TarteTatin

We'd like to be there! I have to go back and look, but are we doing goose vs. duck? I have time to help prep, if need be. I follow directions really well, from past years of wine stewarding, bartending, and waitressing. (but then there was the time when Chef chased me through the restaurant, threatening me with a huge kitchen knife, for rinsing raspberries in water when I was prepping a table's dessert-in the middle of winter. "Do you know how expensive that pint of raspberries is? Don't you know you never wash raspberries?" AAGGHH. Remember Cafe De Costa down below in Newmarket? Mr. Tarte Tatin was the Maitre'd/Manager/Sommelier there too. Very romantic place it was. Usually.)

Thanks, Rlibkind...I did forget that there are often fresh meat's in the refrigerator case at Fair Food. By the way, we got the tastiest milk there a few days ago. The Kingfisher whole unpasteurized milk...just decadent and creamy. Made some cafe au lait this morning and it almost tasted like cream. Really good drizzled on Oatmeal too. Also got some fresh mache at Fair Food, tiny leaves, full of dirt and stones. Had to wash it four times, but very good. They have fresh, local garlic, which I swear has more taste than other types. I think it's a German variety? And, their local cheeses are good too. I got a sheep's milk tartufo. Not enough taste of truffle, but still good.

We buy all our meat from Fair Food in Reading Terminal, and Bob Pierson's Winter Harvest/Farm to City. It's all locally grown, and the beef is all grass fed. I remember Delmonico steaks at Fair Food are $12.50 a pound. Dr. Elkins angusburger is the best tasting ground beef I've ever had, at something like $7.00 a pound. They have other beef cuts, lots of lamb cuts including Jamison, lots of pork, chicken... It all comes frozen. But, I'll tell you, it's all got FLAVOR. Oh, and the best bacon I've ever had, definitely. You should try the Lamb Pepperoni from Winter Harvest. Incredible!

Does anyone have any updated thoughts on Grand Vefour since these 2004 postings, above? The only other thread I found was a "Grand Vefour on Sopranos" one. Or, comparisons to Taillevent, if you will. Thank you.

We got it at the Mexican place in Reading Terminal a few months back. Also, I would think Penzey's...

One of the Madhur Jaffrey cookbooks I have is a big compilation of two books, has a red cover, is titled, "The Madhur Jaffrey Cookbook". Part one is, "Eastern Vegetarian Cooking." Part two is, "An Invitation to Indian Cooking." Published in Great Britain by Jonathan Cape as two volumes. 1981, 1973, this edition, 1992. Under Part one, "Beetroot and Tomato Soup": 3 beets, 1 tsp ghee or veg oil, 1/2 tsp whole cumin seeds, 1 tsp whole black peppercorns, 4 whole cloves, large stick of cinnamon, 3 tomatoes-peeled and chopped, 1/2 tsp salt, 2 ounces crm optional. Peel beetroot (I use rubber gloves), cut into large dice. Put in food processor with 12 oz. water. Blend for 1 minute (be careful not to fill too much, I do this in batches or it leaks). Strain the juice through a sieve, (I use my fist), getting out as much liquid as possible. (Then you throw away the rest of the beautiful beet's! What else can be done with it after the liquid is squeezed out of it?) Heat the ghee, when hot, put in cumin seeds, black peppercorns, cloves, cinnamon (I make a little muslin bag, otherwise it's all floating in the soup). Stir for a second, put in chopped tomatoes. Stir 3-4 seconds, add beet juice, salt and another 4 oz. water. Bring to boil, cover, simmer low for 10 minutes. Strain (I never do). Add cream if you desire and re-heat. It's SO delicious, and comforting! I have found it's better when the tomatoes are in season. "Plastic" tomatoes aren't as flavorful. The paragraph with this, she talks about drinking it like broth when she's working late into the night. She also says that in the 19th century, this was probably thickened with flour.

We were there in October and had pretty okay food, and lousy service. He (I believe it was Jean Arabian) was very rude to us. I have a review in a thread I think I titled something like, "October '06, a week of eating in bistros".

Mark, I just watched your video! That's amazing! That's the same restaurant (in a different village) that we had our incredible tarte flambee in! That taste! It's driving me CRAZY! AAARRGGHHH.

