|
When Daniel Rose opened his
first restaurant, Spring,
it was a small, seasonally driven restaurant on an unremarkable street in
the 9th arrondissement. Word quickly spread about the talented chef, who
helped fuel a revolution of younger chefs in Paris cooking
creatively, most of it French-inspired, but with an additional focus on
sourcing the finest seasonal fruits, vegetables, fish and meats.
As an American, Daniel
didn’t have fixed ideas about how things should be, and used
ingredients that were decidedly French – part of a now full-blown
movement in Paris amongst a younger generation of chefs, who are putting more
vegetables forward on their menus, accenting plates with unexpected
seasonings, using less sauces, and lightening up plates, which eventually
became part of an international conversation about the current and
future state of French cuisine.
Most of these smaller places are
packed, but Daniel made a big move and took Spring to
another neighborhood, offering more intricate menus than he had been
making before. (He is also re-opening the nearby Chez La Vieille
in Paris, and opening another in New York.) Spring restaurant had been a
success in its spiffier incarnation, but Daniel Rose decided to take a look
back at classic French bistro cooking in his new place, applying the same
insistence he’s known for in his other restaurant, on the quality of
ingredients and careful preparation of the iconic dishes that many of us
know and love. It’s obvious on the menu,
and on the plates, that Chef Rose has a deep affection for them too.
I’ve had a couple of meals at La Bourse et La
Vie, a name which is a riff on the expression, “Your wallet
or your life.” (Readers of The Sweet Life
in Paris will recall my confusion over le bourse, which also
means scrotum in French.) And I would certainly give up either (although
I will hold on to my own bourse,
thank you very much…) for another one of the marvelous gougères
brought to the table shortly after you sit down. The golden brown, crispy
cheese puffs are huge, like the ones you get at bakeries in
Chablis. They arrive sliced in half, which is a good thing,
because if I had my own, I would probably not had room for dinner afterwards.
|
No comments:
Post a Comment