heated above 118 degrees, on the belief that a living foods diet leads to a longer, more energetic life.

Take a look at the slight, blonde, 38-year-old Roxanne, mother of four, and you need no other coaching to believe in her theory. Her eyes sparkle, her face beams, her skin shines, her posture is perfect, her earnest demeanor is convincing. She has been a living, living foods advocate for the past five years, and that means no beans, no pasta, no rice, no dairy, no eggs, not even tofu.

But we’re here to talk about good food, and that’s where Roxanne is more than revolutionary. I was a longtime, committed, vegetarian but gave it up in the 1970’s because fare such as Walnut Cheddar Loaf was not getting me anywhere. We knew so little back then. And much like today, too many proponents of a healthy diet focus more on a fear of food than the more positive aspects of flavor, pleasure, enjoyment.

Roxanne takes what she believes and coaxes her fresh ingredients into fare that is beautiful, exciting, flavorful, satisfying. This is not hippy-time carrot sticks and celery or lists of ersatz fare designed to make you feel superior to the rest of the world. As always, the proof is in the eating, and a meal at Roxanne’s is as pleasurable as any well-prepared, well-conceived meal. To say that you won’t even notice that the food is raw is not a criticism, but a compliment to the chef’s who took the time to create such lovely, satisfying fare.

From the sushi rolls with fresh wasabi to the marinated olive and tomato pizza, on to the Thai yellow curry and the tortilla soup of fresh corn with cilantro, avocado and tortilla strips you love every bite. The food is vibrant, colorful, layered with flavors, textures, aromas. In short, you don’t miss a thing (well, except that little slice of crusty, toasty wholesome bread.)

Perhaps the best thing about this modern, elegant one-of-a-kind restaurant is that it does not preach. It teaches by example and let’s you decide on your own. Every thing is set up for you to love it: The former coffeehouse, now a clean, elegant, warm and modern fine-dining establishment seats just 64 diners, and reservations are hard to come by. There are no signs telling you that the flowers were organically grown, the tablecloths and napkins are woven from natural hemp, the lighting is made from recycled glass. No one shouts at you that much of the food here comes from the Klein family’s three-acre organic garden that includes figs, plums, pears, peaches, tomatoes, melons and edible flowers. You just sit down and enjoy.

For perhaps 99% of us, the living foods concept is new and not one we are quick to swallow or even digest. But the staff is incredibly knowledgeable and they seem to be equal partners in this new learning curve. It all succeeds because the professionally-trained Roxanne has worked hard to get where she is. Combining an equal passion for good health and flavor satisfaction, she spends hours and hours on each dish, slicing, dicing, juicing, blending, dehydrating, but never taking the soul or character out of the food. Couscous may be made from parsnips and pine nuts, blended to a couscous consistency. Noodles use in her pad Thai may actually come from ribbons of coconut. Ice cream, with a super-satisfying consistency, may well be made from nut milk. Some 25 different seasonings may go into her vegetable tajine, and food is served on warm plates, to help release natural aromas.

Wine, alas, is part of the living foods diet, because it is a fermented, not a cooked food. And the wine list, created by master sommelier Larry Stone, is one to behold. New world and old world wines are all there to enjoy, sip, and savor.

Roxanne’s
320 Magnolia Avenue
Larkspur, CA 94939.
Tel: 415 924 5004
fax: 415 924-7294.
www.roxraw.com

Dinner only, Monday through Saturday. Closed Sunday. All major credit cards. Menus at $29, $38 and $47, not including wine or service. Taste of Thailand menu, $69, not including wine or service. Tasting menu, $100, including wine but not service.

Lucas Carton: Where Wine is King

PARIS – Recently, I had two extraordinary food epiphanies, and each time they included a slice of the creamy golden, blue-flecked cow’s milk cheese known as Forme d’Ambert.

The first happened this summer while I was both reading and rather absent-mindedly eating a slice of Forme d’Ambert as part of a dinner-time cheese course. I took a bite of cheese, a sip of a red Cotes du Ventoux and suddenly my mouth exploded with the welcome, wintry sensation of fresh black truffles! I paused, was stunned and amazed, inhaled and felt as though there was a truffle in my midst. It was of course the earthiness of blue cheese in combination with the almost truffle essence of the wine that triggered the sensation, but I didn’t want it to disappear. I savored the seconds of unanticipated pleasure and only wished they could be turned into hours. Alas, it was elusive, for a second morsel of cheese, another few drops of wine were pleasurable, but no greater than the sum of the parts.

A few weeks ago, Forme d’Ambert came into play again, this time at the very end of an extraordinary meal at Alain Senderens’ Lucas Carton. This time, the first taste, the second and on to the end were far greater than the sum of the parts. The creamy Forme d’Ambert was teamed up with a rich, rosy, fragrant, buttery toasted brioche laced with sweet cherries and spice and moistened with a glass rich but not overly sweet ruby Port wine. The trio was as good as a whole meal to me, perfection multiplied by many, like a symphony of rich colors and textures on the palate, as though each was destined to share company with the other. The cheese was just slightly chilled and its buttery coolness loved the presence of the warm toast with its hint of spice and sweet, the smoothness of the cherries, then the rounding out of the alcohol on the tongue supplied by Senderens’ choice of Rozes Vintage 1985 Porto.

Today much ado is made of food and wine pairing, which is both a science and an art. As my two experiences suggest, pleasure explosions can be accidental or planned, but when the pairing works it is hard to find more satisfactory gastronomic pleasure.

After 10 years of creating special food and wine menus, Senderens decided to put wine before food and his choices are thoroughly brilliant. They are not complicated or complex, nor are they traditional. He looks for notes in a wine – whether its one of fresh or dried fruit, of toasted nuts, of wood or the woods, of iodine or black cherries, herbs of the garrigue of Provence (fennel, thyme, bay leaf), a touch of curry, butter and vanilla, wet leaves from the woods and mushrooms, honey or a confit of oranges. So when you find these elements in wines, why not just match them up with the real thing? Sounds simple, but if it was really that easy, we might be dining that way every night.

The fireworks at the elegant Michelin three-star Lucas Carton start with the appetizer menu, and such uncommon starters as fresh Manzanilla fino sherry -- with its hints of hazelnuts and iodine -- paired with soft and elegant fresh anchovy filets marinated in olive oil, the bones deep fried to a brilliant crisp, and then a touch of salty, silken Spanish ham, Jamon Iberia Bellota. The second act to this sherry-loving introduction to the feast comes as a tangle of the tiniest bay squid, or chipirons, stuffed with red pepper and smoky pork lomo, and squid tentacles fried and lightly stained with squid ink. The sea, the salt, the land all come together here with felicitous agreement.

Equally amazing and satisfying is the white Savigny les Beaune, 1997 from Domaine J. Boillot, with its elegant hints of the woods, served with a tiny deep fried “beurreck” of pastry-wrapped package of tiny petoncle scallops set in a cream of wild mushrooms, all showered with lightly toasted almonds. Here, the second act arrives as a masterpiece of creamy risotto, laced with scallops, lemon zest and ginger. Oh so complex in execution, but so simple for our palates to understand.

And that is only the beginning.

What amazed me most about this multi-course feast was not only the thought and care that went into creating such a menu but the way in which we, as diners, react to it. Conditioned to an avalanche of flavors and sensations in a single meal, I realized that we rarely have time to pause and reflect. To stop and pay attention. When a single wine and single dish seems to merge as one, we ARE forced to pause, stop, listen, taste, reflect upon our reactions to the interplay of the wine and the food.

Weeks later, what my taste memory recalls most vividly (after the Forme d’Ambert explosion) is the puddle of creamy polenta laced with white truffles from Italy, a fireworks of smooth textures, intense fragrances, rounded out by the cool Corton Charlemagne 1990 from Domaine Bonneau du Martray, rich with truffle and woodsy essences of its own.

Such a meal is not given away, and shouldn’t be. But it reflects a lifetime of study for a chef who has not stopped creating at the age of 63. Go and take advantage of his research and the knowledge.

Lucas Carton
9 Place de la Madeleine
Paris 75008.
Tel: 01 42 65 22 90.

www.lucascarton.com.

All major credit cards. Closed all day Sunday, Saturday lunch, Monday lunch. Lunch menu at 76 €, not including wine. Dinner, wine included, about 230 €.

Petit Marguery Bids Adieu to the Brothers Cousin

PARIS – My face fell when I opened the mail a month or so ago and discovered that some of my all-time favorite restaurateurs – the three Cousin brothers at the lively Petit Marguery – were hanging up their copper pots.

So imagine my surprise when I walked into the restaurant a few weeks ago to find two of the brothers – Michel and Jacques – at the stove. They are still there for the season to assure a smooth transition, while the majority of the long time staff, including the outgoing waiter Yannick, are standing faithful to their posts.

The evening also happened to open the season’s game menu, including a trio of hearty terrines, gorgeous venison, wild duck, and the Cousins’ famed mixture of no less than five wild mushrooms, carefully sautéed and showered with a generous dose of garlic. Let’s hope that this classic, traditional restaurant changes little, though it will be hard to imagine it without the Cousin brothers sparkle.

Le Petit Marguery,
9 boulevard du Port Royal
Paris 75013.
Tel: 01.43.31.58.59.

---

The fall season opens with a spectacular new menu at Alain Senderens’ Lucas Carton, celebrating 10 years of the chef’s detailed pairing of food and wine. But this time, instead of featuring food first it’s wine first, with a lineup that includes no less than a 1997 red Château de Beaucastel (the best of the Rhone Valley’s Chateauneuf du Pape) with roasted Limousin lamb; a most elegant pinot noir in the name of Clos Vougeot Château de la Tour teamed up with duck seasoned with a welcome touch of ginger and mango. But the best marriage of the moment is the aromatic, exuberantly rich “vin jaune” Château Chalon 1995, served with a generous portion of turbot cooked in butter, all perfumed with curry and fall-fresh walnuts. In my experience Senderens is the first chef to offer an aperitif menu, pairing wine and food, of course. Do try the incredible marriage of 1993 Dom Perignon with onions roasted in clay. The sweet onions are enhanced with a touch of Sicilian pistachios and, why not, a generous dollop of caviar.

Lucas Carton
9 Place de la Madeleine,
Paris 75008.
Tel: 01 42 65 22 90.

