Langouste Tails and Sauce Mireille

I certainly wouldn't steam or boil langouste tails at these prices. The best way to bring out their best is to split them, season them with a freshly ground house spice mix featuring pink peppercorn, a whisper of sechuan peppercorn, and a juniper berry or two, sear them meat side down in hot butter to create a spicy crust, flambee them off heat with whiskey and bring them flaming to the table just cooked to serve with a caper-heavy Sauce Mireille.



Sauce Mireille

2 egg yolks
1/4 teaspoon each of salt and pepper
1 tablespoon lemon juice or wine vinegar
1 tablespoon prepared dijon mustard
1/2 cup neutral oil
1/2 cup olive oil
1 tablespoon each of parsley, chives, minced capers and pickles to taste

Place the egg yolks, lemon juice, salt, pepper and mustard in a mixing bowl, and stir vigorously with a wooden spoon while adding the oils in a slow thin stream. When all the oil is incorporated, fold in the herbs, capers and pickles. Refrigerate if not serving immediately.

Plum Lyon

Slowly getting things organized.

Eva Plum would have been her name. It is a name I would have given to a girl, if I ever had one. Eva after my great-aunt, and Plum, meaning... completely. Meaning... fruitful and innocent. Meaning... Fortunate. Plum. So there you have the name. Plum Lyon. It is simply mind blowing to think back one year ago when I first started thinking about this project, creating this kitchen workshop.

In February 2011, I located a property, and within a few weeks we had signed the first batch of papers that would lead to ownership. By mid-May, we were neck deep in a feasibility study with an architect (who would eventually conclude our project was not feasible within our budget), and in June we took possession of the site.

The first week of July, forging on, I had my business plan reviewed by a representative appointed by the mayor's office at the Chamber of Commerce. It might seem strange, but once I finished the business plan, the project had transformed into reality. It was a dream, even if it was a dream coming true, and then finally it was real. Pounding it all out, placing it in its context, plotting it out numerically, made it real.

Not long ago...

Work with a general contractor began to roll out during the month of August. During the time that followed, I got tired, but kept my mind on whatever needed handling at the moment. Due to some timing miscalculations (oh it's such a long story), we ended up homeless for a couple of months, forced to put our things in storage, which was kind of a drag. Still smiling, we packed up a couple of suitcases and moved into a 300 square foot vacation rental, and as autumn rolled in I began walking with the baby down to the site every day.

While at first even the various contractors we invited in for estimates had stood there slack-jawed at the ideas I was throwing at them, I kept at it. I had faith that someone would finally get it. I could tell that friends who came and saw the site at the beginning were a little bit concerned, a little bit skeptical. Strangers and friends kept saying, "you're so brave!" and I could not understand what they meant. Brave? What does that mean?

We have been here in our own place two weeks now. It is heated, we have water, some lights, some plugs, etc. The wood floor is stacked in the corner, the photo studio's roof is scheduled to go up soon, the kitchen's window is still covered with plastic sheeting due to our ineptitude with anchoring systems for the shade. But it is sort of functional, there is counter space, tile and there are ovens and cooktops and hoods. The phone is in. I treated the old pastry marble that the boulanger left to me today. But most of all, she has her name. Plum Lyon.

A mess but slowly getting there.

Short & Sweet: New Neighborhood

I have a new market to explore. Although I've been here before I never had it to rely on like I do now. We are living in a gite up on the plateau next to the Croix Rousse market and although our little courtyard house is not equipped for the kind of cooking I normally do, I do have a big pot and a burner, which is all we need right now for autumn slow simmers. What's more, one of Lyon's major offal suppliers is present on the market four days a week, and the prices for these special cuts are well below the cost of the more common meats from the butcher. You know what this means. It means an enormous brass key turns in an ancient lock in a huge blue painted door. It means my market basket is switched to my left hand while I use another big key to open another gate and I step out, crunching through leaves across a square into the autumn morning with one mission.



I am marking things down in my notebook and will be sharing everything with you in time. But for the moment I will just try and keep things simple. Prepare an autumn stew, pair it with crusty baguette and a cool Bourgogne Aligote, follow it with a salad and a generous cheese platter, roasted or poached pears, and there you have the gist of the pleasures of our table right now.

Toasted

Only about a week ago did the boulangerie stop smelling like toast. I was concerned that it would always carry the faint odor that comes from 150 contiguous years of bread baking in one place, a pleasant aroma at first that reminded me of rich history and artisan dedication. But one morning, quite out of the blue, we were seated at the breakfast table, and at what is usually a calm, relaxed meditative moment in my day, I was gripped with a feeling that something was terribly wrong. Why this fear and loathing, I wondered? Have I forgotten something? Loic in his thoughtful way had just brought me a steaming generous slice of toast from a freshly baked loaf of half kamut with that fresh Jura butter and the salt grinder as is my preference, along with my coffee. The warmth of spirit that comes from such olfactory pleasures wafted squarely to my senses and then it hit. "We'll run out of steam" a quiet smug inner voice crooned, and my chest tightened. Going to the site, seeing the dust and piles of rocks and broken things and bundles of wires that aren't moving and breathing the aroma of ancient toast that exudes from the walls and beams over and over again has conditioned me in some way. I feel slightly nauseated at the smell of bread or toast these days. Strange. No better time like the present to switch to fruit and keep climbing stairs, I suppose.