Oh, my gosh, I agree with Lindak! We were in Alsace many years ago, had tons of flammekuche in many towns, most notably Mulhouse and Ammerschwihr. The taste has not been duplicated anywhere. They are all very good renditions of an Onion Tarte, but not that country taste... Even in Paris, it's not the same. What great food memories!

Thank you, John. And thanks for pointing out the misspelling of Cameleon in the initial post, which I'm no longer able to edit.

As promised, pictures at last. Lunch on the TGV from Montpellier to Paris - The pissaladiere would have been better warm, but was still a great improvement on what was on offer in the café car. And the wine a much better value. The octupus pie of Sete - tasty, but with everything else we didn't finish it. Macaroons from Ladureé - our New Year's Eve treat! (We did share!) Cafe Constant dinner menu. Ravioli de langoustine flavored with basil. (Cafe Constant) Terrine of foie gras maison (2e extra), with fleur de sel, toasts, salad with shallots, ciboulette Scallops (2e extra) roasted-4 in shells with a wonderful brown butter sauce with nuts. Mesclun salad with croutons and shallot avec beurre demi sel. (Cafe Constant) Boudin blanc, pommes en l’air, apples and mache salad.(Cafe Constant) Dessert - Pruneaux in a red wine sauce with cinnamon, clove and nutmeg - We started with seven.(Cafe Constant) In the Enfant Rouges market on rue Bretagne L’Estaminet restaurant. Bottle of Rose cremant-Loire, “’Pet’ de Noel”. 15.50e. (L’Estaminet) Plat du jour: sausage from Montagne and lentils. (L’Estaminet) The small mixte charcroute-sausage, pate, different cheeses. (L’Estaminet) Canal St. Martin, Quai Valmy and rue Beaurepaire, Chez Prune. Salade Lyonnaise, 11e (Chez Prune) Mandarin orange tarte tatin on soft crust with creme anglaise and raspberry.(Chez Prune) Pouilly Fume ‘05, Les Chaumiennes, Figeat (Chez Prune) Scallop salad at Le Comptoir, Carrefour d'Odeon Sale of lamb at Le Comptoir. Brasserie L’Isle St. Louis Cassoulet (Brasserie L’Isle St. Louis) Frisee salad (Brasserie L’Isle St. Louis)

Madhur Jaffrey has this incredible wonderful vegetarian soup. It's a beet and tomato soup. No stock. Really nothing else in it but beets and tomatoes and some basic Indian spices. I make this in summer and winter, as she says, it's also very relaxing to just sip late at night...Probably my favorite relaxing soup. Also just made a vegetarian carrot soup to die for, also from an Indian cookbook. Just carrots and ginger and red peppers. Again, no stock.