---

One could call it “eau de la terre”. Chef Guy Savoy amazed us the other day with a rich and outrageously fragrant mushroom soup and later confided that to enhance the perfume and the flavor or the soup, he made a broth of the wild mushroom peelings, earth and all, carefully filtering the liquid once it was highly reduced. I tried it my own kitchen and it’s clearly one of the most ingenious ways to recycle what otherwise would end up in the garbage. I can’t imagine a more dramatic way to boost the flavor of any mushroom dish.

Guy Savoy
18 rue Troyon,
Paris 75017.
Tel: 01 43 80 40 61.

---

Pierre Gagnaire continues to astonish palates with his delivery of food as edible art. Some recent combinations need to be tasted to be believed: current favorites include a brilliant combination of grilled eggplant topped with fresh figs and set off by a dollop of creamy polenta enriched with the ultra fresh herbal flavor of fragrant lemon verbena. End the meal with Gagnaire’s gorgeous chocolate dessert served in an oversized shot glass: The mousse-like chocolate is flavored with a touch of spicy red pepper, and topped with a bright-colored, intensely flavored pistachio cream.

Pierre Gagnaire,
6 rue Balzac,
Paris 75008.
Tel: 01 58 36 12 50.

---

Chocolate is on the minds of many a Parisian, and if the lines out the door of Pierre Hermé’s jewel-box boutique are any sign, we can’t get enough of his treats. Don’t leave the shop without sampling his “tablette” or bar of Java pure: This chocolate redefine chocolate for me, for it’s intense, rich, dark, and gratefully has a finish that lingers and lingers.

Pierre Herme,
72 rue Bonaparte,
Paris 75006.
Tel: 01 43 54 47 77.

Wine Bar for All Seasons Two bars offer delicious sanctuary

LEGRAND

Since 1880, the Legrand family has been dazzling Parisians with its sweets and bonbons, rare mustards, liqueurs and of course wines. Now, the respected family shop has expanded once again, with a new tasting center, an expanded wine course, and continued efficient service.

The new “wine bar” is not big, just a large round bar in the back of the stunning turn of the century boutique, and a shared communal table in the charming covered passageway, the Galerie Vivienne near the Bourse in the 2nd arrondissement.

When you go, be sure to enter through the stunning turn-of-the-century storefront and then gaze up at the ceiling, a masterfully arranged collection of wine corks. Try to maintain composure as you pass the colorful apothecary jars filled with special sweets from all over France, lend a gaze at some of the well-priced wines from Bordeaux, the Loire, the Rhone, the Languedoc, you name it, and settle in at the circular bar or at the communal table outside.

If I ever opened a wine bar this is the kind of food I would serve: simple, no-nonsense, and the sort that satisfies as it should. There is just a small selection of lunch-time or snack platters, including extraordinary smoked wild Norwegian trout served with perfectly tangy crème fraiche, with freshly grilled toast set at your elbow as you tuck in your napkin. I also loved the fine cheese trays – a generous assortment of five goat cheeses or five cow’s milk cheeses all from the reputable cheese shop Quatrehomme --- one served with a tapenade-like black olive cream showered with basil, another with nuts and raisins, both with a nice green salad alongside. A charcuterie platter, a cheese and charcuterie platter, foie gras, or a can of prized Rodel sardines are the remaining choices. Prices range from 9 € to 16 € per plate.

I could imagine a weekly afternoon rendezvous here, with the additional chance of ordering any wine in the shop for a 15 € corkage fee. I admit I was not dazzled by two white wines sampled from the brief list of those available by the glass. Neither the 1998 Domaine Zind-Humbrecht Riesling, with a promise of a flinty mineral richness, nor the 1999 Bourgogne Chitry chardonnay with a hopeful hint of hazelnuts, did anything for my palate. I found solace, however, in my beloved Domaine de Cascavel 2000, the silken and rich Cotes du Ventoux, fairly priced at 5.30 € a glass.

Once you have been lured to the tasting center, linger in the book shop, buy yourself a set of new wine glasses, sign up for one of their wine courses, or make a note of their next winemaker’s open tasting. And don’t forget the bonbons.

CHEZ RAMULAUD

Chez Ramulaud looks like the old-fashioned bistro of our dreams: A tattered, old-fashioned dining room decorated with bric a brac, clocks intentionally set to the wrong time, a stern-faced patron that can quickly be won over with a good smile and a choice of the right wine, and a lively, varied clientele that is there for one reason and one reason only, to have a good time.

As you enter the 1930’s style bistro – with bare wooden tables and worn patchwork tile floors --- you find wine cartons stacked up towards the ceiling and you take a look at some of the familiar labels and you know you’re, too, shall have a good time.

The wine list is one of the best reasons to set your foot into this popular 11th arrondissement bistro, with its healthy, well-chosen, list that includes the lively 100% Grenache Domaine Gramenon Cuvée Sagesse from winemaker Michelle Laurent, a remarkably pure-flavored wine that tastes of, guess what, grapes and nothing less. Equally appealing is the powerful Cotes du Roussillon Village Domaine Piquemal, a dense, purple wine made just across the Spanish border where the intense summer sun turns their fittingly named wine “Terres Grillées” (grilled soil) into a dense, deep-flavored red that’s a combination of the rugged Carignan grape tempered by the silky smoothness of the Syrah with the tannic aromatic hit of the Mourvedre grape. A fine third choice is the Domaine Gauby Cotes du Roussillon Villages, another intense red that’s loaded with flavor and thoughts of southern summers.

The food at Ramulaud is a combination of classic bistro fare --- grilled entrecote with a fabulous potato and mushroom gratin – tempered with a few modern additions. I loved the brilliant and beautiful ricotta and eggplant terrine, a full-flavored dish that served as a wave goodbye to summer; as well as the feather-light gnocchi teamed up with well-chosen fresh wild cepe mushrooms that lent a distinctive perfume and flavor to a dish that lingered for a good long time.

The bread here is delicious (I think two of us polished off two hefty basketfuls) and although the rolling antique cheese house is charming and the selection is overly generous (on a quiet night they wheel the basket to your table and you help yourself) the cheese would be less dried out if it did not sit all day in the open.

Alas, after a few visits the charm wears thin. Much of the rest of the food was consistently undercooked (rare fish is one thing, bloody rare lamb is quite another), and under seasoned, and waits for service can be excruciatingly long.

But go thirsty, with a dose of patience, and you should have a fine time.

---

Espace Dégustation Legrand,
1, rue de la Banque,
Paris 75002.
Tel: 01 42 60 07 12.
Fax: 01 42 61 25 51.
Wine bar open Monday through Saturday noon to 7 pm. Epicerie and Wine Boutique open Monday 11 am to 7 pm, Tuesday through Friday 10 am to 7:30 pm, and Saturday 10 am to 7 pm.

Chez Ramulaud,
269 rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine,
Paris 75011.
Tel: 01 43 72 23 29.
Closed Saturday lunch and Sunday dinner. Credit card: Visa. About 35 € per person, including service but not wine.

A Little Touch of Heaven

VALENCE - If God is in the details, then dining at Anne-Sophie's family restaurant, Pic, is a like a little touch of heaven. I spent the morning with her the other day, roaming through the vast and airy new ground floor kitchens, where she and some 15 other chefs work with diligence, attentiveness, and discipline, creating a modern style of cuisine that reminds one instantly of the detailed, complex cuisine of Joel Robuchon and Pierre Gagnaire.

This was my first visit in two years, and as Anne-Sophie herself is aware, she has grown immensely in this time, both in her style of cooking and in the way she runs her kitchen. Now 32 years old, this tiny fireball of a chef says she has also softened. No matter how you call it, it's not easy to be the lady boss in a super-macho world of classic French kitchens. She clearly treats her mostly male staff with gentle, sincere respect, and it sure seems to pay off.

Instantly, what I most loved about her current mode is the way she manages to weave just about every seasonal and local ingredient into her menu, whether it's peaches from the Drome, ratatouille vegetables from the nearby farmer's market, all manner of Provencal herbs, summery purple figs, or raspberries served with an ice cream made from the local wild mint, known as melisse. Her vegetable tempura uses no less than eggplant, red bell peppers, zucchini and summer savory, while plump local pigeon is coated with a luscious mixture of crushed walnuts, sweet butter and toasted bread crumbs, all seasoned with Maldon sea salt, its crystals revered for their special crunch.

A treat of the day was a visit to the modern, underground, air-conditioned wine cellar, where sommelier Denis Bertrand gave me free reign, as I poked and peered through the aisles, selecting for lunch an array of wines I knew of but had never tasted. The cellar is a wine-lover's candy store, with a treasure trove of wines, specializing of course in those of the Rhone. All the great Chateauneuf du Pape are there, from Beaucastel to Rayas to Vieux Telegraph, La Janasse and La Nerthe and on to Paul Avril's Clos des Papes. Names such as Chapoutier, Chave, Guigal, Vernay, Delorme appear as old, close friends. But the most exciting for me was the ability to share in their own regional discoveries, such as the fine elegant, Grenache-based red Vacqueyras Montirius 1997, like a rich confit of fruit redolent of blackberries and blueberries, and two outstanding unknown whites, including a 100% Roussanne from Domaine le Serre in Condorcet near Nyons, and a Vinsobres Chaume-Arnaud (a Marsanne, Roussane, Viognier blend) that taste of pure apricot kernels.

For my palate and my money, some of the best buys on the list come from winemaker Michele Laurent, whose varied clean, Côtes-du-Rhône wines that taste of pure fruit are my favorite flavors of the day. Try, for sure, the 1996 La Sagesse, a blend of 95% Grenache and 5% Syrah: It is for sure one of the purest wines I know, round, mellow, velvety, with a flirty, flattering silkiness. And it is honestly priced at 45 €.

Anne-Sophie's starters alone would serve as lunch for most of us on a given day. Miniature phyllo rolls are filled with a rich guacamole, while classic tiny meatball-like caillettes have that rich saltiness that make us truly salivate. Her rosemary sablets are a simple touch of brilliance, while piquant anchovies find their way into pastry-wrapped mini-mouthfuls.