So far in the project there have been times when I could not make decisions because of a missing element, or missing passion. Missing something, anyway. This summer we marched through the cookie cutout kitchen showrooms of all the big manufacturers, and I kept ordering myself to pull myself out of it and make some kind of decision, any decision. I held out for awhile and just at the beginning of this week when I could pinpoint why I can't stand these kitchens, the ideas came easily. I can't stand them because the spirit and chaos of really good cooking straight from living things and the earth is missing from them. The lines are too straight, too many ball bearings, sleek things that match, stainless steel racks and spotlights, and not enough spirit. Even the expensive ones. Like meat in styrofoam and plastic, I don't want them. I don't want ceiling high wood veneered particleboard armoires decked with ball bearing baskets that slide out in ergonomic blissful perfection, I want old oak cabinets that creak a little bit and that came from the back landing of a Savoyard chateau with the direct knowledge that they were used to keep linens until the chateau was sold to someone who didn't want them anymore. Even if I have to bend down to get to the bottom shelf. I don't want marble because it's expensive nor do I worry about stains or etching, I want old marble that has been etched and honed with time and not by machines. A slab that tells a long friendly story to keep me company while I flip and roll pastry and dough. I want my kitchen to welcome like-minded people in this way, to tell a story of Lyonnais and French cooking. I suppose it's the story I'll have to insist on, like I always have. I hope you don't mind me telling it.



During times of waiting, or inactivity on the site, I go up there and do what I can. I occupy myself by measuring things again (my father always said to measure 3 times, I'd never be sorry), or with little tasks like removing layers of old paint from some drawer handles I recuperated from an old counter left behind by the boulanger, or wiping down the marble slabs we have, still not sure if we're going to be able to use them, due to technical questions that came up yesterday.

Summer in a Glass

About 5 years ago, I took my in-laws on a three week tour of the Northeast. Near the end of our journey, we went to New York City. At the end of one day, we wandered into a cocktail bar where the music was so loud I could not hear anything my father in law was saying. What a relief to get a load off our feet after walking around Manhattan all day! Brigitte and I shared a little grin while we looked at the cocktail menu. All were expensive beyond my wildest dreams, but since it was a special trip, and we'd had a great day, we splurged and each ordered a fancy cocktail.



Mine was a delightfully refreshing gin cocktail involving cucumbers. I wondered how they got this amazing essence of cucumber into the drink, and asked the woman behind the bar how it was done. She smiled and said that that they utilized the services of a mixologist for that cocktail and she was not at liberty to tell me their secret, which cost them a lot of money. I imagined all kinds of special techniques involving scraping the inner side of the skin of the cucumber to spritz precious flavorful oils across the top of the icy glass. A clear taste memory of the drink has come to mind from time to time over these last 5 years. One of those "I must figure out how that's done" kind of thoughts, on hot summer days, mostly.







Fast forward to this summer. We're up in the mountains, where a couple of months ago, I planted cucumbers and we left them to tend to themselves. The two plants have flourished and each time we come up, we're treated to the most delicious cucumbers. When you crunch into a fresh picked home grown cucumber fresh from the vine, you come to understand why people just call them "cukes". The sublimity of the gustatory experience is so jarring, so refreshing, that it simply boils down to a single syllable in your mind.



Oh look what I found! The cocktail! I fixed mine with ordinary gin, good juicy limes, a generous handful of suit shaped sugar cubes I had hanging around from a card playing weekend, fresh cukes, and mint plucked direct from the garden. It's exactly what they were serving in that cocktail bar. It turns out that the original recipe was submitted by a curator (obviously a man of good taste) named Adam Frank who entered a New York Times readers drink contest in 2006. It's too bad that owner of that cocktail bar didn't read the newspaper, he could have saved himself a lot of money. I plan to prepare it for everyone I know. You should too.



The Cuke, Original Recipe here, for which I think I paid something like 11 dollars for one in New York City. Serves 3-4.







3 limes

a huge cucumber from the garden

a generous bouquet of fresh mint

a large handful of sugar cubes

a cup of gin

ice

Perrier



Wash the limes, cucumber, and mint. Slice one and a half of the limes, and put them in a big bowl. Do the same for half the cucumber. Squeeze the rest of the limes and add the juice. Add the sugar cubes and the mint leaves. Take a spoon and crush it all up until it begins to render a good deal of juice. Add the gin to this, stir it up, and then transfer everything into a container you can put into the refrigerator. Chill for 30 to 45 minutes. I suppose you could chill this longer if you're getting ready for a party.



