Bux

Galicia was interesting. Seafood was good, but not inexpensive. I love Albarino wines and they're inexpensive as a rule. We were there in January and the weather was quite nice. There's no tourisim in January, but we heard it was not the best time for seafood as the fisherman don't go out as much in mid winter. We found it surprisingly warm. I have a level of interest in regional Spanish food, but on the whole I'm still clueless about most of it. I recall eating sea urchins in Galica, in a sauce. I seem to recall the waiter mentioning that they weren't eaten at all in neighboring Asturias. There is little local market for avant garde food. The restaurants that had dishes influenced by what Adria, Arzak or Berasategui were doing, were rare. At one place they offered a sashimi like or fish carpaccio dish of thinly sliced raw fish. The waiter said it had been on the menu for years, but only lately has it attracted interest from locals. What was probably the best restaurant in the area, in Santiago, was closed for vacation unfortunately. We ate well, but not like in Catalunya.

In both Catalonia and the Basque region, I found this true of many of the better restaurants whether they were in town or in an outlying residential area. In San Sebastian, I recall driving right by Arzak and Berasategui was almost impossible to find once I got to Lasarte. In Catalonia, Lesguard, Sant Pau and Can Roca were all poorly marked and none seemed to have the inevitable signage leading the traveler to the restauarant that starred restaurants would have in France. It's almost as if they don't expect anyone who wasn't there before. This whole transient automobile driver gourmet travel thing that drives top restaurants in France is still rare in Spain, or so it would appear. Prices also seem most reasonable when compared to France. This is most evident as I'm planning a trip to Paris right now. My wife is right, we really have to spend more time in Spain.

mogsob, what is it about zins that you don't like? i don't think any other country is producing zins at this time. i can't imagine it will stay that way for long though. I've heard of at least one grower in e Languedoc who is growing it experimentally. He had to get special dispensation form the French government to plant Zinfandel. They have laws about the grapes you are allowed to grow for wines. The Languedoc has little tradition in terms of fine wines and in some ways, resembles the "new world" when it comes to thinking about wine production.

Chez Panisse was one that got away, the one time we visited the bay area. Thanks for that report. I enjoyed it very much.

We do pretty much what Klc does and for the same reasons--to aovid mositure condensation on the cold beans. We buy one kilo bags of roasted beans. Put the beans in small jars. Freeze the jars. We take a jar out of the freezer the day before we need it and open it only after it comes to room temperature. We use those beans, grinding them as needed until we need the next jar. At least that's our preferred pattern. We only use espresso roast and only make esspresso. We usually have about two cups each a day. Usually doubles.

I've had very few potatoes in the US that have had enough flavor of their own. I can get beautiful potatoes at the Greenmarket for $2.50 a pound and up with wonderful flavor, but otherwise my potato soups have always benefited from some stock. Nevertheless, the density of the soup is going to be a related to the amount of potato and the amount of liguid. It may not be directly proportional to the respective weights and maybe we need the molecular gastronomists here. First let me note the caution of Julia Child whose book taught us the basic potage recipe. She prefered a food mill to electirc blenders. It was a matter of texture for her. Since then I've read warnings about trying to make mashed potatoes in a food processor--something about the starch turning to glue. I wonder if that isn't happening when an immersion blender is used to puree the potatoes for potato soup. If not, it's just the proportion of potatoes to liquid.

There is, or was, a lunch menu that I thought was an exceptionally good buy, but I don't recall it as offering the ultimate le Bernardin experience. It was not a tasting menu and I seem to recall that choices were limited. Nonetheless it was a good value and an excellent introduction to the food as well as a chance to sample it again without reaching deepling into your wallet.

That was a good post in the sense that it reminds us of the importance of keeping an open mind as well as the rather subjective nature of taste and traditional approaches to cuisine.

That's the question. Do we treat them as a vegetable because they act like a vegetable or do they seem like a vegetable because we're used to treeating them as one? One of the most appealing simple desserts I've had in a bistro was braised fennel with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Fennel is obviously a vegetable and definitely not a fruit, but it also has a flavor akin to one we often associate with candy--licorice. Braising it in a simple syrup made it taste like a dessert.

Check out Veyrat's site. It's quite interesting and even if you neither stay at the inn or eat there, his list of addresses in the area is worthwhile if you care to buy cheese or wine. As for dropping names, I don't find that as useful as just gaining some first hand information about a place that so many others are talking about. It's kind of nice to have your own views and a reason to have them as well as the experience to defend them, if you think you're going to find yourself in the company of those who are likely to speak about Veyrat.