Outstanding main course of the day include the pigeon, served with a fitting garnish of thinly sliced, butter-cooked potatoes, and purple figs roasted in sweet Banyuls wine; and the giant meaty langoustines (this not from Provence, but of course Brittany) paired with a stunning, intensely flavored fresh peach chutney, heightened with white wine, vinegar and a touch of fresh ginger. Equally inventive and inviting is the baby pig, or porcelet, the ribs simply roasted, with the cheeks turned into a soothing confit laced with a touch of licorice. All this was paired with a garnish of wild girolles mushrooms, a tasty ragout of the plump white fresh beans from Mollans-sur-Ouveze in the Drome Provencal, a crispy potato tuile and paper-thin slices of crusty, bacon-like ventreche.

There were moments in the day that I felt that Anne-Sophie was training for a marathon run, as though piling on practice miles - rather than seeing the finish line --- seemed to be the immediate goal. She is clearly in a frenzy of composition and I fear that sometimes a touch of taste is lost during all the arranging and creating. While her complex quartet of eggplant seemed astonishing in the kitchen, it had less punch at the table, and the dish would have been better with a little editing.

But all of this is done for the good of us, the diner, for she does win out on the end, not in just pure presentation, energy, intellectualism, but in the fact that we all left as very satisfied customers.

Pic
285 boulevard Victor Hugo
26000 Valence
tel: 04 75 44 15 32
fax: 04 75 40 96 03.
Internet: www.pic-valence.com
Closed two weeks in January, Sunday evening, Tuesday lunch, and Monday from November to March. Menus at 99 and 120 €. A la carte, 90 to 215 €, including service but not wine.

Great Tastes, Different Vision

PARIS – As cooks, I am convinced that most of us look at the ingredients before us with a single dimension. My asparagus are always blanched and cooked whole (rarely steamed or roasted). My baby leg of lamb is often roasted whole, on the bone, with need of nothing more than a streamlined seasoning of salt and pepper.

Apricots are halved and pitted for a tart, always cooked with their sunshine face up; and my classic vinaigrette varies little, just red wine vinegar, sherry vinegar, olive oil and salt.

Habit? A rut? Lack of imagination? Perhaps a bit of all three. In defense of all of us, part of the pleasure of cooking a dish, and revisiting it again, is the simple memory, the pleasant familiarity, of how the food looked and tasted and pleased us the last time. There is also a touch of anticipation involved and, for sure, a dose of security.

But it is clear that chef Pascal Barbot of the Michelin-starred Astrance has a totally other vision. What we mortals see in black and white, he sees in Technicolor. While we look at things straight on, he seems to stand on his head, hang from a bar, cock his head to permit a whole new take on ingredients.

I was amazed by his food when I first visited the newborn restaurant in the winter of 2000. A recent revisit only suggests that this talented, modest chef has grown and grown and grown.

Like many contemporary chefs he focuses on the ingredient first, the process second. But its in his combination of ingredients as well as his pristine, even exciting presentations that he distinguishes himself from the rest of the pack. And no one has thought through the very idea of how an ingredient is cut and presented the way Barbot has.

Along with partner Christophe Rohat, this young chef is one to follow, for sure.

A recent lunch included samples of a good portion of the summer’s menu, and ran the full range of seasonal fare. Crab and avocado, zucchini and baby turnips, fava beans and langoustine, tomatoes and arugula, tuna, barbue, pigeon and veal. As good as ever is his signature crab and avocado “ravioli,” really thin slices of avocado masquerading as pasta, layered over a brilliantly season salad of crab enhanced with lime zest, chives, fleur de sel, and the most delicious, sweet and fragrant almond oil.

But the single dish that sent me into rave mode was his astonishing combination of turnips, begonia flowers, fava beans and marjoram. Big deal, you say? The dish has to be seen and sampled to be believed. The combination arrived in a pure white soup bowl, an artistically perfect color blend of red, white and green. So pretty I waited a full minute to indulge, appreciating the aesthetics of the moment.

The baby turnips had been blanched and sautéed, the same for the brilliant green fava beans. The bright intense flavor of the begonia petals, touched with a bit of black pepper seemed to say that summer was on its way.

Color played a role again in the daily special barbue – the turbot-like brill – standing tall and on end, its alabaster skin offset with bright spring green lemon verbena oil, and a raw, sweet onion salad paired with fresh lemon verbena.

But it’s not just color and show here. Somehow the newness of all the combinations force us to think about what we are eating, and contemplate the incredible variety of ingredients, colors, flavors, textures that nature has given us.

Rohat’s ability to surprise never stops, as zucchini skins are sliced paper thin and layered like a millefeuille with shavings of cool and salty feta cheese, thin slices of white button mushrooms, all set on an ultra-thin layer of crunchy, sweet pastry.

Langoustines are so gently sautéed, served with a juice made from tomato skins, offset by a singular green puree of arugula.

The cool and soothing grey dining room, the starched linens, the gilt-framed mirrors add a restive backdrop to all this modern excitement. Rohat’s choice of wine – a deep red Pic St Loup, Château de Cazeneuve, with overtones of dark red fruit and a touch of gingerbread --- was a totally fitting match. Reservations at Astrance are hard to come by, so plan ahead for your next exciting meal.

---

Astrance
4 rue Beethoven
Paris 75016
tel: 01 40 50 84 40
Fax: 01 40 50 11 45
Closed August 1 to 21, February school vacation, all day Monday and Tuesday at lunch. All major credit cards. 30-euro lunch menu. A la carte, 55 to 75 euros, including service but not wine.

Provence Quartet

Vaison la Romaine – We have lived in this tiny Provencal village for nearly 20 years, and never has the choice of pleasant, small family restaurants been better. This is a land of plenty, with the spicy Rhone wines leading the pack, and black truffles, fresh cherries, plump apricots and figs, and all manner of vegetables following close behind. So putting a simple but great meal on the table is child’s play.

But up until recently, dining out was pretty much limited to pizzerias, a few good Asian restaurants, and very little in the way of chefs who knew what to do with the bounty before them.

LE GRAND PRE

The newest game in the area is Le Grand Pre, opened last year by Belgian chef Raoul Reichrath and his Mexican wife, Flora. The two make a perfect pair of restaurateurs, with Raoul alone in his spotless kitchen and Flora in the dining room, sharing her vast wine knowledge and putting everyone is a good mood with her perky personality.

The two have worked all over the world, from the best restaurants in Belgium to the King David hotel in Jerusalem and the Marquis Reforma in Mexico. Now, in the hamlet of Roaix they have transformed an old farmhouse into a charming little restaurant with a wine list that will make most Rhone wine-lovers weep for joy. All the good names are there – Goubert, St Esteve, Rabasse Charavin, Beaucastel, Bouissiere, Domaine de la Mordoree, Santa Duc, and Château Hugues – whether it be white, red, or rose.

Raoul’s food is sophisticated, but not so much so that it feels out of place in a small country restaurant. What I love is that his food does not follow any single school other than his own imagination, which is vast. On a recent evening, he wowed us with a trio of starters – caramelized tomatillo with foie gras; a spoonful of fennel puree; and a crunchy cheese cookie topped with a pumpkin seed – and put us in the mood for sipping a favorite white wine, Domaine de la Mordoree’s Lirac Reine des Bois, a complex, thinking person’s wine made with no less than six grape varieties.

The meal began officially with a platter of plump warm oysters, topped with a green parsley puree and a rich sea urchin sauce. The main course pigeon – roasted fabulously rare -- was caramelized with a touch of soy sauce, giving it a walnut-toned glaze. Cheese comes from my village cheese shop, Lou Canesteou, run by Josiane and Christian Deal. Dessert might be as simple as bowlful of the tangy seasonal strawberry Mara des Bois, showered with crushed black peppercorns and paired with a soothing grapefruit ice.

L’OUSTALET

Few wines have the intensity, authority and diversity as the Rhone valley Gigondas, strong and full bodied wines that reflect the heady summer sun of Provence. Lucky for us, this charming village with its cozy shaded square boasts of the finest spots in the area, L’Oustalet, where owners Marlies and Johannes Sailer help us feast on the freshest seasonal ingredients, ranging from simple, whole tender roasted pigeon to green and white asparagus, baby artichokes with a zesty fresh tomato sauce, fresh Mediterranean fish and shellfish, rich local duck and soothing soups. The desserts are stunning, and might include a perfect millefeuille filled with the renowned strawberries from Carpentras or individual cherry clafoutis paired with a bright cherry sorbet. The Sailers have transformed a village house into a small and welcoming restaurant where, in the summer months, tables spill out onto the shaded terrace where we can watch the sun set at the end of a long day.

DOMAINE DE LA PONCHE

My most recent neighborhood discovery is the peaceful, 17th-century turreted château set in the middle of the vineyards of Vacqueyras, a Côtes-du-Rhône village and appellation known for its peppery, Grenache-based wines. Domaine de la Ponche serves as a simple and homey hotel and a fine table d’hotes where there is a just a single simple but sublime menu each evening. By reservation, La Ponche also accepts diners who are not staying in the chateau. Owners Jean-Pierre Onimus, Ruth Spah and Madeleine Frauenknecht have a flair for simplicity, both in the kitchen, the garden, and the wine cellar. Food with clean, clear flavors is served in the bright dining room and the nicely shaded terrace. A starter might be as simple as the most perfect, thinly sliced cucumbers, tossed in a lemony vinaigrette and heartily seasoned with freshly cracked black pepper. On one visit, the evening’s special was lamb chops, delicious, moist and meaty with a pure lamb flavor, served with a picture perfect, sheer potato gratin. A huge mound of green beans cooked with Ruth and Madeleine’s professional flair made an ideal accompaniment. And you will be a very lucky diner indeed should they decide to wear their Italian hats that evening, for everything they do with pasta and rice is purely awesome. Dessert may be as simple as warm apples, ice cream and almonds. Jean-Pierre is sure to suggest a local wine that will turn you into a believer: A favorite of the moment is the La Fourmone Vacqueyras La Fleurantine, a complex, floral white from the vineyard just across the road.