When you're ready to serve the cocktail, fill up tall glasses with ice, a long thin slice of fresh cucumber, and strain the mixture over the ice until it's about on half to two thirds full (depending on your guests). Top with Perrier (or any soda water you have), and serve immediately. Delightful.

Prunes to Pie

The ones I got on the Marché Saint-Antoine the other day were this year's last. There will be no more Prunes St. Jean this year. Soft and flavorful, they expand like summer days in our mouths. Ian looks doleful and waits sweetly while I pit them for a pie. We're waiting, hoping, fingers crossed for news on our grant application for the teaching kitchen. I toss Ian a pitted plum every now and then and he repeats each time "merci, maman". Wishing I had filmed him, I hear Loic running the bath. The baby trots back, mouth full of plum, to peel off his play clothes and arrange his boats. I head to the kitchen to dump these plums onto some quick finger-spread dough. Look, there are some currants. A little sugar. Fingers crossed, then licked.

*the word for plum in French is prune.

La Boite à Café

There comes a time in every expat's life when the question of coffee comes up. It does not matter what country you're in or what country you're from. In my first years abroad in Beijing, for example, I harbored a persistent daydream of my country's "bottomless cup". That waitress at Denny's Erie Boulevard Syracuse played a role, the one who was very tan all year round and had beached hair. When we went there to study for exams, she'd come over and purse her shriveled lips voluptuously, her halo of brittle split ends backlit by a sunken spotlight in the ceiling and say "more coffee, hon?" Her wrinkled cleavage always shifted plumply in her polyester uniform and there was that hot pouring sound.

What you think is good at 18 and what you think is good at 28 are completely different. My university days pre-dated any really good coffee in Central New York. But in my expat mind, the dream-coddled cup festered and grew. I remember coming home from one really long stint away, stopping in New York City for shopping on the way home and suddenly being hit at a Manhattan cafe with the reality that all the great service and bounty of unlimited fabulous coffee was indeed a distilled composite. It didn't really exist.

Since that time, however, good coffee actually materialized in the States, in the west. I went back for a couple of years and have very good memories of worshipping one particularly fabulous coffee shop in Santa Monica. They were so mean there! I was pleased as punch to submit to any amount of cult induced scorn to read the paper on a ratty old couch with the west coast sun steaming through abundant windows. Man, did I love that place. And when I became we, and we left the country again, I'd pay for the good coffee that had then made it's way east and drink it down, I'd pack so much of it into my suitcase to return to France that it looked like I was trying to smuggle something. I always distribute it to friends and freeze as much as possible. People ask what to bring and I always say "good coffee". I'll sit at one of the chain shops that have proliferated from time to time and pretend, but it really doesn't amount to anything but suspension of disbelief. Even Illy doesn't do it, although I do like the limited edition tins.



I have taken to walking stairs with a little spitfire of a Korean American who will not accept "my hip hurts" as an excuse not to get out early and go at full speed for an hour or two each day. I love her determined will and knowing ways, she's a very good coach. Some days we conquer stairs until there are none left to conquer, and some days we saunter through neighborhoods and stop in the cafes for a cup of whatever coffee they're serving. We figure if we try a different cafe every morning, in a few years we will have tried every one in the city of Lyon. This old dust pressed through dirty valves ranges from dimly acceptable to abominably bad. One fine morning just a few weeks ago, we happened, on one of our sauntering days, across a brand new cafe, and sat down.

Imagine my surprise to be transported by an initial sip that pierced like a steam engine straight to my longing soul. I am talking years. Maybe even a dream come true. "We are drinking real coffee here, Mimi", I remember saying. We then fell into a conversation with the man who roasts his own beans. He is one dedicated barista and they have their ways of strongly suggesting certain manners that fall in line with the culture of people who really care about coffee, but to my grand pleasure, the cult of scorn has been eliminated from the equation. Their summer menu lists weekly roasted coffees along with their provenance, altitude, estate at which the beans were grown, variety of bean, and any certification the coffee enjoys, as well as ideas about what to expect in the flavor of each kind. They serve their coffee filtered, French pressed, syphoned, brewed by Chemex, and of course regular expresso, with a variety of classic cafe standards on the chalkboard every day. They'll grind you a sack full of whatever is in season to your specifications and send you on your merry way leaving a swirling waft of heaven in your wake. Your neighbors will wonder at the aroma in the hallway when they arrive home hours after you've come home. This couple's work completes something in your life, and in the neighborhood.