Paris, Dec 31-Jan 6th (If anyone knows how to change the title of this thread to: "Paris Bistros/Brasserie's: Oct '06 and Jan '07", that would be super!) Dec 31 was basically TGV food and friends over to our apartment for "Apero". Jan 1: (not much open New Year's Day) Lunch at Odeon in a corner cafe..Denton, I believe. Just croque’s and pichet's. Sat in the window and watched the world go by... Went to our old stand-by, Chez Janou for dinner: Pumpkin soup with marrons, I had steak with those fabulous potatoes dauphinoise and the whole roasted tomato with rosemary. He had veal liver with pomme puree and cooked apples and a raspberry apple fresh compote. Split the big bowl of choc mousse that they let you help yourself from. Rose Languedoc bottle, “Chez Janou” and also a pichet of it after. Before, at the bar we had Pastis, “muse vert”, delicious. Near the Place Des Vosges. Jan 2: Another old stand-by, Chez Prosper for lunch: Poulet Tandoori salad, Entrecote frites, Berthillon pignon praline glace! Delicious! Cafe Constant for dinner upstairs. Domaine Cachau, cote de Roussillon-’05. Bisque de Croustache & ravioli de langoustine flavored with basil. Yum, not too rich, not a lot of it, but that was super..merely a “soupcon” of soup! Tiny ciboulette garnish...Terrine of foie gras maison (2e extra), with fleur de sel, toasts, salad with shallots, ciboulette...Scallops (2e extra) roasted-4 in shells with a wonderful brown butter sauce with nuts? (it was almost too rich, but not quite...). Mesclun salade with croutons and shallot avec beurre demi sel, He had boudin blanc, pommes en l’air, mache on top. Dessert was pruneaux, 7 whole prunes in a vin rouge sauce, maybe with cinnamon or vin chaud epices. Very plump. 10e most entrees, 14e most plats. Jan 3: Enfant Rouges market to L’Estaminet restaurant. Bottle of Rose cremant-Loire, “’Pet’ de Noel”. 15.50e. Plat du jour: sausage from Montagne and lentilles. I had mixte charcroute-sausage, pate, different cheeses. 6.5e. 47e. Friends over for apero. All went to Asian place in Place d’Italie. Their dog (Belle) poisoned from eating rat poison under the table. Ugh. She ate the rat poison in the box, so we left dinner and had a vet come to our apartment at Midnight. All is well, don't worry! Jan 4: Canal St. Martin to Chez Prune. Favorite new place! 4 items changes daily. Salade Lyonnaise for both. 11e. Pieces of soft sausage over zucchini, carrot, red onion mandoline mixture. Yummy tiny potatoes with mustard seed sauce, YUMMY onion confit, so sweet! Big red leaf lettuce with raddichio, red pepper, side of cukes. Pouilly Fume ‘05, Les Chaumiennes, Figeat, Bronze medal ‘06. They offer two choice of white wine. That or Chardonnay. Mandarin orange tarte tatin on soft crust with creme anglaise and raspberry. 52e. Dinner at Le Comptoir, went early, at 7:00 p.m., thought we had lucked out to have dinner there! Not a chance. Luncheon menu this week only for dinner! We've had lunch there 5 or 6 times now, still can't get the degustation menu at night!! Had it with Yves when he was at Regalade, and am craving it! Darn....Glass of Bugey-Cerdon Rose Petillant, 6e, Love this! He had glass of Ventable vin cuit de Provence. Domaine Les Bastides, very different, a bit sherry-ish? 6e. Chestnut soup with celery and lots of chunks of foie gras! & tapioca and almond slivers. Not much taste of chestnuts at all, lots of black pepper. It was kind of thin but good. He had Bisque de homard with chunks of lobster poached in vinegar, pistachios. I had scallop salad 4 lovely scallops around long hearts of romaine in the middle with parmesan, pine nuts and balsamic. He had Sale of lamb, lamb steak with a little bone in the middle and a round ramekin of mash with gravy. 1 liter Saumer white 15e. (merde, I should order the carre of lamb next time, looks great! but I think they overcook it). I had 3 glaces: lait de brebis (LOVE this), chocolate with piments esplenette, (spicy back taste) and caramel with sel (delicious). Sam had chocolate guanaja pot de creme with valrona. Eau de vie de pruneaux, 105e. Jan 5: Levain du marais, our favorite near Place des Vosges, for pain au chocolat and a brioche fondant, flat with sugar. I’sle St. Louis to Brasserie D L’isle St. Louis. Cassoulet good! Tomatoey, chewy beans. I had frisee aux lardon salad. Didn't come with an egg... Vin chaud to start with and a mutzig beer. Riesling Charles Tux 23e from Alsace. Big muenster au cumin and a big tranche of baba full of rum. Marc de gewurtztraminer. 85e Dinner at Bar a Huitres-Blvd. St Germain close to Maubert. Everyone had plateau’s on their tables. Everyone. Ours was 50e and huge and gorgeous! Spider crab (araignee), 4 small crabs, meaty and tasty (etruille?), raw mussels (funny, that) from Spain....also 5 belons, and 11 claires (creuses), shrimp, amandes and poalourdes clams, teeny gray shrimp that nobody eats cause too small, tons of bilots (periwinkles). A mignonette, mayo, rillette of pork, good rolls, and small squares of brown bread and those butters in the long wrapped foil....2 pichets muscadet. The only place in the States I've found a good Plateau is in NY at L'Absinthe. Jan 6: Montmarte. Ate at Le Progres in 18th by Abbesse metro, rueYvonne, large windows with good view of lots of steps up to Sacre Cour. Sort of a small Chez Prosper or Chez Prune...He had tartare with raw egg on top, large portion, sort of a mix your own. Came with cornichon, shallot, capers, worchestire sauce, tabasco, sam mixed his own. I had veg soup, just ok, and bavette with potatoes roti, and a nice poivre sauce on the side. Came with lettuce, corn, tomato salad. first had a pichet of horrible rose, then one of ok chinon. 50 euros, not great, but ok....This place was recommended by Eat.Drink.Sleep.Paris. Or something like that, just ok. Went for another steak dinner that night! Le Relais du Entrecote, 20 St. Benoit, right by Deux Magots. Good steak frites, that’s all they serve. The sauce was delicious, mushroom, bay, butter?? And frites, just ok, but they give you at least two servings, possibly all you can eat? Starts with a salad with walnuts. Bottle of tarn wine, 68e. Deux Magots for drinks after, just cause we've never been... Jan 7: Our airport van went to pick up people past Tolbiac and Place d’italie, and there was a market. The van driver stopped, said we were early to pick the other's up, I asked if I could go to the market....brought back two drumsticks and pommes to the van and we had roasted chicken for petit dejeuner in the van! The driver didn't think we were crazy at all. Food trends: Rosemary sticks on everything....esplanette in everything and also for decoration....Rose petillant...Chestnut soup. Of course, foam and vertical food everywhere. It's about time for us to go to a nice restaurant again. We've been to so many in the past, and the past couple of years, we've been in this "bistro" mode. But we really are ready to eat out nice again and see how creative and delicious Paris food is. I think we're missing a lot lately by our choices. Mr. Tarte Tatin will be posting some food pictures as soon as I can get him to!

