They say the devil is in the details. We’ll, they’re not kidding if those details have a girl whinging for a 10,000€ accessory. It’s an evil plot, I tell you. So in my valorous attempt to stay angelic, I’ve collected a whole packet of beautiful things, but in pixels, which are virtually free to me, and now I can share them with you!!!
The End
Well folks, I am afraid that Friday@Flore has called in sick today. After a week of running around like chicken with my head cut off, standing out in the rain for Paris Fashion Week shots, juggling Back to School night and spending sleepless nights coughing up my left lung, I simply can not sit out at a café terrasse under a threatening grey sky.
BUT, hey, we’ve got a chicken with its head cut off, so lets use it and make some chicken soup! I made some earlier this week and frankly, it was the best I’ve ever made, which is actually saying something because with my Jewish roots, good chicken soup runs through my veins.
At the market I got 2 leeks, 2 small onions and 8 carrots. Grandmère French had just sent up a batch of fresh thyme from her garden, I’ve already got dried bay leaves and the butcher prepared a Baugrain chicken for me by taking out the innards (Did I want to take them home? Non, merci, you can keep them, but do want the neck) and cutting it into 8 pieces, minus the head and feet. 
At home I cut the greens and roots off the leeks, then chopped each large white stalk in half. No matter how long I’ve lived in Paris, I am still lazy Californian so I don’t peel the carrots, I just chop them in thirds. Coins would be more elegant, but then they’d be over cooked. I skin the onions and cut them in 1/4s.
The prep work done, I throw the bird, veggies, 2 bay leaves a small hand full of grey sea salt from our trip to the Ile de Ré, the fresh thyme and about ten whole pepper corns into the stock pot, which I then fill with water. I put it all on the stove top at medium-high and go back to bed for forty minutes.
When I return to check on the soup it is with a large spoon so that I skim off all the grey scum that comes up from the chicken and the fat that is now floating on top. I adjust the heat, get everything down to a low simmer and go about my day.
Before serving I usually take a pair of kitchen tongs and remove the thyme, as well as the skin from all the chicken bits. Put into a bowl an serve steaming hot.
PLEASE NOTE / Next week I’ll be posting photos from Paris Fashion Week EVERYDAY / This is NOT turning into a fashion site, being sick for 12 days (and counting) has created quite a back log with my workload, and I need a mini-break. Stay tuned!!!
That maybe a title for another post. I can’t recall. It’s a feeling that happens to m fairly often since moving to Paris. And yesterday I got a big dose of it while attending the Elie Saab fashion show. This was my first large, international show with super stars and the über-chic crowd. After years of watching them saunter by as I ran errands or hurried to the office, I was finally “in”. And I got to be “in” with a truly fantastic designer who is more about style than brand, more about design than labels. I was as happy as a cat in a patch of sunlight on a winter’s day.
Elia Saab is an independent designer from Lebanon who was first invited by the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture to show his collection at Paris Fashion Week in 2000. By 2006 he was a member of the Chambre. When I think of other designers, I may think of their classic cuts, nostalgic silhouettes, or daring designs. When I think of Elie Saab I immediately see sparkles and sumptuous fabrics that flow.Yesterday’s show did not let me down.
And I was not the only one soaking it all in.
Hundreds of international press were there recording every moment. Like when Taylor Swift showed up, or Rachel Zoe sashayed in. And my personal favorite, when the designer himself came out to acknowledge his fans, a brilliant, genuine smile on his face.
Rachel Zoe loving the blue dress
Taylor Swift loving the blue dress, too
What is it like going to one of the main shows? You get there on time, because if you’re late, they won’t let you in. Than you stand around for about half an hour until they start letting the press enter. As you wait the fashion press and bloggers are out milling about and shooting everything that moves while fashion students flirt with the guards, hoping for a nod in. Finally, you can enter, and within a few minutes close to 1000 people have taken their seats. The music begins to pump through the speakers, loud enough to vibrate in your chest and the first model steps out. Flashes start flying, iPhones start tweeting and a brief 12-15 minutes later it is over, you’ve seen the entire collection and the women return, walking out single file for a final viewing. Just as they disappear behind the screen, the designer walks out, gives an appreciative wave and the music stops as everyone files out.
The fashion was fantastic. Bright, solid colors flowed elegantly while enlightened with plays of lace and light. A couple of graphic dresses were young, modern and ready to hit the streets. It all looked wearable and even comfortable, which almost sounds like an insult in this world of tortured looks, and nearly impossible for formal wear, but it was a delight to the imagination and something of a dream come true.
Yesterday, with sinuses swollen like two bagpipes and bags under my eyes the size of Louis Vuitton trunks, I dragged my drugged up self out of bed and started Dressing with a capital D. Its still fashion week and yesterday was the Chanel show at the Grand Palais. I was going to the spectacle even if it meant calling in medical reinforcements.
a sneak peek
Since following Paris Fashion Week, I’ve learned to arrive on time. Never early and there is no point in being late. But this was Chanel and I was expecting something different, so I went an hour early, camping out at a nearby café nursing a mint tea. Sitting there with my personal fan, Jane, we were surrounded by the crème de la crème of the fashion world, everyone proudly sporting their black and blue plaid, glossy invitation. Of course, I didn’t have one (sniff, sniff)
This lady showed up at our café on foot, and then had the limo drive her the 50 yrds to the backstage entrance!