Their coffee is so good, they don't need anything but that to keep a steady stream of customers all day long, every day. But they do have Free wifi and a terrace, which basically makes the place perfect.

La Boite à Café
3 rue Abbé Rozier
69001 Lyon, France
04 27 01 48 71

You can read more about this couple and their business on their website.

Slow Feuilletage

A few days ago, I was planning to have a dinner party and while on the Quai St. Antoine, I saw the man who comes down some days from the Jura mountains. Amid various mountain cheeses, he had a slab of raw butter. After asking his price, which when calculated in my mind cost slightly more than your average supermarket butter, but less than the haut gamme butters in mass distribution, I asked for a taste. Light, unsalted, complex as it flowered on my tongue, it sold itself to me easily. I bought a kilo. While he wedged off two large chunks that miraculously enough came out to weigh about 500 grams each, he told me that the butter he was selling me had been made at the farm just the day before. Walking back home, I wondered at the deliciousness that this raw butter made just the previous day would produce in my home made pastry.

Having my recipe for fast feuilletage already in your notebook, I thought I'd share a few ideas and a reminder that puff pastry rolled out at home tastes far superior to anything you can find in the store and quite possibly better than you can get from the neighborhood bakery. It's all about the butter. When I talk about good butter, I don't mean some technical quality that one or another butter might have, but the flavor of the butter. A butter that tastes good makes excellent puff pastry.

Puff pastry has got such a bad rap. I just don't know what to say when people say they can't bring themselves to do it. After all, I used to be one of those people. Oh the things I never dared to do! But after some risk taking and realization that it isn't nearly as easy to mess up as people say it is, I felt like I was in on a kind of secret. One of the most wonderful things about puff pastry is that it freezes very well. Instead of hours of hard labor, hands-on time is more like 15 minutes, in little pleasurable bursts interspersed over an evening. If you have a kitchen timer and a little counter space or a table, you can easily fit feuilletage between cooking dinner, bathing children, story time, reading a book, catching up on your e-mails, or talking on the phone. It fits into normal family contemporary lifestyles, and can make a huge difference in your inclination to invite people over at a moment's notice, because you'll be able to serve really great tasting and beautiful feuilletage-based creations if you already have the good kind ready in your freezer.

What can you do with feuilletage? For starters, I suggest taking a good look at the many recipes that require pre-fab puff pastry. Next, know that you don't need recipes to have fun with puff pastry. You can roll things up in it and slice them, make matchsticks and spread them with things before baking, use leftovers, cut shapes with cookie cutters, make sweet desserts, tartes, classic millefeuilles, and hundreds of other things just by using your imagination.

Last night I had dinner out, and enjoyed a first course of this season's asparagus, roquefort and thin sliced cured ham layered between two little rectangular wedges of feuilletage. The asparagus had been cooked in advance, and this first course was constructed and placed in the oven just long enough for the cheese to melt and the pastry to puff, crispen and brown on top. It was a delicious combination and will be even better with my own pastry. I plan to do a variation on that very soon as a first course for friends.

In the meantime, I have a freezer full of tapenade rolls ready to bake, and several blank slates ready for just about anything. There are so many things, sweet or savory, that you can do with this pastry dough. Use the kitchen scale for this and weigh the water too.

Recipe: Slow Feuilletage

500 grams flour
12 grams finely ground sea salt
300 grams water
400 grams butter, chilled

Place the flour and salt in a bowl and make a well in the center. Pour the water in and work it into a smooth homogenous dough. Work the dough with your hands to get it nice and smooth, place it in a ziplock or wrap it in plastic wrap and place this dough into the refrigerator to rest for 30 minutes.

Notice the rounded ends are tucked under at first.

You don't have to do this but it makes things roll out more squarely.

Remove the dough from the wrap and lightly flour your counter surface. Roll the dough about 1 inch thick and then with the rolling pin roll out four edges to form flaps that you will fold over the butter. Once you have done that, remove the butter from the refrigerator, and place it on a big sheet of freezer paper or baking parchment, fold the paper over it to protect the rolling pin from getting greasy, and pound the butter with the rolling pin into a flat piece that will fit easily into the center of the dough. Fold the edges you have created over the butter in the center. Now, you are ready to roll it out.

Roll this mound of dough folded over your butter out flat into an oblong rectangle. Now fold this rectangle into thirds, turn it a quarter turn, and roll it out again. Fold and roll once again, then place this into the refrigerator to chill for 40 minutes.

Repeat this folding into thirds process 2 more times, for a total number of folding and rolling of 6 times. From there, you can place it back in the refrigerator to be ready when you plan to use it in the next day or two, or put that into the freezer, where it will keep up to three months.

Thanks go to Chef Sylvain Malland of Cuisine et Dependences Acte II, 68 rue de la Charité, in Lyon's 2nd arrondissement for allowing me to take photos of him rolling and folding puff pastry during a coaching cuisine demonstration at Emile Henry.