Couldn't find the place Ptipois described. Ended up in Brasserie La Donjon. Described in Languedoc/Rouissillon, "Where to eat" thread... Mr. Tarte Tatin makes better...!

December 26-31st, 2006 Sete-Narbonne-Carcassone-Marseillan-Montpellier. (If you'd like details on the beaches, towns and sites we visited, please email us!) We took lots of food pictures, hoping that Mr. Tarte Tatin will provide some soon. 12/26: The Grand Hotel in Sete, half hour south of Montpellier, an island reached from a causeway. Our room faced the canal, gorgeous. We were exhausted. We decided to eat in the hotel restaurant, which I think used to be good according to Graham Tigg, but that was many years ago, and it has a new name now. Quai 17 ... We had Muscat from the region, for an aperitif, then a rosé from the region , a Coteaux du Languedoc - Chateau de l’Engarran - very KoolAid-y pink, but a tasty wine nonetheless. Amuse bouche of cauliflower cream with gelée pain grillée (kind of strange), then entrée’s of oysters of Thau - very tasty and lots of sea taste - Chincoteague salts times 4. Served with mignonette and salted butter and brown bread, on a bed of uncooked lentils which were very messy - better to have served them on rock salt. Also a risotto with local mussels and chorizo with a cheese crisp. For main courses we both ordered the bourride. A different take on the usual preparation. This was less of the fish soup and more of a white fish, parsley, garlic preparation supplemented with cream. On reflection this was not a very good dish. Very strange. One dessert - a pear marmalade with ice cream and a burnt reglisse (regrisse?) (licorice) garnish. Very cool decor in what was obviously at one time a grand restaurant in the old tradition. The decor is now supplemented by LED lights, white paint, hardwood floors and interesting tables - pedestals, no legs. Nice heavy silverware, table ware laid diagonally, and Schott glasses. Service was pretty good and probably better than most of the other service we experienced down here in the Languedoc. 12/27, Lunch: Narbonne. We had read that Brasserie Co. was okay. Just a simple town brasserie, but modern ... there was an upside down Christmas tree hanging from the ceiling. We ordered a 50 cl bottle of local wine, a place we had passed on the way from the Narbonne plage. Chateau Ricardelle, -La Clape, 2005 rose. Good rose. Dry. 11.50 euros. I had “Vice Versa de canard”. This was canard done two ways. A couple of nice sized pieces of sautéed foie gras, and a large piece of duck breast on a skewer, served very rare. Really pretty presentation. Lots of cooked sliced apples, all over a demi-glace, topped with lots of sautéed parsley and fresh chives, tasty chives for a change ... the foie gras was tasty. The duck breast was chewy and a bit tough, but still good! It was rolled in a few white sesame seeds and black pepper, but both were underplayed and not overwhelming. All this was topped with three large vertical pieces of fried spaghetti! Also a smudge of squid ink? over the side of the plate. 17.50 euros. Sam had “Tagine agneau”. It was a very gamey tasting lamb shank over couscous with raisins, served in a modern white tagine plate, they removed the top when serving it. It was okay, I like when lamb has taste, can’t stand most American lamb that hasn’t the taste of the animal at all. However, this was a bit too much for me. I don’t think it was old, mutton? 13 euros. He had a “Tarte citron vert”, which was basically lime mousse served in a glass, covered with groseilles and a “L’amour en cage” piece of fruit ... gooseberry? There were choc crumble leaves, a raspberry and strawberry … underneath was a shortbread or similar. The glass was served on a plate with pieces of white chocolate and raspberry sauce. We had two cafe’s which came with their own small pots of chocolate creme. Delicious, and the coffee was a large (for France) size, and delicious.Total: 51.30 euros Wine shop and Dinner: Found this great wine shop in Frontignan on the way back to Sete. Chateau de la Peyrade. Bought a Marc de muscat, a cremant de muscat, some sec and doux muscat and a couple of glasses. Monsieur gave us a recommendation in Sete for dinner, turning up his nose at Quai 17. Paris-Mediterraneae-menu 21 or 26 euros/2 or 3 courses. Olives with fennel seed and lemon peel, delicious for our muscat aperitifs. Tarama amuse foam creme-very light, a bit of espelette or harissa and parsley. Mini ravioli with moules with sun dried tomatoes in a mussel bouillon and foam with chives. Croustillant chevre frais avec pamplemousse and salad. Huge pave saumon wrapped in lardon with mash/chervil, topped with 3 large rosemary sprigs and roasted garlic in a demi glace. Local Squid with squid ink targliatelle - topped with harissa? & creme, basil leaves. They comped us Marc de languedoc, since we mentioned the recommendation. Tarte au Coing with puffed pastry, pretty good, soft, not caramelized enough, with clotted cream that had tangerine? and bits of nuts in it, topped with groseilles (what is it that everything is topped with this?) and 2 raspberries and mint. More rose with dinner (L’esprit du Silene-’05, dry and honey) Total 73 euros. 