Could someone explain "Michelin-style" to me. I don't get it. What would make a restaurant definitely Michelin-style? I might have some picture in mind from the use of a phrase such as "Michelin 3 star style," from which I would infer some high end service as well as very sophisticated food. Is there some belief that Michelin is only useful, or even most useful, at the high end or that the Michelin guide is only a list of fancy restaurants? Has no one used the guide to find the inexpensive meals it highlights as well as the moderate tables it chooses to list? Do diners have a perception of a Michelin style that's different from a GaultMillau style or a Bottin Guide style? I suppose the use and reliability of the various guides is a whole other thread, but I think it's been discussed and for the most part we seem to end up with people talking mostly about Michelin and GaultMillau. The latter has become corporate with both Gault and Millau out of the picture. I wonder if anyone has ever tried to compare a guide to the restaurants of France with one to restaurants in the US. I'm thinking of the Mobil Guides and that sort. I remember reading an article about the Mobil five diamond restaurants in New York and wondering how much effect the guide had on the choice of diners visiting New York.

Tomatoes are a fruit. But I understand. When I ate at Arpege in Paris years ago, I thought the same thing so I passed on Passard's new tomato dessert and went for the avocado souffle. Speaking of flavoring ice creams, I watched a pastry cook make ginger ice cream. A whole lot of fresh ginger went into the milk to simmer and thinking that weights were very critical to the success of pastry, I asked how the cook knew how much ginger to add. It looked like an awful lot. I got back the response that it wasn't important how much ginger you used as long as you kept tasting and strained the mix when you got the flavor concentration you wanted.

Thank you. I get it. It was about Rick Stein's athletic prowess. Now explain how my friends in the south fit in to this when I spoke of their friends' taste in restaurants.

The stereotyping is far more tiresome than it is amusing, but let's take "my" Rick Stein for a minute. I would have thought that he's "yours" not "mine," but perhaps I'm missing the right sort of distinction your "kind make" about "my kind." You'd be surprised at how naive Americans can be. Let's see, he's an Oxford grad who opened his own restaurant as a chef. Does that really strike you as the fast path to the money? That he's done well at it, is something else, but it seems to offend you. As to what I should know as an American, you forget that we don't pay all that much attention to the UK when it comes to food and restaurants. I know very little about Stein. Has he earned Michelin Stars? There's a world of difference in our outlook towards eating I suppose. I don't have the confidence that the desk clerk at the tourist office is a better judge of restaurants than the guys Michelin hires. In the south of France, where friends of ours live, I am well aware that their friends mostly eat in the least expensive restaurants in the area. Most of them equate good value with large portions. Fortunately there are no bus stops in the area for me to think of asking for bad information. I have to rely on a small network of people dedicated to seeking out the best meals and vineyards in the region.

I would ask it to be both exciting and delicious, but there's a sufficient audience that will pay that price if it's merely good and the service and luxury are there. On the other hand, as I'm looking at the Michelin, it seems as if the other three stars are raising the ante. Have there been so many restaurants in Paris where the set menu is over two hundred dollars as there are this year?

The espardenyes (correct spelling, I believe) I've had in Spain have been very tender, the sea slug, as I recall, is not. Perhaps it's how they areprepared or the variety. Here from an earlier thread on El Bulli quoted here as that thread is long and going there would require too much further searching.

I really don't know much about the chefs in Catalunya and the name doesn't ring a bell. Unless Josep Quintana has his own restaurant, it's unlikely you'll find out much about him. Sorry for the delay in answering. These less popular threads can really fall off the earth if I don't check the board. Catalan, to give it it's full due is a separate langugage that developed from Latin alongside French and Spanish. It is closely related to Occitan. It bears some resemblance to both Spanish and French. Catalan is an official language of the semi autonomous province of Catalunya, as is Basque and Gallego in the Basque region and Galicia.

Percebes? Probably not....percebes are goose barnacles (although I am enjoying the mental image of goose barnacles getting scared and falling off their rocks!). I used to eat them in Portugal and the Açores....never noticed them in Spain, but I think they're readily available in Galicia. "Sea anemone" is anémona de mar, but it could be almost anything. (For instance, Portuguese has at least 4 completely different words for what we think of as "crab", depending on the specific type.) You're right. I think it would be tough to scare a barnacle of any kind, let alone scare them off. Percepbes are eaten in Galicia, but I think they're either seasonal or rare. The more I think about it, I think I recall someone using the term sea anemone here in this board, but my search came up blank. Could it have been in relation to espardeñas or espardenyas? They are commonly referred to as sea cucumbers, but remind me of nothing like what I see in Chinatown sold as sea cucumbers.

Yeah, when you change the name of the country to "Standard."