This Season's Asparagus

If you want the ultimate asparagus experience, the time is now. People are talking at the market about this year's unusual weather. Spring officially started 3 weeks ago and the weather's been like we're about to enter the month of June! Aside from an amazingly flush selection of culinary herbs, promising fabulous workshops and inspiring great ideas for how to best put them in the spotlight, we see that the Asparagus is out. This is quite extraordinary, actually. If you cook with the seasons where you live, you might have already observed some things where you live being ahead of schedule. The producer's stands are piled high with crisp fresh spears here in Lyon. This won't last long. As the season evolves, the prices will drop as well as the quality, since the smaller stems are better eating than the larger ones. The producer of the asparagus pictured above confided that the early season is going to leave him in the lurch until his next wave of produce reaches maturity. I think also it was an excuse for charging such high prices for his product. I didn't hesitate to buy from him anyway, since he's got great produce at reasonable prices the rest of the year. We are eating his excellent asparagus either plain or lightly dressed with a lemon boosted green olive oil dressing, and with hollandaise. As the season wears on, soup is on the menu chez Vanel. Here's my sampling of French market menu uses for asparagus, one I refer to often when thinking of great ways to use it. Green asparagus is kind of exotic in France, because traditionally the French only had white. This struck me as strange when I first arrived, having only had the green ones growing up.

Giving it Up

Many good years in this apartment. We hadn't planned on selling just yet, but when we met that sunny afternoon in the notary's office on the Quai Saint Antoine and each signed our names on every page of a big stack of documents, it was like a hammer slid into the cog of the inner workings of a big ancient clock. The papers were signed and everything got set in motion, to open the next doorway along the passageway to ownership. We must come forth with the full amount for the new site, design work and renovations, and in order for us to get the loan, our lovely apartment must at least be on the market. I am scrambling to get all of my creative clutter under control, mainly planning to sort and pack it up, living in more of a blank slate while we show our home. While I take these little objects and place them into boxes, I am reminded of my stubborn belief in charms. The baby delights in the big open spaces, placing himself in various staging areas to dance and play. I didn't know it was possible to harbor such opposing emotions. We tried to find a way to keep this apartment, guarding it for retirement, maybe renting it out, while at the same time moving into a place that better suits our needs. But sometimes you just have to make that decision to move forward, when the dream comes forth with enough momentum and you remind yourself that you needn't let go of the memories.

Pickled Radis Noir

A couple of months ago, Hank Shaw was seeking ideas for the use of radis noir, which is ubiquitous on market tables here in Lyon at the end of winter. I immediately suggested pickles, since I had some experience with simple pickled spring radishes and knew that this type of root generally takes kindly to a vinegar pickling method. The next time I was out with my basket, I decided to give pickling them a try with a couple of big ones wedged into chunks. Coriander seeds harvested last autumn from my garden, whole fennel seeds and bay leaves went into the jar, along with a handful of shallots which I simply peeled and left whole. I wasn't very enthusiastic about the results at first, since the roots seeped some of their color and gave a drab tint to the vinegar. I placed the jar alongside many other half done experiments in a cool place and forgot about it for a while.

It's funny what a little time can do. About a week ago, I realized that these pickles had taken on a nice mellow flavor. At the opening of salad season, I was fishing around for additions to my lunch bowls and suddenly I was looking at these now mature pickles in a new light. I have found that slicing them thin and sprinkling them over salads is one delicious way to enjoy them, as well as using them to garnish toasts and canapes with potted meat and slices of dried sausage. They are excellent slivered and folded into Caviar de la Croix Rousse. They add crisp punctuation and look pretty too. This jar is almost halfway gone and I don't suspect they'll last very much longer. They came out tasting so nice, I think I'll do two jars next year.

When you pickle radis noir, be sure to give them a very good scrub with a potato brush and blanch them whole before slicing them into chunks and salting them. Otherwise, the recipe and method are the same as this one here.

Greens for Spring

At about this time of the year in Lyon, we always see an assortment of various foraged or otherwise uncommon greens making their appearance at the markets, a kind of bridge to the bounty, taking us on a little joyride past the precocious radish. When the weather warms up, people go out searching for a burgeoning explosion of cute little vegetables, and the reality is that yes, while the weather is indeed warming, we can't expect miracles. Things need time to grow.

We saw stinging nettles, bins full of dandilions, aka pissenlit, given this name for their long held reputation as causing children to wet their beds, and some scraggly turnip greens lopped from last year's plants. While they looked a bit ragged around the edges and gone to seed, I had a hankering for some. When did you last have a nice plate of fresh turnip greens? People were asking how to cook them. The lady was telling them they should put them into soup. I could already taste them tossed with the bacon I had, the good bacon that I buy from the girl who smokes it herself.