DOMAINE SAINT LUC

In 1971 Ludovic and Eliane Cornillon bought a ruin of an 18th-century farm, rented vineyards, and as soon as the house was restored, set up a ferme-auberge. They have just a handful of guest rooms and overnight guests also get to enjoy the table d’hotes dinner prepared lovingly by Eliane, one of the best Provencal cooks I know. Their wine has grown immensely in quality and quantity, with a wide range of reds and whites made for drinking today as well as cellaring for tomorrow. A typical meal here might begin with giant platters of tender green beans tossed with an avalanche of basil; a shoulder or lamb paired with onions cooked to a melting tenderness, and a gratin Provencal made up of potatoes, onions, tomatoes and a touch of garlic. There is always a generous platter of cheeses, followed by fruit desserts paired with simple homemade cookies. And of course Landover’s assortment of wines, served personally by the winemaker, who speaks lovingly and he artfully of his craft. You will always learn something from Ludovic. Guests dine in the spacious stone dining room of this lovingly restored farm. (And I have to add that as of the 2001 vintage, Ludovic is making our own wine from the three hectares of Grenache, Syrah and Mourvèdre that make up our very own peppery red Côtes-du-Rhône Clos Chanteduc.)

Le Grand Pre
route de Vaison (D 975)
Tel: 04 90 46 18 12.
email:legrandpre@walka9.com
fax: 04 90 46 17 84.
Closed June 25 to July 3, January 28 to February 26, Tuesday, Wednesday lunch, and Saturday lunch. Credit cards: American Express, Visa. A la carte, 29 to 54 euros, including service but not wine.

L’Oustalet, (in the center of Gigondas )
84190 Gigondas
tel: 04 90 65 83 30
fax: 04 90 65 85 30.
email: loustalet-gigondas@libertysurf.fr.
Closed November 15 to December 28, Sunday (except lunch on holidays) and Monday. All major credit cards. 13.50 euro children’s weekday lunch menu, 17 euro weekday lunch menu, menus at 26, 32, 39, 50, and 60 euros. A la carte, 39 to 60 euros, including service but not wine.

Domaine de la Ponche
84190 Vacqueyras
Tel: 33(0)4 90 65 85 21
Fax : 33(0)4 90 65 85 23.
email : domaine.laponch@wanadoo.fr
www.hotel-laponche.com
Open for dinner only, by reservation only. Closed Sunday and Tuesday. Rooms priced from 92 to 191 euros, depending upon the season. Meals at 33 euros per person, including service but not wine.

Maison d’Hotes Domain Saint Luc
26790 La Baume de Transit
Tel: 33(0)4 75 98 11 51
Fax: 04 75 98 19
email: domainestluc@wanadoo.com
www.dom-saint-luc.com
Six rooms and two studios with kitchenette, from 64 to 99 euros, including breakfast. Meals 25 euros per person, plus 10 euros for wine. There is also a swimming pool on the premises.

Tastes from the Top

PARIS -- In these days of French anxiety, it is always reassuring to know that when all else fails in this country, one can always be assured of a certain gastronomic bliss. Recent lunches at my two favorite restaurants in Paris --- Guy Savoy and Pierre Gagnaire - reminded me of what several hours of pure pleasure can do for the soul.

Since finally receiving his well-deserved and long-delayed third Michelin star, Guy Savoy has been giddy with joy. His staff acts as though they are in perpetual training for a non-existent fourth star, and we the diners are the fine beneficiary of all that unleashed enthusiasm.

Guy Savoy has always been a brave, modern man, a trendsetter in the kitchen and the dining room. He was the first chef I ever saw use such an array of ultramodern white china bowls, so perfect for tiny tastes, with the edges acting as a blank canvas for a chef's creativity. His penchant for modern art took fine restaurants out of the obligatory oversized vases of flowers and a touch of red velvet.

Savoy's latest act of bravery is to serve a single green asparagus on a plate. But not just any asparagus. Imagine the plumpest spear of green asparagus cooked to perfection, with a little rectangular notch carved out of it. In that little rectangle he poses a finely fitting portion of a foie gras royale, a creamy compact, smooth-flavored foie gras, all bathed in a forward-flavored truffle vinaigrette. Not a bad way to start a lovely meal!

I have had the pleasure of twice sampling his turbot trio, a combination of gently poached Brittany turbot paired with ratte potatoes poached in the turbot water (picking up a gentle brininess along the way) and bathed in a touch of turbot butter. This is followed by his "petit ragout des cuinsiniers" tasty bits of turbot quickly pan fried. It is hard to imagine how such simple ingredients can be elevated to more than the sum of their parts, and at the same time left seemingly untouched. In this presentation, flavors are pure, almost intense, textures are clean and well-defined.

Guy pulls off the same success with his "agneau de lait dans tous ses états" combining brochettes of shoulder and roasted leg of lamb allowing us to admire all the ways a single tiny piece of lamb can taste.

He remains faithful as ever to his classics: the ever-soothing artichoke soup topped with black truffles and Parmesan, paired with a rich brioche buttered heavily with a truffle and mushroom butter.

A wine I have loved here is Jean-Luc Colombo's Saint Peray, La Belle de Mai 2000, a beautiful example of one of my favorite grape varieties, Roussanne, which has the ability to offer a wine with a fine balance of acidity, with complex floral notes.

I confess that it is rare that a dessert remains my strongest food memory of a meal. But I can't stop thinking about how pure and pleasurable I found Pierre Gagnaire's chocolate dessert. When the sweet, dark, extravaganza arrived as part of a procession of "quelques" desserts our table burst out with a laughter of joy. It was like a candy store on a plate: four or five rounds of chocolate cookie the size of an Oreo all filled with a smooth chocolate mousse, stacked up like a dark brown millefeuille. The dessert was streamlined and simple in its own right, pure decadence in another light.

Like Savoy, Gagnaire is at the top of his form, and that's saying a lot for both. Somehow, these two classically trained chefs have managed to always keep up with the times, always remain passionate and true to their art, and make us all feel that they are having a good old time at it as well.

Gagnaire's food has always been complex and full of fireworks, but once you think through a dish of his, it really is all about the purity of flavors, with am emphasis too on beauty, on the progression of colors, of varying essences of varying power. Even his butter looks like the more beautiful thing you've ever seen, the color of brilliant lemon zest. Sometimes I think that his food is about all sensations, all the time, and you have to step back from the table and think about what is going on to digest it all in your mind.

But nothing is lost if you just dig in! He is into processions these days, especially during his market menu at lunch time. You will find things like a tiny bouquet of asparagus green and asparagus white, enhanced with a egg yolk pate that looked as though it was applied to the bowl with a putty knife. An incredible gelée of varied vegetables --- peas, snow peas and white Tarbais beans - is a riot of color, texture, spring flavor. Lieu jaune - a generally less than noble codfish --- arrives warm and has a rich herbal essence to it. Here we have the smoothness of the fish offset by the Gagnaire's original 'sel cuisiné," his own varied mixtures of fresh herbs and sea salt that he sprinkles atop his dishes like we use common salt and pepper. Here the mixture is one of chives and salt, and this simple addition creates a texture that common salt could not. Finally, his curry de racines (a mixture of varied root vegetables paired with bean sprouts and pistachio oil) create a colorful, spicy climax to his lineup of starters.

The main course - a perfectly cooked saddle of lamb, pan-fried with oregano and served with a timbale of lamb sweetbreads and sorrel - has an almost a calming effect as it follows the fireworks of the complex first course.

Wines I have loved here include Rossignol's 1999 Volnay Chevret, a fine example of the 1999 red Burgundies that are drinking now with a certain youthful beauty; and Thevenet's 1999 Macon Villages, an always welcome well-priced example of a classic Chardonnay.

Guy Savoy
18 rue Troyon
Paris 75017
Tel: 01 43 80 40 61.
Fax: 01 46 22 43 09.
reserv@guysavoy.com.
Closed Saturday lunch, Sunday, Monday, and August. All major credit cards. Menus at 170 and 200 euros, A la carte, 135 to 175 euros, including service but not wine.

Pierre Gagnaire
6 rue Balzac
Paris 75008.
Tel: 01 58 36 12 50
Fax: 01 58 36 12 51
p.gagnaire@wanadoo.fr.
Closed Saturday, Sunday lunch, holidays and the last two weeks of July. All major credit cards. Lunch menus at 83 and 85 euros and 182.94 euros. A la carte, 155 to 215 euros, including service but not wine.

A Tribute to the American Middle West

Takashi Yagihashi Farmington Hills, Michigan – As maitre d’ Mickey Bakst likes to say, “I wanted people to walk away from our restaurant feeling as though they had never been to Detroit.”

By all accounts, Bakst and the restaurant Tribute’s chef, Takashi Yagihashi, have succeeded royally.

The mission was to bring a luxury restaurant to the Detroit suburbs, where automakers could wine and dine their customers in splendor. But the elegant, eclectic, electric spot situated at the crossroads of a suburban highway (wedged between a gas station and a mom and pop pancake house) draws more than deep pocket guys from the industry. The restaurant, opened in 1996, has received just about every restaurant accolade one can garner in the US, as it is listed as one of America’s 50 Best Restaurants by Gourmet Magazine, and in the year 2000 chef Yagihashi was named one of America’s Ten Best New Chefs by Food & Wine magazine.

Americans always believe that if you sink enough money into a project, you can make it work. Restaurant Tribute – created with a huge, blank check – tends to prove the point. But there is more than money behind the restaurant: There is also passion, serious forethought, a love for blending the classic with the modern in both design and in the kitchen, and a lot of strong personalities to tie it together.

Bakst and Yagihashi, along with pastry chef Michael Laiskonis, have created a true gastronomic haven with a lot of soul. So Andy Warhol art is framed in thick gilded frames, and Asian Bouillabaisse appears on the table. The result is the best of both worlds, carried out with care and calculation.

The wine cellar, of course, is astonishing, with more than 1,000 top world wines on the list, including plenty of welcome half bottles and a healthy selection of wines by the glass.

A recent meal there showed up their special talent for pairing wine and food. A delicate, vibrant and clean-flavored first course of big eye tuna and fluke sashimi, teamed up with geoduck clams and sweet onion-soy dressing, was a dreamy match for the deep-flavored, golden Champagne Veuve Clicquot La Grande Dame 1993.

But the star of the meal was unquestionably the chef’s brilliant Asian Bouillabaisse, a welcome version of the often tired bouillabaisse imitations found around the world. Here, the chef offered a full palate of fish and shellfish – from clams to mussels, to rich meaty lobster – and bathed it all in a fragrant, tangy kaffir lime foam. The full pleasure of the dish was achieved with the pairing of the rich Zind-Humbrecht 1999 Riesling Clos Saint Urbain. Here, the much ignored Riesling grape seemed to do a little dance, happy to play its role by adding spice, acidity, balance and a refreshing counterpart.