I agree. I sem to recall much earlier commenting about the contrast between a meal several years ago at El Bulli and one the next day at Can Majo in Barcelona. Both are listed in Michelin, but Can Majo has no stars and a single fork and spoon. It was hard for me to state categorically which meal I loved more. Of course Can Majo is not really the opposite of El Bulli. Sitting by the beach peeling shrimp cooked with peppers, onions and garlic and eating them with your bare hands has some Adria-like quality to it. I did not like Spanish food when I first traveled to Spain the early sixties (Catalunya does not count.) and it's taken me a long time to rediscover both the haute cuisine of Spanish chefs involved with the the new cooking, and regional cooking as well as that inbetween category of local chefs who have been influenced by traveling, reading and eating or working in kitchens outside their region. I've often bemoaned the lack of interest in these foods, although my recent interest and knowledge is fairly limited to the north from Catalunya to Galicia and even there I've not been along the coast west of Blibao and east of around Cambados in Galicia. Percebes?

I suppose I can't convince you that chefs speak with some pride about their work and enjoy critical acclaim as does any artist or artisan. It's not only about the money, but of course how would I know, I am an American and I gather you're from the UK. Try not to worry too much about the spelling. Under certain conditions and in certain situations red may be blue for all I know. The problem with stereotyping is that it indicates a prejudice. It's not that you disrespect all Americans because of what I've said, but that you don't bother to read what I write because you don't need to read what Americans write. I have never said that Michelin is the end all in any country, including France. I've been quite critical about inclusions and omissions, but you can dismiss that because you already know what I mean as I'm an American. You can also dimiss what I've said in this thread about using Michelin to find unstarred restaurants in areas in which I have no other recommendations. I get it all too well. The worst thing about the Michelin Guides is that they're run by a Brit. Well of course it's in both Michelin and GaultMillau. How do you find new restaurants? Can you tell just by the cover how good a read the book is, or do you use recommendations?

I was wondering why someone eating oysters in Nantes would order Champagne rather than Muscadet (not withstanding the fact that many people, inlcuding all the Bretons sitting at my table at a wedding party, seem to hate Muscadet) but the photographs make it all clear. Just as I instantly feel the need to drink vin rosé when I'm sitting outdoors on a warm day, the interior of that brasserie says "order Champagne."

I too have had mixed results at the 3 stars and generally fared better at two stars, but I suspect part of the problem has always been the expectation--and maybe the expense. Veyrat's was a place I was prepared to find pretentious because of all the notoriety, but I was blown away by the meal. It's not classic cuisine however. He's creative, inventive and known for using the wild plants and weeds from the Alpine region for flavoring. In that sense he uses regional produce, but his food is unlike that served in the region. I'm also not a great fan of the local wines although I tend to order then when I travel and did there. Nevertheless it's an expensive meal and one I wouldn't recommend to anyone who wasn't familiar with what's been said about Veyrat. It was also a long meal--we took the tasting menu, and then he introduced several courses as we were about toave cheese--and possibly not best enjoyed alone. I've not eaten in Jardin des Ramparts or Jacky Michel, but on the basis of your post, Veyrat might not be your best bet. Our other meal in Annecy was at a disappointing place that looked inviting, but there are regional dishes that can probably be had at the better and less touristy local restaurants. There are two one star Michelin places in Annecy. I have no personal experience with either, but the specialties listed in Michelin make them both sound inviting. With the exception of a salt water seafood dish, all of the other specialties make use of river or lake fish and local cheeses. The listed wines are local as well. So I still recommend Annecy. We also had some wonderful dried sausages, ham and other pork cuts. There's a wonderful charcuterie in town and if you can hit Annecy on a market day, so much the better if only for window shopping. The market winds around the canals and the little streets abutting them.

Can you describe the Supreme Princesse Helene? Is it a savory course or a dessert? I assume the oysters were very fresh.

Not knowing your prejudices and interests, it's a broad question. Of course you know Marc Veyrat has his three star restaurant on the shores of Lake Annecy just a few kilometers outisde of the town of Annecy in Veyrier-du-Lac. Annecy is a rather charming town, albeit a bit over run by tourists in season. The old part of town with its canals and adjacent parks is picturesque. Veyrat's Auberge de l'Eridan offers rooms for 400-600 euros, but the restaurant is so close to Annecy that it's easy enough to stay in Annecy and enjoy Veyrat's spectacular cuisine. The Imperial Palace in Annecy is about half that price and rooms on the better side of the hotel offer a great view of a park and the lake. The walk from there to the old town center is not long and goes through a park along the lake. There are any number of other hotels closer to the center with rooms from 50 to 150 euros. Most are under 100 euros.