That night after a good washing, they went into the pressure cooker to steam, which is what I do with old greens like this that might need a head start cooking before I toss them in the hot pan. I steamed them with slices of this wonderful bacon and a few tendrils of fresh young thyme. After steaming them under pressure for 5 minutes, they still had a their body but it was easy to pick through them quickly to pull out any hard stems that might not be good to eat. The leaves and soft stems came off cleanly. They were ready to be chopped and transferred into a pan of sizzling onions I'd gotten started on the side. I tossed them over high heat for a bit to get a little sizzle along the edges of the steamed bacon, then since we had a little time, I added a teacup full of that veal stock that I had recuperated from the pot on Saturday morning (always a habit to set a little aside for opportunities such as this) and put that on low to simmer and mingle while the baby got his bath. When things settled down, chopped spring chervil went in at the last minute and we ate simply with pasta, enjoying the haze of the heavy spring evening outside the window, thinking of the season, waiting for the rain to begin.

How I See the Floors

Inspiring things I've seen around lately

My father and I went to the early morning flea markets right up until I left my home town in my early 20s. I searched for history. We had something we called our history, we had our odd traditions, we had our generations of cousins far far away and all of the family stories, we had this rather large rambling family home, we shared this penchant for going to the flea market together, searching. It was always about finding something valuable. You know, things possibly worth money. Digging, scanning every table, every little case, searching. "Come and see what I've found."

There were a few things that gave something value. One, being a collectible or well crafted. The other, the thing being old. Really old meant really valuable in my mind. Like this object had tendrils that extended and intertwined with something completely inaccessible to us now. Holding secrets in the present tense, while having mingled with emotions and harbored the collective thoughts and sighs that changed and swerved and as a whole became self aware. Things that spanned farther than any human life were valuable beyond belief in my child's mind, something with a story that could be legend for all the lack of proof, except for this object. These old objects we rifled through at the flea markets held different degrees of connectedness. It was our pastime to work together on developing that eye to see and discuss their placement within the framework of time.

Years ago, less than a year after my father died, only about 3 months new into my marriage and having just arrived to the city of Lyon, I was standing in front of a church built on original early Christian temple foundations that dated back to the Roman era. That warm afternoon, a buried passion for the lifelong project I had shared with my newly lost father was staring me in the face. This passion we had shared, and this place, one he never had the chance to see, this ancient place, took me and held fast, cemented me, shook the foundations of my grief almost violently. With that, like any slap to the face, I felt hurled back into a pre-loss-of-my-father frame of mind. That moment, my connection with Lyon the place grew. Not just a flash or a feeling. I believe Lyon has great value not only because it is old, but because it is thriving and old, and sprite and lanky, mean. But most of all, determined to survive and remain its very old self.

I was standing in the "laboratory" of the Boulangerie that will become my teaching kitchen on my first visit and the floors caught my interest. They're a hodgepodge of various dated working class tiles, patched together. The shard like mosaic type floor is typical from about 80 years ago. There are plenty of things we could do with the floors, lay down hardwood, etc. There are bare areas as well, tamped bare earth where the oven has always been, for example. My plan is to find materials that harmonize with this rather random splash of tiling styles and hopefully to find a way to bring them all together, in my father's way. Uncovering and buffing out the little details, to hold in hand a bit of the existing patina, and pull out as much of this place's original story as I can.

Changing Focus

We are not moving far, I would say about 5 blocks away from where we live now. When you walk the streets of most of centre-ville in Lyon, pretty grey stone Haussmann style buildings that are relatively new to the architectural cityscape line the avenues, each building featuring its own signature details, sculptural elements at the main doorways, big varnished wooden doors with brass knobs, and mosaic tiled hallways with marble staircases. This sumptuous entry and housing style is what the French call "Grand Standing". The apartments in these buildings, which originally took one entire or even several floors of a building, were built as dwellings from the beginning and have been slowly transformed and divided over about 120 years and generations into the apartments we know now.

Our building is one of the many of this sort on the frontier of a sort of bourgeois enclave, the Martiniere neighborhood. There's a little footpath of an alleyway that communicates the Halle de la Martiniere to Place Sathonay, and there you step out onto cobblestone, and look up and begin to see a remarkable shift in building style, to a different type of architecture that has a very interesting and colorful story. These buildings, much more modest in structure and finishing, were created as workshops in Lyon's silk production. Single exterior doors open into tight hallways, tunnels, and interesting labyrinth type passages and stairwells that cut through and make footpath shortcuts between the winding roads that climb this hill. These are called traboules, and there are hundreds to tell you about. But back to the buildings: These workshops were not finished with plasterwork, moulding, and wood paneling, but followed their function with enormous bare beams that floated above cavernous spaces holding the enormous looms employed in the weaving of Lyon's world renowned silk. The whole mass of this district was built rather quickly in the mid 1800s, in a grand re-organization of Lyon's silk industry by Napoleon III, with the goal of consolidating production into one area of the city, since it was previously scattered between various districts: The docks just south of Vieux Lyon, warehouses in the 8th arrondissement, and trading and shipping consignment houses located on the presqu'ile. These workshops were built over this hill that in pre-revolutionary days had been church owned gardens, orchards and vineyards.