A main course roasted loin of lamb (cooked to a perfect rareness) was paired with a measured portion of Hudson Valley foie gras, a fricassee of spring vegetables, and a most welcoming spring pea custard, all tied together with an understated (but oh so evident) red wine and rosemary sauce. The 1996 Italian Barolo -- the Bricco Rocche from Brunate – was in perfect company.

Pastry chef Laiskonis stepped in with energy and clarity, offering a soothing French melon soup with a Sauternes gelée; and a quivering buttermilk pannacotta flanked by a ginger-citrus gelée and a rhubarb-blood orange compote. But the grand finale --- a chocolate caramel egg shell anointed with just a few grains of fleur de sel – brought the house down. In happy company was the 1997 sweet white Bonnezeaux, Chateau de Fesles.

Tribute
31425 West Twelve Mile Road
Farmington Hills, Michigan 48334.
Tel: 248 848 9393.
Fax: 248 848 1919.
Email: tribute@earthlink.com Internet: www.tribute-restaurant.com
Open for dinner only, Tuesday through Saturday.

Nothing beats the anticipation of returning to a restaurant you have loved for years. A recent dinner at one of my preferred restaurants in the world – Rick and Deanne Bayless’s casual Frontera Grill and more formal Topolobampo – found the owners, their kitchen, and dining room, in top form.

As ever, the food was full of dense, intense flavors, with dishes that both offered surprises and that essential security net, familiarity. Most of us did not grow up with palates weaned on banana leaves or crunchy jicama, poblano peppers or pasilla chiles. So Rick and Deanne do their best to add touches of familiarity, both visual and gustative. A case in point is their new tostaditas de Tinga, crispy tostadas topped with home-smoked organic chicken, roasted tomatoes, smoky chipotle chiles, avocado and cheese. The simple addition of a tiny tangle of frisee salad seemed to tell us all, it’s ok, it’s familiar. I could have easily had three servings of these delicious tostaditas. In fact, a fellow diner actually had two!

Other dishes were no less appealing, and included very smooth and tender shrimp tamales steamed in banana leaves and served in a bright-flavored ancho-arbol sauce and a tang, cooling pea shoot salad.

Pork is back in America in big way, showing up on the best menus all over the nation. Chicago is no exception, and the Bayless’s offered roasted Maple Creek Farm pork loin cooked to a welcome rareness, much as one would cook a loin of lamb. The meaty, tender pork was accented by a complex, rich (but not at all heavy) sauce that combined hazelnuts, pine nuts, and pecans in a mole of ancho and pasilla chiles. The accent was almost French in the accompanying braised organic spinach and garlicky bread pudding.

Topolobampo
445 North Clark, Chicago, Illinois.
Tel: 213 661 1434.
Chef’s tasting dinner, five courses, $70 ($100 with wine.) A la carte, about $45 per person, not including service or wine.

When modern meets classic in Bordeaux

Restaurant La Tupina BORDEAUX --- This will not be the last time you will hear of Yves Gravelier and the charming, modern, restaurant that bears his name. If I sit down and think of qualities I personally look for as a diner, Gravelier seems to pack many into a single meal: The food is modern yet bears all the best of the Classic French Touch. The décor is bright – lime greens and tangerine ---- and says fun with a capital F. You feel as though you are right place, right time.

All that would be nothing if Gravelier did not have such fine schooling (Fredy Girardet, Jacques Chibois and Alain Senderens) and an understanding palate. This is food that is inventive as well as attentive: In a single dish the 41-year-old chef manages to surprise and please, offer a course in classic French cuisine, add an

Asian touch, and make it all very, very pretty. Best of all, this man understands two essential elements of cuisine: texture and acidity. We don’t think enough about textures in our food, yet Gravelier understands the human response to a creamy coating of the tongue that plays against a fine bit of crunch. He also gets the importance of acidity in a meal, the very quality that makes us walk out of a restaurant feeling light as a feather. All this for bargain-priced menus at 24, 32 and 40 euros.

My favorite dish here is his starter of grilled pigeon, served with its liver and a deliciously rich red sauce. I’ve had the combination many a time, and savoring it made me think of what can make such a difference when dining in a restaurant that is new to us: that combination of familiarity and surprise. Here, the portion was small and just enough to tease. The taste was pure, classic, and yet was it the fact that it arrived on a plate that might have been rectangular, or square, that made it taste so different? (I once dined with a friend who could not eat in restaurants that served food off of anything other than a round plate….)

Another hit was his 12-hour lamb, here served as a moist cake made up of potatoes and long-cooked lamb topped with rare-cooked lamb nuggets, all served with green asparagus and a brilliant green asparagus sauce.

Desserts were a delight, especially the mix of crispy chocolate and chocolate mousse accompanied by a duet of cherry treats; and the raspberry crepe soufflé.

Service here is attentive, and managed by Gravelier’s wife, Anne-Marie, the daughter of none other than noted French chef Pierre Troisgros.

Nothing is more fear-inducing than returning to a favorite restaurant after a long absence. Fond memories seem to be embellished with time, and it is actually very hard for most places to live up to those skewed recollections.

I have been dining at the warming, fragrant Bordeaux bistro La Tupina for more than 20 years and have never been disappointed. My last visit was no different, and in fact was better than my memory permitted. Everything we sampled at the hand of Jean-Pierre Xiradakis had that magic touch, food with a rich, golden glow, and deep, true flavors. From fat white asparagus teamed up with fresh morels, to giant golden fried potatoes, and on to a fabulous duck carpaccio smothered in deliciously acidic shallot vinaigrette, the food spoke of France’s famed southwest. Don’t miss the hauntingly rich macaronade --- gigantic rigatoni tossed with foie gras and wild mushrooms – or the fare cooked in front of the roaring fire -- chicken, lamb, beef, you name it.

Gravelier
114 cours Verdun
33000 Bordeaux
tel: 05 56 48 17 15
Fax: 05 56 51 96 07.
Credit cards: American Express, Diners Club, Visa. Closed Saturday lunch, all day Sunday, and Monday lunch. 18.30 euro lunch menu, dinner menus at 24, 32, and 40 euros; a la carte from 37 to 44 euros, including service but not wine.

La Tupina
6 rue Porte de la Monnaie
33000 Bordeaux
tel: 05 56 91 56 37.
Fax: 05 56 31 92 11.
Email: latupina@latupina.com
Web: www.latupina.com
Weekday lunch menu at 15.50 euros; lunch menu at 30 euros. Seasonal lunch and dinner menu at 50 euros. A la carte, 31.50 to 75 euros, including service but not wine.

Passion, Persistence, Passiflore

Paris – In the past, the talents of chef Roland Durand seemed to simply pass me by. I sampled his food at the Relais de Sevres, La Camélia in Bougival, and later at the Pre Catelan, and never fell in love with the fare and style that won him a coveted place as a meilleur ouvrier de France.

But persistence has paid off and so has this chef’s passion for travel. In his latest incarnation – the warm, chic, lively restaurant Passiflore (passion flower) --- he has hit it on the nail. His food sings, flies, does a fine little dance. Michelin thinks so too, and awarded him a Michelin star on March 1.

A first glance at the menu will no doubt confuse many diners. What country are we in and what is the century? Here we have everything from steak with polenta to a sweet potato vichyssoise and on to langoustines served with an Indian mulligatawny with Thai herbs, and then stuffed cabbage.

Surprisingly, this Auvergnat chef who spent years living in Thailand manages to combine all of his experiences into a cuisine that is at once modern, traditional, and exciting. He does not color outside the lines, yet his is a cuisine that takes French fare out of a rut.

Durand has a passion for soup, and manages to pass along that enthusiasm with a variety of brilliant renditions: His chilled red beet soup laced with horseradish is a winner and a real alarm clock for the palate. The sweet potato soup perfumed with star anise, along with chunks of fresh crabmeat, was astonishing in its complexity and ability to please.

Favorite dishes here include gorgeous langoustines paired with plump, ultra fresh scallops in a mulligatawny-spiced dish that managed a certain elegance; the wildly audacious jellied calves head paired with oysters in a deliciously capery sauce; and the obligatory molten warm chocolate cake, only here the surprise was a river of pistachio sauce running from the center.

Less ambitious diners will be just as happy with the thick and wholesome seared beef rib steak or the gargantuan and delicious stuffed cabbage. I found the pasta in his raviole of crab too thick, and the warm chocolate tart a bit too lacking in chocolate to satisfy.

The décor – faux marble walls in ochre tones, leopard skin carpeting, lots of chocolate brown, and crisp white linens – matches the cuisine. Service is excellent, and the wine list offers plenty of choice. Try the white Cairanne from Domaine Richaud (37.50 euros) or the fine red Fitou, Terre Natal (22 euros).

It will be a pleasure to follow Durand’s progress, and inspirations that come with the change of seasons.

---

Passiflore
33 rue du Longchamp
Paris 75016
Tel: 01 47 04 96 81
Fax: 01 47 04 32 27

Closed Saturday lunch and Sunday. Credit cards: American Express, Visa. Menus at 30 and 38 euros. A la carte, 45 to 67 euros including service but not wine.

New Kid on the Block: Paris's Very Fine Hiramatsu

Paris – Each season a new restaurant sneaks up on us and seemingly overnight becomes the latest rage. The restaurant of the moment is Hiramatsu, a miniscule 18-seat restaurant set along the banks of the Seine on the Ile Saint Louis.

Since its opening last October, the restaurant has had its share of fans and foes. The achievement of a Michelin star on March 1st only helped fuel the flames of controversy. There are critics who wonder how chef-owner Hiroyuki Hiramatsu – who seems to have come out of nowhere – managed to land such a beautiful site, managed to become the rage, managed to garner a coveted Michelin star in such a brief time.

And then there are those (like me) who say, who cares where he came from, it’s what’s on the plate that matters. And in my estimation, this Japanese businessman/chef has brought an always welcome breath of fresh air to the Paris dining scene.

The crisply elegant restaurant is a tiny jewel box. With black and white tile floors, comfortable beige leather arm chairs, crisp white linens, and lots of ultra-modern Bernardaud china, Hiramatsu is ultimately pleasing.