12/28 Lunch: Carcassonne to find Cassoulet better than Mr. Tarte Tatin's. Walked around and chose Brasserie le Donjon. They were so in the weeds... Salad of Mache, endive, walnuts, bleu cheese with a light walnut oil, tomato concasse? around plate. Both had cassoulet. Bit of duck confit with bone, bit of sausage with filler?, bit of ham. No thyme, no nothing, very thin and too soupy ... there was a bit of crust which was good though there was a distinct lack of garlic. Corbieres red wine. Chateau Censier St. Louis, ‘04, 14 euros. Gourmand coffee avec mini square creme brulée (excellent), tiny raspberry tarte, tiny apricot one, chocolate bon bons, Valronha choccie and good coffee. bread not as good here...57 euros total.-15 each for cassoulet and salad. (Maybe the best things about this sojourn in the south so far, has been the fantastic local oysters and the wine. Most of the food has not reached an imaginative standard or a true respect for the ingredients. The cooking has an international sameness to it and one could as easily be in Philadelphia, Barcelona, Rome or Stockholm with some of the places we’ve dined in. The servers all speak English of a sort, everyone takes Visa, you can definitely get things you’d recognize, and the vegetable garnish is the same. Someone has managed to convey the concept of plate decoration and not just with parsley or chervil. There’s streaks of balsamic, dustings of espelette, sprinklings of sesame seeds). Dinner: Sete plage at La Corniche plage- La Table de Jean at the Hotel Conga - Yet another bizarre eating experience. Rosé Faugéres Abbaye Sylva Plana ‘05, Both had a panache de coquillages, 4 shrimp, 6 huitres de Bouzigues, 6 raw mussels(which everybody serves) , tiny palourdes (clams) barely enough to taste. Fish soup, huge tureen enough for a family of six, croutons, cheese, aioli -nice taste, and graininess. Not too spicy or rich. Moules farci á la setois - big mussels, split, stuffed with sausage and covered with a tomato sauce and an aioli accompanied with a basic mound of rice. Skipped dessert and coffee and tried to get the bill - it took 30 minutes. We think the service is so bad everywhere, because it's the week between Christmas and New Year's and it's the "B" team. 12/29 Lunch: Marseillan for lunch. The Pourcel brothers restaurant was closed and the windows soaped over - Couldn’t figure out if they just closed for the holidays or if it was permanent. On the other side of the little harbor were four restaurants - The only one that was busy was Tavern du Port. This was one of those restaurants that you want to find and never can. A warm welcome, close tables and a menu with things you want to eat. Aperitifs of Amber Noilly Prat (it's made right there, but the museum was closed). Had moules marinere - big local mussels cooked with onions and Noilly Prat. Served with excellent bread. A feuillete of seafood, puff pastry filled with seafood in a cream sause with a tiny bit of curry. There were squid, scallops and fish. Then there was ‘seche’ which appeared to be sauteed squid strips with a lemon sauce. Very tasty. Indifferent chocolate mousse - grainy, aerosol whipped cream. Drank a Faugeres Rose 05 - local to the area - tasty and ideal with lunch. We could have ended up staying all afternoon as the guy next to us introduced himself, and his friends and then took our picture. The owners of the Tavern not only run the restaurant, but have a wine shop attached. Talked to the son while I was paying. A very serious, but pleasant guy who enjoys what he does. After lunch we found an artisinal chocolate maker that who was recommended to us by the guy at Chateau Peyrade. Bought some truffle dark chocolates-made with real truffle, not candy truffle, the mushroom stuff! Also some prune-armagnac with bits of prune in it and a tomato basil chocolate. Dinner: Sete waterfront tourist trap. Didn't even take notes, there was a guy outside opening fresh seafood and it looked okay. Oursins (sea urchins), panache of four oysters, shrimp, raw mussels again.. Who knows what else... 12/30: Had a private degustation in St. Christol, north of Montpellier at Chateau Hospitaliers. Madame and Monsieur kindly invited us into their home for a lunch of duck confit, boiled potatoes, salad and cheese. Also apples that they grow themselves. Bought some cremant for New Year's...we've had their wine before in Philly. Good, basic Languedoc. Dinner in Montpellier: Stayed at Hotel Arceaux, near the aqueduct. We really should have reserved our meal in advance. This was the Saturday night before New Year's, and we had thought many times about reserving Jardins Des Sens and other's on Graham Tigg's list. But we didn't, and, lo and behold, every place was booked up. Ended up at Le Petit Jardin, near the Botanical Gardens. Not great at all...Head Cheese for Mr. and I had Linguine with salmon to start, Sea Bass over rice with indifferent vegetables, Magret with same vegetables, Pear with chocolate for dessert, another amour en cage...Good Viognier Serre de Guery, '05. Overall, this is a SUPER region for fresh, local Bouzigues oysters, and we ate a lot of them, and saw lots of oyster farming areas on the bay off of the Med. Sea. The oysters have taste, they taste of the sea. The oysters I have in the States don't seem to have much taste at all on their own...The local mussels are great too, although I prefer them cooked to raw... And, yes, this was a bad week for good places being closed, between Xmas and New Year's...but we had a super time, ran on some beaches in 50 degree weather to work off all the food and protein... Now, we have to push Mr. Tarte Tatin into getting the food pictures posted!

