July 2009
51 posts
France cuts VAT in restaurants and cafes making... →
Holidaymakers heading to France will be able to enjoy their cafe, moules and fromage at more affordable prices thanks to a cut in VAT at restaurants and cafes. From the beginning of July the French government will substantially cut VAT from 19.6 per cent to 5.5 per cent in eateries across the country.
June 2009
57 posts
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Has New York Said ‘Au Revoir’ to All That French... →
Now that it’s been out for a week, you may have read a bit from Michael Steinberger’s Au Revoir to All That: Food, Wine, and the End of France, which explores the decline of French cuisine. A passage reprinted on Slate (Steinberger is the site’s wine columnist) describes the Michelin guide’s loss of authority, and another details the rise of McDonald’s in a country formerly known to appreciate...
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Frugal Pleasures of Paris in Summer - NYTimes.com →
WELL before midsummer, the sun sets late over Paris. Even at 9 p.m., you can sit on the banks of the Canal St.-Martin in the 10th Arrondissement, and see in the still water the reflection of the sky, a blue mottled with thin clouds, and the low pale buildings with their amber lights just turned on, and the ruffled, fractal edge of the trees in full green bloom. Night seems as if it will never...
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Au Revoir to All That - FT.com →
The French call it déclinisme, the national propensity for measuring, discussing and wallowing in the country’s seemingly perpetual decline. Books, newspaper columns and television chat shows dwell obsessively on the downhill direction of French society, democracy, work habits, civility and culture. Conferences and colloquies on such subjects are more numerous than Paris strip shows, as Theodore...
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Obamas’ Dinner Enlivens Paris Cafe Debates: A.... →
It was a routine romantic Parisian dinner for two — a quiet evening at the 101-year-old La Fontaine de Mars on Rue Saint-Dominique — until the public discovered that the American tourists sipping house Bordeaux in the neighborhood restaurant’s second-floor room were Barack Obama, his wife Michelle and a Secret Service food taster. Now, more than two weeks after the Obamas’ supper of...
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“The new menu at L’Atelier makes fine dining more accessible than ever...”
– Joël Robuchon on his new ‘L’Unique,’ menu at L’Atelier de Joël Robuchon at MGM Grand in Las Vegas.
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Le Big Mac has conquered La Belle France -... →
La Belle France: charming bistros, glorious wines and cheeses, bountiful markets, streets filled with the smell of freshly baked bread – all emblems of the greatest food culture that the world has known. Sadly, though, that culture is now in eclipse. Twenty-five years ago, it took some effort to dine poorly in France; these days bad meals are depressingly common, and it can be tough to find even a...
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French wine courts India and China | Reuters →
Caught napping by a consumer crisis after a series of record years, the French wine trade is lusting after the potentially huge markets of China and India as an outlet for Old World wine sales. But this may not prevent a restructuring of the cozy grand family-oriented traditional wine industry with its myriad of chateaux still on show at the opening day of the twice-a-year Vinexpo world wine and...
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How the Michelin guide crippled France's... →
In his new book, Au Revoir to All That: Food, Wine, and the End of France, Slate wine columnist Mike Steinberger examines the startling decline of French cuisine over the past few decades, explaining how a country that turned eating and drinking into an art form has lost its touch for cheese, wine, food, and fine dining.
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Texans can take credit for good French wines - El... →
In 1862, Monsieur Borty imported American vine cuttings to plant in his vineyards in Rhone, France. Little did he know that he was introducing a tiny aphid lying in the roots that would soon devastate the French wine world. Borty had just introduced a grape plant pest — phylloxera — to France that would devastate the French wine industry.
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French wine courts India and China - Reuters →
Caught napping by a consumer crisis after a series of record years, the French wine trade is lusting after the potentially huge markets of China and India as an outlet for Old World wine sales. But this may not prevent a restructuring of the cozy grand family-oriented traditional wine industry with its myriad of chateaux still on show at the opening day of the twice-a-year Vinexpo world wine and...
“Nouvelle cuisine was so specifically French that it was, and still is,...”