The menu is as diminutive as the site, with five selections of starters, fish, meat, and dessert. And Hiramatsu’s food has a surprising, dramatic, gee-whiz quality about it, the kind of fare that can get even the most jaded palates excited about the freshness of ingredients and their juxtaposition on the plate.

Like most good modern chefs today, Hiramatsu is obsessed with the quality of ingredients and several meals here attest to his attention to those details. Currently, diners begin the meal with a small plate of paper-thin slices of Spanish ham drizzled with great olive oil and sprinkled with pepper. Utterly simple and utterly divine. The palate teaser is an equally excellent royale, an alabaster-white pudding topped with a fragrant, intense, truffle bouillon laced with matchstick slices of black truffles.

Perhaps the prettiest dish on the menu is the first course serving of duck breast, cabbage, and foie gras. Strips of raw duck breast are mounded teepee- style atop the cabbage and foie gras. At table, the waiter pours boiling vegetable consommé over the duck, allowing it to cook every so slightly.

On the soothing side, Hiramatsu offers a marvelous modern ravioli --- a giant sheet of pasta enveloping huge chunks of firm, white Saint Pierre (or John Dory), teamed up with miniscule cubes of eggplant and zucchini. An almost lactic, acidic sauce served to bind them all together.

But I guess my favorite dish here is the turbot, pan-fried on the bone, and presented at table before whisking it back to the kitchen for the final touches. The turbot is seared with a mixture of very finely chopped dried orange rind and juniper berries, making for a fragrant, pungent coating, and is served with an elegant, equally pungent green mustard sauce.

A close second favorite would be his first course salade de fruits de mer, a mixture of lobster, scallops, bar, salmon, turbot, sliced mushrooms and strips of celery root all set atop a porcelain grill. Beneath the grill lie some 13 spices, all smoking away, giving the dish a mysterious, delicately smoky quality.

Desserts include the obligatory molten chocolate cake, which here runs like a veritable live volcano: I loved the warm, oozing, river of bitter chocolate. Equally pleasing is the millefeuille of orange confits, served with a superb bitter chocolate sorbet.

Service is fine, often chatty. The wine list – created by wine steward Hideya Ishizuka, formerly at the Michelin two-star restaurant Chateau Cordeillan-Bages in Bordeaux -- is excellent, with great variety and a wide choice of half bottles, rarely seen and much in demand.

So who is this mystery man? Hiramatsu has an empire of elegant French and Italian restaurants in Japan, and as he tells the story, he has had a long time dream of having a tiny restaurant in Paris to use as a sort of laboratory for testing and selecting ingredients to export to Japan, as well as training kitchen and dining room staff. He was walking along the Ile Saint Louis one day, found that his current space was available, and grabbed it. The chef spends half his time in Paris and half in Japan, and plans to change the entire menu and all the china four times each year. As he says “Food does not change. Seasons do.”

---

Restaurant Hiramatsu Saint-Louis en l’Ile
7 Quai de Bourbon
Paris 75004.
Telephone 01 56 81 08 80.
email: paris@hiramatsu.co.jp.
Closed Sunday and Monday. All major credit cards. 45 Euro lunch menu, 92 euro tasting menu. A la carte, 90 to 140 euros per person, including service but not wine.

Fusion! The French break loose

PARIS -- It’s the modern Parisian restaurant : a clean, contemporary look, cozy chairs, and a menu that might be called many things: fusion, unstructured, Franco/Japanese/Italian. Gone is the French insistence on a traditional first course, main course, cheese and/or dessert. What freedom! Go ahead, break the rules, order two first course, and nothing else! Or just go for two pastas, or, gosh why not just cheese and dessert?

Anything can happen at these places. And while Americans have pretty much been ordering this way for a very long time, this is true innovation for the French. And after a few visits to some of these modern eateries, it is clear that while the French are ready for it, they do sit at the table, often totally bewildered.

Fortunately, at two of the best of the lot --- both Left Bank newly solid spots, Ze Kitchen Gallerie and Caffé – the waiters are patient and informed, and ready to help out any baffled diners.

At one of my favorite new spots, Ze Kitchen Gallerie, chef William Ledeuil has done it again. He has his finger (and palate) on the pulse of the modern diner. Despite the kitschy name, Ze Kitchen Galerie is a delight. The menu is divided between soups, pastas, raw and marinated fish, and main courses, all cooked à la plancha, or directly over a very hot, flat griddle. I have loved just about everything I have tasted over a series of visits. Ledeuil (also chef at Les Bookinistes right next door) wisely hires young chefs from various nationalites so the food has an authentic flavor.

His combinations and creations are always inventive, never wacky. Mussels are teamed up with coconut milk and mushrooms in a creamy, warming soup. Lentils and mushrooms are turned into a wintry soup enlivened with gingerbread, or pain d’epices. I love most, though, the pastas, such as the roborative macaroni with pesto, pine nuts and grilled chorizo. Best of the selection of raw fish and shellfish is his yummy preparation of oysters and scallops in a spicy horseradish cream.

Desserts are simply fun. Try the roasted pineapple served with a tiny vanilla milk shake and a scoop of rich vanilla ice cream; or the cinnamon caramel ice cream with a chestnut milk milkshake.

There is a small but always inviting wine list: Try the always dependable Faugères from the Languedoc, here the intense, well-structured red Château Anglade from Marie Rigaud-Anglade, a fine blend of Syrah, Grenache and Mourvèdre grapes. The décor here is modern and a touch cold, but that’s the style today.

Caffé, open since the first week of January, is a delight. I adore the décor: Solid brick walls and arches make for a warming setting, and bare wooden tables make for a nice, open room. The menu offers simple, solid, contemporary fare. And rather than the traditional menu separated into first course, main course, cheese and dessert the selections include à la vapeur (steamed); marinés et cru (marinated and raw); plancha (grilled on a flat hotplate); pates et riz (pastas and rice); les canailles (and those favorites of childhood).

Do try the unusual steamed oysters – the tiny boudeuses from the Brittany village of Prat ar Coum -- served in elegant white bowls with a series of sauces. The oysters are also available oh so simply, on the half shell, served with the traditional bread and salted butter.

On one visit, I feasted on a daily special --- the freshest of rouget, or red mullet fillets, delicately wrapped in feuilles de brick, the light Moroccan pastry, and deep fried. Palates in search of heartier fare will adore the steaming, homey casserole filled with joue de cochon, or pig’s cheeks, served with a bounty of winter carrots.

Other specialties include a simple carpaccio of beef; steamed cod with cabbage and smoked milk; orrechiette pasta with broccoli; and traditional risotto Milanese, laced with bone marrow and saffron.

The wine list is brief: Do try the dense and tannic red Corbières, Castel Maure, well- priced at 28.50 euros.

---

Ze Kitchen Galerie
4, rue des Grands Augustins
Paris 75006.
Telephone :01 44 32 00 32.
Fax: 01 44 32 00 33.
Closed Saturday lunch and Sunday. Credit card: Visa. 30 to 40 euros, including service but not wine.

---

Caffé
74, boulevard de Latour Maubourg
Paris 75007.
Telephone : 01 47 53 80 86.
Closed Sunday and Monday. Credit card: Visa. 30 to 50 euros, including service but not wine.

From a Perfect Angle

PARIS -- I don’t know when I last had such authentic, well-prepare and well-presented French fare as this: Succulent, moist, glistening cubes of lamb shoulder, paired with meltingly tender potatoes enhanced with the essence of violet-toned garlic. Braised veal cheeks so gorgeous any French housewife would fall on her knees with joy if she had prepared them, teamed with a truly original (and successful) gratin of macaroni and artichokes. What could be bad about that? Add a glass or two of the rich, velvety red Vin de Pays d’Oc L’Hermitage, Les Domaine Camplazens (a bargain at 30 euros) and you are certainly on the road to heaven.

All this at the very understated, carefully conceived l'Angle du Faubourg, owner Jean-Claude Vrinat’s “wine bistro,” or little brother of his august restaurant, Taillevent. L’Angle has been open since last March, showing us all that Monsieur Vrinat, once again, knows how to create a winner. The restaurant is just what one wants of this talented man: Excellent classic fare with a modern flair, a drop-dead wine list at worthy prices, and a pleasant setting that does not look and feel like every other new restaurant in town.

The bare, colored-cement floors, brick-toned walls, simple white linen tablecloths and soothing celadon china sets a discreet, undistracting background for what is to come. The menu, brief and in the know, remains true to French culture, while not getting lost in a swirl of nostalgia. The beef cheeks and lamb shoulder assuage our classic cravings, but much of the menu is devoted to more adventuresome, modern fare. The ‘’risotto” special changes daily, and on our last dinner the chef created a lovely creamy dish fashioned of the Provencal poor man’s wheat, known as epeautre. Baby artichokes are prepared in the classic barigoule style (braised in white wine, herbs and vegetables) but are paired with shavings of rich Parmesan and a shower of arugula. A pot of foie gras prepared ‘’a l’ancienne,’ is all that foie gras could hope to be; rich, well seasoned, better than butter.

There is always a trio of cheeses with accompaniments, such as goat’s milk Cabécou drizzled with chestnut honey; the rich blue cow’s milk Fourme d’Ambert marinated in the sweet Loire Valley white wine, Coteaux du Layon; and sheep’s milk tomme de Brebis from the Pays Basque is rubbed with piment d’Espelette.

Even the lady who can do without desserts plunges in here: A perfect layered chocolate cake, served with a fine bitter almond ice cream.

Even if the food were just ok, L’Angle would be worth visiting just for the wine list. It is not a heavy, biblical tome, but rather eight pages of wines that would be worth drinking any day of the week. There is a full page of wines by the glass, including Domaine d’Aupilhac’s white vin de pays from the Languedoc, and Domaine du Deffends’ Clos de la Truffière from the Var. On my last visit, I enjoyed the pleasant white Picpoul de Pinet, from Domaine Saint-Martin la Garrigue in the Languedoc (16 euro), along with the Domaine Camplazens. Other wines worth trying here include Domaine Gauby’s Cotes du Roussillon Village Vieilles Vignes (62 euro); Chateau La Voulte Gasparets, Corbières Cuvée Romain Pauc, as well as Domaine Huet’s always dependable Vouvray Sec , Le Mont (44 euro).