We have lots of goose stock from Thanksgiving. Would like to make a French onion soup with that. Any ideas, recipes? Do you think it will work? Hard to find time to go back and read all the pages in this thread to see if that was already covered.

Levain du Marais on the Rue de Turenne right by the Place de Vosges. Incroyable. Better, is their pain au chocolat. Warm, right out of the oven. Yum. Also, their brioche fondant.

Funny, we were in the same location a few nights ago, on January 5th! Everyone seemed to have this huge plateau on their table, so we ordered one too. Delicious. No rice though...

Thanks, John. What about L'Relais de entrecote, which is closer to us, near Odeon I believe? Have you or anyone else heard about that? Meating's reviews (when googled), says it specializes in American beef. The whole point is that we like the taste of French beef...

We're just finishing up two weeks in France. The first in the Languedoc region, the second here in Paris. Lots of pictures and talk about the places we dined, but it will most likely take a few weeks to organize it all. It was a delicious vacation! So, for our last meal out, we would like a really good steak frites. (people coming to our apartment Saturday night for "apero"), I know we can go anywhere, but does anything stand out in your minds for this tomorrow, Saturday lunch? Merci!

That's beautiful! I don't have an answer to your questions. However, as a quince lover and a membrillo lover, that's just beatiful! Oh, we do have a cut piece of membrillo in the fridge that we brought back from Paris the end of October. We cut it open on Thanksgiving, and used some the other day and it was perfectly fine.