– Mark Kurlansky, ‘Choice Cuts’ (2002)
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Bordeaux wine fair hopes to beat recession blues →
The world’s biggest wine fair opened Sunday in France’s wine city of Bordeaux, with leading exporters and producers saying prospects for the sector looked bright despite the global downturn.
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“I’m not going to romanticize the French, but a country with street markets and...”
– Regina Schramling
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Socca, Enfin - David Lebovitz →
Socca is basically street food, intended to be eaten off napkins to blot up all the excess olive oil, with plastic cups of frosty-cool rosé.
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Burgundy expects lower wine prices in softer... →
Burgundy wines, hit by a fall in U.S. and British demand suffered a 30 percent drop in first-quarter exports and a “more difficult” year ahead is expected to lead to price cuts for the region’s finest vintages.
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Obamas’ New Organic Garden Has Well-Bred Parisian... →
“My great-grandfather supplied organically grown vegetables to Emperor Napoleon III,” Berrurier says while helping tourists dig up clutches of his historic white asparagus on the family farm an hour’s drive from Paris. “Madame Obama is welcome, too,” the 83-year-old gastrodiplomat adds. “I’d be happy to offer her some gardening tips.”
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Carrots are the new caviar →
Passard, 52, has since retreated to a more conventional format (foie gras is back on his menu, along with caviar and turbot), but his move towards a vegetable-based cuisine had lasting effects. His influence can be seen in places as far-flung as Manresa in Los Gatos, California, where David Kinch’s inventive and delicious dishes are based mostly on vegetables grown on a farm connected to the...
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Quel Cassoulet! - France Today →
In France, cuisine de terroir refers to the culinary savoir-faire and the traditional dishes that emerged from its various regions through the centuries. Its continued existence reflects a laudable Gallic résistance to global trends toward the mass production and standardization of food. While many such regional specialties have fallen out of fashion, perhaps no classic French dish has fared as...
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A Potted Poulet Saves the Day - Washington Post →
It was a natural impulse: When my food-obsessed friend Rachel and I were planning our trip to Paris, we decided to rent an apartment rather than stay in a hotel. It was going to be cheaper, but we also would be able to cook from the markets instead of going out to eat — at least part of the time.
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review: la bohème… « the ulterior epicure →
Unlike it’s brethren, l’Arpege does not cosset and caress. Like the food it’s known for, this three-star Michelin restaurant is more hearth and home than retrofitted palace.
“My primary goal is to create a dish that respects the ingredients, offers a...”
– Alain Ducasse
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“People who like wine are nicer people that those who do not like wine!” -...”
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'Johnny' Hugel dies →
Legendary Alsace producer Jean Hugel died yesterday at the age of 84. For over 60 years Jean Frederic Hugel was one of his native region’s greatest champions…
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Les imbres au chocolat (chocolate stamps) →
Mailboxes across France are smelling a little better recently. Because last month, La Poste released a limited-edition of, yes, chocolate stamps—or des timbres au chocolat.
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“We in France, especially in Provence, have raised the process of producing rosés...”
– Op-Ed Contributor - Taking the Bloom Off the Rosé - NYTimes.com
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EU abandons plan to allow blended rose wine - The... →
The war of the rosés is over. The European Commission announced today that it had abandoned its plans to allow European winemakers to make cheap rosé wine by mixing red and white wines together.
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Review: Au Revoir to All That: The Rise and Fall... →
But on the nitty gritty of what is happening to the bistros, the reliable restaurants in small towns in the middle of nowhere upon which the country’s reputation was truly based, there is little. That’s unfortunate because, while the death throes of the €500 dinner are endlessly entertaining, it is the demise of the quality €15 lunch that is the real story.
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France gets its Obama moment →
When dining out Saturday night at a no-star bistro, La Fontaine de Mars, the presidential party was served water, Coke and table wine to accompany foie gras, lamb and steak with shallots, and paid for meals “like any client,” said owner Jacques Boudon. “It’s just what they wanted.”
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Asparagus: Now's the Moment | Dorie Greenspan →
When it’s asparagus season in France, everyone celebrates!