All the while, Vrinat manages to keep his grand restaurant, Taillevent, at the same, fine level. The food at Taillevent, under the direction of chef Michel Del Burgo, remains classic to the core, with foie gras, lobster, filet of beef, saddle of lamb and pigeon leading the way. A recent visit offered a fine, substantial meal, starting with a truly satisfying serving of thick, homemade raviolis stuffed with domestic mushrooms and a dash of truffle, all bathed in a frothy creamy, soup-like sauce laced with foie gras. Equally good was the main course veal chop, thick and served just this side of rare, paired with fat, first-of-season asparagus wrapped in lace-thin pieces of pancetta and seared to a golden brown. Only the individual tarte Tatin, or upside down apple tart, left me feeling a bit deprived and disappointed.

The wine list, as well, is as much a part of the Taillevent experience as is the exquisite service and food: Here, Monsieur Vrinat is happy to help you choose. Don’t miss the selection of white Burgundies, starting at 30 euro, or the white and red Rhônes, including a favorite, Domaine de la Mordorée’s 1999 Lirac well priced at 56 euro, or the their stunning white Lirac La Reine des Bois, at 56 euro.

And once you have been to both restaurants, stop off to fill your wine cellar at the companion wine shop, Les Caves Taillevent.

---

L‘Angle du Faubourg
195 rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré
Paris 75008
Telephone 01 40 74 20 20
Fax : 01 40 74 20 21.

Credit card: Visa. Closed Saturday lunch and Sunday. Daily menu at 35 euro. A la carte, 40 to 55 euro, including service but not wine.

---

Taillevent
15 rue Lamennais
Paris 75008
Telephone : 01 44 95 15 01.
Fax : 01 01 42 25 95 18.
Email:mail@taillevent.com

Credit cards: American Express, Diners Club, Visa. Closed Saturday and Sunday. Tasting menu at 130-euro. A la carte, 105 to 225 euro, including service but not wine.

---

Les Caves Taillevent
199 rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré
Paris 75008
Telephone : 01 45 61 14 09.
Fax : 01 45 61 19 68.
email : mail@cavetaillevant.com
internet : www.taillevent.com

Closed Sunday, and Monday morning.

Thomas Keller: A Chef with a Passion

Yountville, California --- Eating at chef Thomas Keller's famed Napa Valley restaurant The French Laundry makes me think of watching Fred Astaire. When you watch the master dance, you only think about how much fun he must be having, it all looks so easy, so natural. It never crosses your mind that he is working about as hard as a human being can work.

The truth is, no matter how hard the modest, talented Thomas Keller works, you can be sure he is having fun at it. As he says himself, the trick is to learn to ''maintain passion for everyday routine,'' and there is plenty of that in any kitchen, especially one generally considered the very best table in America.

I first encountered Keller's exciting, well-crafted food in 1986, when he opened restaurant Rakel in New York City, just a few years after he served apprenticeships in some of France's best and most up and coming restaurants, including Taillevent, Guy Savoy and Le Pre Catalan.

In 1994 he purchased the 1900's stone building that had actually once been a French laundry, dedicating himself to creating a top country restaurant in the heart of Napa Valley. There are still rough spots to work out (the restaurant is too cramped for his expansive cuisine), but I can't imagine coming to the hallowed Napa Valley and not trying my best to secure a table at this superb establishment.

Keller has what many other chefs don't have, and that's a sense of humor. As our very first taste arrived on a recent dinner at The French Laundry, our table of four burst into giggles, like schoolchildren. Set before us were his legendary ice cream come starter --- buttery, miniature homemade ice cream cones filled with salmon tartare and sweet red onion crème fraîche - food that was both fun and delicious, and they went down so well with delicate sips of bubbly. It is all the better to know that the chef actually created the dish during a moment of personal sadness, while eating a Baskin Robbins ice cream cone!

The Napa Valley was originally inhabited by the Wappo Indians, and nappa was their word for plenty, and plenty certainly applies to a meal at The French Laundry. Rather than a first course and main course Keller will tempt you with many many little bites, well rehearsed, close to flawless, well executed. And there are plenty of them.

A favorite legendary French Laundry treat is Keller's "'Oysters and Pearls,' plump, gorgeous oysters set atop a bed of smooth pearl tapioca sabayon then topped with a small oval scoop of glistening osetra caviar. What could be bad about this? The kind of dish that must be savored, oh so slowly, for once you down the last grain of caviar, it's all over. All that remains is the fine memory, and a palate still filled with the iodine-rich essence of the sea.

Strong, assertive flavors continue as we confront warm, sweet, fruitwood smoked salmon served with feather-light potato gnocchi all joined together with a signature balsamic vinegar glaze. Keller cooks the delicate smoked salmon in milk (much as the French do traditionally with herring) to help retain its texture and to allow him to serve it warm.

The meal moves on, with rabbit treasures and goat cheese surprises, ending with perhaps his most famous dish, Coffee and Doughnuts, another creation born out of sadness, and you guessed it, a trip to S&K Doughnuts in Los Angeles. What Keller serves in a giant bowl of warm ''cappuccino semifreddo,'' or a frothy white blend of sugar, eggs, espresso extract and cream, paired with adorable homemade cinnamon-sugar doughnuts, yeasty, golden, and reminiscent of some of my best food memories of childhood.

Keller tugs at our food memories in the nicest of ways. He is also lecturing us a bit. He rightly considers a respect for food, a respect for life, but admonishes that "our hunger for the twenty-minute gourmet meal, for one-pot ease, prewashed precut ingredients has severed our lifeline to the satisfactions of cooking." He says it all. So go into the kitchen and cook up a meal you can be proud of, with respect.

---

The French Laundry
6640 Washington Street
Yountville, California 94599-1301
Telephone: 707 944 2380.
About $100 per person, not including service or wine. Reservations are accepted no more than two months in advance.

	Fish, Main d'or, Chez Marcel, and Il Vicolo

Enter the Era of the Quiet Chef

San Francisco --- We are, at last, entering the era of the "quiet' chef. Thank goodness, all that stacking and fireworks and dishes with 1,000 misplaced ingredients are beginning to be behind us. This is the day of food that is sensible, subtle, understated. And when it is done well, it is simply delicious.

A recent dinner at the two-year old Gary Danko restaurant in San Francisco solidified that trend for me. The meal was superb, from beginning to end. And what's more, service was in line with the finest you will find in the world: attentive, intelligent, grown-up.

A native of New York state, Danko grew up with a food-loving mother from Louisiana and an architect father. Restaurants played a role in his life from and early age, and by 1977 he was graduated from the country's respected Culinary Institute of American in New York state.

Soon he found himself in California, distinguishing himself with awards, accolades and top jobs up and down the state. His name was always mentioned when one asked where to dine in California.

Two years ago he opened his very own elegant, classic, wood-toned restaurant near the Wharf in San Francisco. Wisely, Danko serves no more than 65 diners. Tables are hard to come by, and the food is not given away, but that's the price diners pay for a top restaurant.

I always judge a restaurant menu by the number of dishes I would LOVE to eat. On Danko's dinner menu, there were too many to count. Shall it be glazed oysters with leeks, salsify and osestra caviar? Or a risotto of Maine lobster, rock shrimp, winter vegetables and rosemary oil? And what about the Vegetarian artichoke, tomato and chickpea stew? (And while I was making the final decision, two glorious cheese carts came rolling past, making the decision all that much more difficult.)

I was in comfort food mode and that meant risotto won out. And was I delighted. A perfectly tooth-tender risotto bathed in a soothing rosemary oil-infused sauce, studded with the truly sweetest of rock shrimp and lobster. Elegant, satisfying, a perfect start to a cool fall evening.

As a main course, my cravings for spice won out, and so it was the Moroccan-spiced squab with Chermoula, orange-cumin carrot. Like a perfect color palette the dish had everything: the richness of the meaty squab, the hit or Moroccan spices, the color or carrots with a fine hint of cumin.

Danko's sommeliers have done him proud, with a world class wine list. I devoured it, as I did the menu, and came up with two true winners from California. By all means try the 1998 100 percent Roussanne from Qupé vineyards in the Edna Valley north of Santa Barbara. The white wine has all the qualities of a pure Roussanne: fresh-tasting, with perfect balance of fruits and acidity, bone dry with overtones of pineapple and honey.

For a red, I turned again to the Santa Barbara neighborhood for a Zaca Mesa syrah, full of flavors of peppers, berries, and spice.

Danko offers a brilliant dining formula: Choose three, four or five courses, and the quantity of each course will be altered according to your tastes. And if you can't wait for reservations, the full menu is available at the lovely bar without reservations.

Gary Danko
800 North Point at Hyde
San Francisco, CA 94109
Tel: 415 749 2060
Fax: 415 775 1805
www.garydanko.com
Open daily, dinner only. All major credit cards. Three-course menu, $55; Four-course menu, $64; Five-course menu $74. Five course tasting menu, $74, with wines, an additional $35.

JoJo's Market? Not Yet

When French chefs head for New York or any other big American city, I assume they’re going for the bucks – they want to test themselves and their money-making aspirations in the American cauldron. But when a French chef who is astoundingly successful in New York (and London, Hong Kong and Las Vegas) comes to Paris, my assumption is that they’re looking not for riches but for confirmation, proof that they can not just get rich but cook for the world’s most demanding culinary audience.

So when French-born Jean-Georges Vongerichten announced plans to open a restaurant in Paris I was cheered at the prospect of more frequent access to the wonders of a chef whose New York restaurants – Jo-Jo’s, Jean-George, and Vong -- I have long admired.

Well, I might as well have bet on a better burger coming across the McDonalds counter. Vongerichten’s Market, (the comma is part of the logo, not my typo) is a major disappointment, from start -- the telephone calls to make the reservation -- to the finish.

New York is a wonderful city and I love most things about it. What I don’t love, and hate to see migrate to this side of the Atlantic, is the indifference and even disdain that the hot restaurant of the moment rains on its clients. It took three calls to get a table. For the first one, the young woman who said hello apparently forgot what came next, because she talked instead to someone else in the room until she hung up. The second one obtained the information that there were tables at 7 P.M. and 11 P.M. but no possibility at all in between.

With a third call, again with a lot of conversation with someone else in the room, we found that there was indeed one table in the bar at 8 P.M.

Nothing quite builds anticipation like not being able to get a table in a restaurant and then succeeding. So when we arrived promptly at 8 we were surprised to be practically alone in the place. That didn’t preclude our being seated at the smallest table in the bar, the one right by the door. The smallest table, but the best seats, because we could observe the ditzy disarray at the front desk as well as the crowd when it began arriving at 9.