Saw this in Michael Klein's column last week or the week before: "Munish Narula, who sold his interest in the Karma restaurants, recently opened what he thought would be a simple healthful-Indian delivery service, Tiffin.com, out of a Girard Avenue storefront that last housed a sad-sack joint called Chick-N-Fish. When foodies began showing up for budget-priced takeout, he served them. Now, he said Monday, he's expanding Tiffin.com into a 30-seat dine-in space called Tiffin Store (710 W. Girard Ave., 215-922-1297). It should be ready by next week, he said."

YUM. We finally went tonight, with a few friends that had been there before. Never had Korean food! Jong Ka Jib, on N. 5th St. We had: First, a pancake with squid and onions, Second, a vegetable dish called boom bang bing or kim bop or bimimbap or something that was wonderful...the rice sort of cooked in the pot until it was crunchy and there were all sorts of delicious vegetables: Seaweed and/or spinach, turnip, rice, an egg, carrots. They mixed it together after it sat and cooked for awhile, with a medium hot sauce that was the consistency of tamarind, but red, Then...a soft tofu with mushrooms, kimchi and beef dish. Yes, it was silken, incredible, even Mr. Tarte Tatin liked it a lot! There was a raw egg broken over the top of that, and it cooked while we waited a few minutes to be told we could eat it. Hard to describe, it's not like egg drop soup, the tofu is delicious, the consistency silken and the taste very more-ish (as in, I want more of that!). Then.. we had Beef short ribs, marinated with five spice, slow cooked, sliced very thinly. Very thin flanken steak, pounded thin, with little bones in it. I tasted cinnamon and earth and the five spice, faintly tasted peanut butter maybe? Marinated for days, probably... Also... had squid, which looked more like octopus, or as a dining companion said, maybe cuttlefish. Long, thin pieces, with a big piece of squid body that looked like a pancake that he cut for us with scissors... Oh, they provide scissors, real, full size scissors as cutting instruments for both the meat and the squid! They sit happily on the side of the dish. Everyone was given a bowl of the most glutinous rice I've ever seen, never thought it would be that tasty, but it was. The accompaniments were kimchi, great little brown beans (azuki?) that looked like baked beans without the sauce, delicious...other things we weren't sure of but were tasty...bean sprouts with vinegar or ginger?... Squid and ginger in a peppery thick red sauce...a clear sauce to dip with pieces of cabbage or kimchi in it...a marinated cabbage...Oh, the marinated cucumber with red pepper and cilantro was to die for! Thought it was zucchini at first, but then we agreed it was cucumber. Four people, all this food, $50....Some of us put in $15 a piece, some $20 a piece. We left $70 with tip. Brought a couple bottles of wine, I know, Korean should be beer or something, but we're wine drinkers. The staff doesn't speak English very well at all, but we got along just fine. It's pretty far up north Broad St., north of Einstein, and then down to 5th. But worth it. Can't wait to go again.

Well, you hit most of the high spots already. If you want some even more eclectic dining experiences, head for the Reading Terminal Market and have breakfast at the Dutch Eating Place, then lunch at DeNics - get the hand carved pork sandwich - and then go to HanZhou Hand Drawn Noodle House on Race Street. Get the Fried Soy Sauce noodles and watch the guy in the back make your noodles. In addition, try Standard Tap at 2nd and Poplar. Have the duck salad, the octupus (best in Philly, and just about anything on the menu. You could also try Full Plate Cafe at Liberties Walk - also in Northern Liberties - It's a BYO. Go bowling at North Bowl, but don't eat the food there. Also try to eat at Django, 4th and South Streets. It's one of the best BYOB's in town. Try the oyster po boy at Grace's Tavern, 23rd and South.

" ...the French fries at lunch - the beneficiaries of a three-day treatment involving duck fat and truffle oil - were unbelievably good." The above from Laban's review! AAAHHHH! Duck fat and truffle fries! We drove in the snow last January, east of Epernay in Champagne, to a town called St. Menehould, just because we heard about their duck fat fries! AND The place wasn't open!! We have to go to Lacroix and have those fries! (On another note, the town of St. Menehould is full of Louis 15th history, and it's the first time that Mr. Tarte Tatin had real Pied de Cochon. The restaurant that was open, had pigs foot about 10 different ways. Louis had a real thing for pig's feet too, and that's where he ultimately got caught, so they say...Me? I had an omelette. Not that adventurous)