This is from a finished apartment we looked at one street over (too expensive).

Our ceilings will be lower but feature this kind of wood and stone.

When we started looking at property on the Croix Rousse hill, the exposed ceiling beams and the warm stone became the predominant architectural detail that gave the spaces their flavor. Since the ceilings of the majority of these workshops were originally built high enough to accommodate the loom works, the thing you notice immediately in the renovated spaces we were looking at were their sweeping volumes and warehouse-like loft style spaces. This is a very seductive but also troubling aspect of the architecture here, if you have ever tried to furnish a room with 20 foot ceilings on a budget. While the space seems enormous which can sometimes seem cold, at the same time, the earth and wood elements bring at the same time a unique and architecturally indigenous warmth that achieves a balance. We looked at a handful of apartments that had been previously renovated, some very well done, others DIY projects gone awry when people built shoddy looking platforms with cheap stained plywood (think frathouse) and called them "lofts". They all had one thing in common: EXPENSIVE. The average price per square meter for the most polished places was way beyond our means for the floor space we needed. We comforted ourselves with the thought that they would cost a fortune to heat.

The boulangerie has what is called a "floor and a half", meaning that we have the ground floor and an originally conceived second floor with lower ceiling heights, yet with their old beams and stone original to the structure.The boulanger tells us that it has "always been a boulangerie", but I am not sure about that. The notaire's job is to do the research on the history of the building, and we have a first appointment with him in a couple of weeks.

When we first moved into our current apartment, I had problems with the ballroom-like ceiling height, feeling like all of our belongings had sunk to the bottom of a fish tank. You don't think about these things when you're falling in love with empty space and sweeping windows, and it takes some finesse to try and draw the gaze up from the floor with artwork and furniture arrangement to visually dwell in the whole space rather than just what's settled at the bottom.

So that will be the first main difference in considering the organization of the space in the boulangerie. It is going to be much more down to earth in its volumes. I think this is a good thing, because the predominant warmth of the wood and stone elements are naturally adapted, in my opinion, to surrounding people in an intimate way.

The Boulangerie

Now that Ian is two, we're beginning to really feel the need for a little more space. It's a buyer's market, but when you've got such a wonderful place to come home to, nothing seems like an improvement. We calculated many scenarios. We dropped our weekend plans to check out neighborhoods and argue the ins and outs of every detail in a series of imagined housing situations. We got into spats about toilets in bathrooms and toilets outside of bathrooms. We drove across vast expanses covering every single road, zigzagging for hours through neighborhoods near and far. We frustrated many real estate agents. In the midst of all of this, I was taking my winter morning walks up Lyon's various long ancient urban stairwells. Looking over the city, I was silently saying my goodbyes while I watched the sun rise over fog softened rooftop silhouettes. Staying in the choice neighborhoods would have to entail a stroke of luck.



The lock tumbles, the wood creaks and settles under your feet, the light plays just so. We have allowed ourselves to be pulled into the fold of this family heirloom-like bijou of an apartment, magically placed on a square nestled into the curve of the Saone, river on one side, hill on the other, every day for the last eight years. At first, the 14 foot high ceilings, glistening polished marble fireplaces, the beautiful carved panels and 19th century woodwork didn't seem possible. The soft light, branches of the trees swaying in the breeze, birds singing on the square, too luxurious to be true but somehow happening. We painted the walls grey and kept the wood and marble buffed and polished.



Looking for an apartment has been a very invigorating project. The stories I could tell you! Once we had seen everything on the market in the neighborhoods we wanted, it became a mad scramble to get in and see everything the day it was put up for sale. All the best apartments usually got offers the first day they were on the market. One day, between appointments to look, I stopped into a real estate office with the idea of asking a few questions about possibly finding a combination shop front and living space, just an idea for my teaching kitchen. A charming man named M. Bernard, an expert in his field, received me in his office and listened to my dream. His eyes lit up immediately. He had a place in mind. It is an old boulangerie, smack in the middle of the perfect neighborhood. It needs more than a little work, more than a renovation. It needs a complete strip down to the bones and a rebuild. Before he saw it, Loic thought I had gone off the deep end. I told him, in preparation for our first visit together, that this world was created by people who were brave enough to imagine possibilities and make them happen. I reminded him of projects I have handled in the past. With this in mind, we examined the old boulangerie, we held hands, and we dared to fall in love with what was underneath.