The diners matched the beautiful decor, as well turned out as the restaurant is inviting in all detail, from the canopy of trees out front to the lightness of the wood wall panels. And the crowd on a recent Saturday night was older than I expected, more the Arrived than the Aspirational. (They were so much my own contemporaries, in fact, that I wondered if they had the same trouble I did reading the small print of the wine list in the low light of the dining room. Why do restaurants pose that challenge?)

Our first choice, the “Black Plate” starter – the plate itself is indeed black – raised our hopes. A rare example of the “fusion cuisine” that has mostly and happily bypassed France so far, it contained a sampling of crispy nems, succulent sushi and delicious fried shrimp, each with its own sauce, and pan-seared quail with a salad of cress whose lack of peppery character was a surprise. The quail too seemed to have been plumped up on steroids, but otherwise the array of tastes was an exotic delight.

To follow, our choices were chicken and salmon, and with those the letdown was palpable. The salmon was not “fondant,” or melting, as advertised, but rather seemed to have been rescued from something problematic. It was served on a bed of “truffled potatoes.” Now this season does promise to be very difficult for truffles, and I don’t know where these were from, but whatever their provenance the transfer had sucked out all of their lusty flavor.

But the chicken was the most disappointing. It had a crusty, caramel top, but the flip side was undercooked and totally without interest. Even my first mother in law made better chicken.

We skipped dessert and coffee, too.

The wine list also bears “fusion” characteristics, with an interesting sampling of wines from the New World as well as the work of several significant French producers. I particularly enjoyed Chapoutier’s Mount Beson syrah from Australia since it reminded me of my Rhone Valley home.

Prices go with the address, if not necessarily with the greeting or what gets delivered in the plate.

If this is indeed the attempt of a chef I’ve always admired to prove himself in his homeland, he’s got work to do. The French critics have been brutal in their reactions, and for once I have to agree with them. You can do better, Jo-Jo. We all know that and you do too.

Market
15, avenue Matignon
75008 Paris
Tel: 01 56 43 40 90 Fax: 01 56 43 40 92
Open daily. Credit cards : American Express, Visa, Mastercard. About 360 francs per person, including service but not wine.

Moveable Feast, Cross Channel Auvergne Specialties in Paris, A Taste of Lebanon in London

PARIS – One huge, polished wood table for 12, a cozy round table that will just seat five and a few tables tumbling out onto the sidewalk. That is all you get at L'Auvergne Gourmande, one of the newest and finest little places to open in Paris in a while. But the little turns out to be a lot.
.
No surprise here, for this is the annex of the generally reliable Left Bank restaurant La Fontaine de Mars. In their newest, pocket-size endeavor the Boudon family has invested all its knowledge of the gastronomically abundant Auvergne region of France, its rich culinary history, its impeccable farm products and some pretty decent wines and cheeses.
.
Best of all, they have brought back the daily plat du jour, almost a dinosaur in today's Parisian cuisine. So Monday it is duck à l'orange, Tuesday lamb chops, Wednesday beef tongue, Thursday stuffed chicken, Friday salt cod with the garlic mayonnaise known as aioli and Saturday suckling pig. How's that for hearty?
.
But this little table d'hôte - where everyone sits together on bistro-style stools - has a modern take as well. The grande salade de legumes is a mound of greens with seemingly every kind of fresh vegetable imaginable, nicely cooked and dressed and topped with a crunchy tuile, or cookie, made of Cantal, a sturdy Auvergnat cheese of cow's milk. Other starters might range from homemade foie gras and a green salad to a fresh pea soup with little chips of smoky bacon.
.
This is the sort of place where you can eat depending upon your appetite. Have a simple Auvergnat cheese platter and a sip of fruity Saint-Pourcain from the gamay grape, or go for the whole shebang with a thick and meaty cote de boeuf, teamed up with a rich potato purée. I feasted on a wonderful breast of guinea hen, pintade, with a deliciously puckery vinegar sauce served with sweet sautéed apples.
.
The wine selection, by the glass or the bottle, is vast, inspiring and educational. You can find some little-known wines from the Auvergne, small appellations from the Cotes Roannaise, Gaillac, vin de pays de l'Ardeche and a Coteaux du Tricastin. Paris needs more places like this: energetic, inventive and fun, with some good food to boot.
.
L'Auvergne Gourmande, 127 Rue Saint-Dominique, Paris 7; tel: 01-47-05-60-79. No credit cards. Closed Sunday. About 110 francs ($15) a person, including service but not wine.

---

ON to London. Wonderful ethnic food at low prices has long been a draw here. A quick tour turned up some of the finest Lebanese food I have ever tasted - at Le Mignon, a tiny, seven-table restaurant in the Camden Town area of northwest London.
.
The owner, Hussien Dekmak, does all the cooking and serving and offers a fine, fresh-flavored lineup of specialties from his native Lebanon. The pure, clean flavors make for a happy food revelation of a cuisine that makes so much sense. With a diet based on dried beans, fresh vegetables, olive oil, yogurt and a touch of lamb and chicken, what could be bad?
.
Don't miss the hommos beiruty, a smooth, tingling chick pea purée flavored with sesame paste and lemon juice with judicious touches of garlic and parsley, topped with tiny cooked fava beans. Likewise, the moutabal (also called baba ghannoug), a smoky purée of grilled eggplant seasoned with sesame paste, lemon juice and olive oil had that essential, mood-elevating sense of purity.
.
I had never before tasted batrakh, thin slices of dried smoked roe served with fresh garlic and olive oil, and would surely go back for more.
.
I love lamb sausages from any cuisine and Le Mignon's fried spicy lamb sausage, or sujuk, served with nothing more than a touch of freshly squeezed lemon juice, made my palate very happy indeed. Le Mignon, 9a Delancey St., Camden, London NW1 7NL; tel: 020-7387-0600. All major credit cards. Closed Monday. About £15 ($21.50) a person, including service but not wine.

---

A great place in London for a drink before or after dinner is the Sanderson Hotel, one of Ian Schrager's latest hits. The long, narrow bar is graced with elegantly hung sheer white draperies, with lighting and artwork cleverly veiled by a second layer of sheers. The walls of the shiny stainless-steel-top bar are lighted to reflect a cool lime-green glow, while the stainless bar stools perfectly lined up along the room make want you want to hop on and sip champagne. Hip, chic, magical you might say.
.
Sanderson Hotel, 50 Berners St., Soho, London W1T 3NG; tel: 020-7300-1400; fax: 020-7300-1401.

Now Paris has Nobu

PARIS – Some of the city’s most see and be seen restaurants are not the sort any self-respecting gourmande would set foot in. But now Paris has Nobu, the creation of Japanese chef Nobuyuki Matsuhisa, with outposts in New York and Tokyo, Las Vegas and New York, London and Aspen and Milan. How could anyone turn out so many trendy places that actually serve good food?

I, for one, am delighted that Matsuhisa, in partnership with actor Robert de Niro, has managed to offer us such a fine level of cuisine. And such a pretty place, all soothing light beige and warm dark brown tones, offset with shiny black onyx and polished copper. Located on what is now becoming trendy restaurant row – off the Champs Elysées on Rue Marbeuf, on the same street as restaurants Korova and Man Ray and not far from Spoon – Nobu took off immediately after opening this July.

There are problems, of course. Even though the large, two-story restaurant has room for 150 diners plus a sushi bar, diners have to fight to get in. Unless, of course, you love to dine at 6 pm.

But on to the food, which is bright, varied, full of flavor, original and at times even brilliant. On a first visit, at least, I highly recommend the tasting menu (which began at 600 francs in July and has already jumped to 650), which changes from day to day. For those less familiar with the Nobu range --- a very modern take on Japanese fare, with a mix of cooked and raw, with a huge assortment of sushi and sashimi – the tasting menu saves one from roaming aimlessly through the menu. Nobu, 53, studied to become a master sushi chef, then took off four Peru, Argentina, Alaska and then Los Angeles, where he opened the soon celebrated Matsuhisa in 1987.

His Parisian tasting menu might begin with a crisp, highly seasoned tuna tartare, or perhaps a salmon tartare anointed with a welcome touch of caviar. Then he will hit your palate with a tartare of yellowtail, or seriol, spiced with a touch of jalapeno peppers. Nobu’s most famous dish, around the world, is a beautifully cooked piece of the freshest black cod, often served in a rich, fragrant, deep black miso sauce. The menu will close with perhaps a heavenly, clear soup with stuffed shitake mushrooms floating on top. Whatever he serves, the food has an original touch, your senses are aroused by the careful presentation, by color, aroma, texture, warmth or cold.

If one orders a la carte, one can roam all over the world. One finds Florida rock shrimp served as a deep fried tempura in a creamy, spicy sauce. Peruvian-style beef rib steak arrives in a spicy sauce. Alaskan king crab claws arrive in a piquant butter sauce. And Dover sole appears in a rich black bean sauce. The skin of salmon – fat and full of flavor – is used liberally, in sushi rolls and even in salads.

My beverage of choice – chilled, crisp sake – can be found in many qualities nad many prices. The waiter, of course, will recommend the delicious and pricey (495 francs for a 30 cl bamboo bottle) for the rare Daiginjo sake, but I found the less expensive Onikoroshi, dry, rich and spicy , quite drinkable, and easier to swallow at a price of 155 francs for a 30 cl bamboo serving.

Service can vary. The youthful, extremely well-informed staff all wear that Disneyland smile. It can be a bit much, but I’ll take an inauthentic smile over snarley service any day. When the restaurant is crowded and full – which is all the time – the cadence of the service can be painfully slow. But I will return, again and again, dreaming of sea urchin tempura and eel and cucumber sushi, asparagus tuna roll and another sip of sake.

, , Paris 8. Tel : 01 56 89 53 53. Fax : 01 56 89 53 54. Closed at lunch on Saturday and Sunday. All major credit cards. From 200 to 600 francs per person, including service but not beverages.

---

Nobu
15 rue Marbeuf
Paris 75008
Tel : 01 56 89 53 53
Fax : 01 56 89 53 54
Closed at lunch on Saturday and Sunday. All major credit cards. From 200 to 600 francs per person, including service but not beverages.