You know, I have been giving my classes for awhile now. This was initially a series of talks for Dartmouth College students here on exchange in Lyon. When I got started at Emile Henry, the clientele changed but the material remained as dense as it was in the beginning. The context of Lyon as a city and the love of cooking from the market basket help people to remember and learn better, feel like they’re taking home something more than a recipe. I have garnered much encouragement and support from my students, while I give them encouragement to go ahead and build on their repertoire.



Just the other day, the owners accepted our offer on the boulangerie. We’re going for it. I am going to build my teaching kitchen.



One day you go from "wouldn't that be nice" to "now is the perfect time" And when that happens, if you've been taking yourself seriously and really asking this question in earnest, your dream, the one you have explored over and over again in your mind for years, so much so that it seems like already a done deal in your mind, might actually fit into your life plans.

Salade d'endives aux noix et bleu

The tight fresh endives look like early spring magnolia buds right now, and I cannot get enough of them. They are always cradled in purple paper on the market tables, clean and white. Today, I chop them in staggering diagonals like my Ayi once showed me, just holding on to her in this way. There's no other reason. The angle of a knife. It's funny how a simple gesture can bring so many thoughts about a person to mind.

A raw endive salad with walnuts and blue cheese is a French classic. Sometimes I wonder if I crave this during winter months just for the blue cheese. But when the endives are just right like they are now, I feel the sweet crunch that flirts with bitter in my mouth, punctuated with chunks of salty bleu d'auvergne, the whole tied together with the astringent warmth of the walnuts. The completeness of the trinity is distilled to one note. It cannot be broken down to its elements.

Recipe: Salade d'Endives aux noix et bleu
Serves 2.

1 recipe walnut oil vinaigrette
2 whole endives
1/2 cup freshly cracked walnuts
1/2 cup crumbled blue cheese of your choice
Optional: Two handfuls of seasonal greens of choice
salt and pepper to season

Prepare the walnut oil vinaigrette and put it into the bottom of a salad bowl. Clean the greens and place them in the bowl over the dressing. Remove the outer leaves from the endives if necessary, and chop them, transferring them to a colander and rinse. Taste a wedge with core, and decide whether to use them in the salad or not. (Endives these days have been bred of most of their core's bitterness, but freshness will also affect the flavor, verify and eliminate the cores if they seem too bitter.) Spin or pat them dry with a clean cloth before transferring them to a salad bowl over the greens. Layer the walnuts and blue cheese on top. Toss with the walnut vinaigrette and a generous grind of pepper at the table before serving.

Scallops and Endives

Briny fresh scallops paired with with the cool closed buds of winter's light-sheltered bitter greens. Now that we are in the height of the season for both endives and scallops, why not consider a tarte?

Scallop and Endive Tarte

1 recipe of your favorite pâte brisée
2 tablespoons duck fat
1 onion
1 cup cleaned and shredded mild mushrooms like oyster mushrooms or white button mushrooms
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 cup shredded leftover cooked chicken meat (poulet au vinaigre today, 2 drumsticks worth)
1/2 a bunch of chives, minced
the leaves from 1/2 a bunch of chervil, minced
8 scallops, shelled
3 endives
2 teaspoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground fennel seeds
1 Tablespoon butter
1/4 cup chicken broth
salt and pepper

- Prepare the pastry and set it to chill.
- Slice the onion thin.
- Melt the duck fat in a saute pan, and add the onions and garlic, let them sizzle for 10 minutes over medium heat, tossing frequently, making sure that if they begin to turn brown, you lower the heat, avoiding them turning brown as much as possible.
- Add the shredded mushrooms and chicken, turn up the heat and toss and cook until the mushrooms release their liquid and things begin to take on a crispy browned edge.
- Toss the herbs in, and toss over the heat for another 3 minutes.
- Add 1/4 cup white wine and cook until the mixture is soft and glistening, the liquid reduced. Season with salt, pepper, and ground fennel.
- Wash the outside of the endives. Cut off the base end, and then slice them into wedges approximately the thickness of your scallops. Tip: Vary the thickness of the endives slightly to allow their differences in height to add to the visual impact of the tarte.
- Roll out the pastry, and lay it into to a baking dish.
- Spread the onion/mushroom/chicken mixture around the base of the pie shell.
- Arrange the sliced endives and scallops over the onion mixture, thinking about slices, to make sure each of 8 slices will give your guests at least one scallop.
- Sprinkle sugar over the scallops and endives.
- Slice the butter thin and scatter it over, making sure to get some butter on the scallops (see photo).
- Bake in a hot oven (400F/200C) for 25 minutes, allowing the endives and scallops to begin to brown.
- Remove the tarte from the oven, and lower the heat to 350F/180C. Drizzle the chicken stock over the tarte, cover tightly with foil, and return to the oven for another 15 minutes.