Earlier than usual limos started to arrive and we started following the crowd, literally falling into the International press and the elbow of a super aggressive Japanese photographer as they waited for celebrities arriving by the back door. Photographers screamed for the attention of each fashionista as she poured out of a limo. I recognized no one and all the jostling had my instincts looking for the nearest shin to kick and I was afraid it would awake my inner parisienne like the full moon brings out the werewolves. It was time to move to the entrance
.
Good move, because that is where the party was full on. Aspiring, young designers from across the globe were wearing their most outrageous outfits, hoping to be discovered. Fashionista bloggers were in full outrageous mode, with same dream. And the fashion world started to arrive, the true professionals heart breakingly elegant and simply beautiful. Gala was handing out roses, American Apparel giving freebies and Les Echos had a Karl inspired magazine for everyone. And the shoes. OMG the shoes. Simply orgasmic. I got dizzy shooting all the amazing shoes walking in every direction, like watching a meteorite shower under the desert sky in August.
Don't know who it is, but the skirt is pure Alaïa
The man in the bordeaux cardigan is Bill Cunningham, my idol!!!
Half an hour after the show was supposed to begin, the doors opened and soon, the vibrant, pulsing music began. 20 minutes later it was over.
20 minutes is long for a fashion show in this part of the world. Karl was giving the crowd a generous fix. They poured out of the enormous hall looking happy and relaxed, which is another anomaly for fashion week. Pure magic.
Being sick this past week has reminded my of our arrival in Paris over a decade ago. The girls were 5 and 9. One of them had strep throat, but for the life of me, I couldn’t tell you which one was sick. The French call that being a mère indigne. But the thing is, I had caught a lingering case of pneumonia while doing the expat marathon of shopping for apartments, schools and music teachers earlier in the month. Then I had returned to SF and spent the remaining two weeks packing. To say I was out of it would be like saying the French like cheese.
In addition to our (lack) of health, it was cold outside, with an unusual amount of snow and freezing temperatures plaguing the region and confusing our California internal thermostats. We needed chicken soup and we needed it, like, today.
It was time to buy me a bird. The challenge being that every other time I had visited Paris, I had been a sworn, devout vegetarian. I had had a hard time walking past butcher shops, much less entering them. But Mom-mode took over and I was soon in a local shop asking for a poulet.
“What kind would you like” asked the butcher.
I wasn’t sure I’d understood through my pneumonia induced haze. There were kinds of chickens? I’d had no idea. “Uhh… a dead one?” I hesitated, “and, well, maybe you could take the head off, remove the feet and do something about those feathers? Oh, and, is Madame ok?” There was a lady sniffing quietly in the background.
“Well, do you want one from Bresse, or a yellow legged or a red label?” he insisted, ignoring madame.
“I don’t know, nothing fancy, my daughter is sick and I need to make her some chicken soup.”
“Well, you should have said so, you don’t want a poulet, you want a poule!”
I was learning butcher-ese!
Suddenly Madame began to wail hysterically so I went directly to the source and asked her if everything was alright. That was when I learned that butcher’s wives can go somewhat mental when they learn that their adult son is a vegetarian, as madame had learned during lunch earlier that day.
Papa butcher carefully selected the lamest, cheapest bird he could find and started chopping as he explained that soupe au poulet wasn’t really French, that I may find all the chicken fat makes my kid feel worse instead of better, and that I really should consider making a proper vegetable soup. WOW. No wonder his son had become a vegetarian, he wasn’t exactly selling me on my dinner plans.
That evening I looked it up, there are nearly 50 different varieties of chicken in France, and each variety has its particular culinary strengths. Many countries only have one variety, the US has about a dozen, including the now famous Leghorn (bonjour Foghorn!). Only the Germans come anywhere close with 24 different breeds. Which explains so much about the French military reputation (oops, sorry that is VERY unPC)
Please excuse my self, Sylvia Sabes for being late with the Findingnoon Monday post. Her dog ate it on the way to class.
Yes, folks, only four five (darn, time really does fly, at super sonic speed en plus) months of posting and I am already coming up with lame excuses for being late. Particularly lame, as I don’t have a dog and I haven’t been out since Friday. That is because I am at home in bed sick, and I’ll give that as a truer excuse as to why I simply zapped and did not get this post up before the iPhone buzzed noon. Thank heavens I’m not depending on any wayward mice or pumpkins to get me from A to B, or I’d be stuck at the palace gates!!!
The worst part about being sick this weekend is that it was GORGEOUS out and I had to watch it all from behind double paned french doors. AND I missed the best fashion week show of the season…. Jean Paul Gaultier. Ughhh…
On the plus side, I live in France, and France has the highest prescription drug rate in the world. I’ve got meds. Some really great meds. When friends and family come to town, they like to stock up on some of the French cold medications, because they seem to be more effective than the stuff they can get at home. I don’t know if this is true, but I do know that Fervex is a big favorite with our visitors. Its a powder you pour into hot water and sip until you fall asleep for the night, which usually happens before the mug has been drained. The taste is horrid, but I think people love that pleasantly stoned feeling it gives you. The skin under your nose has rubbed off from constant blowing? Who cares, you feel greeeaaaat!!! And the constant drip from the tip of your nose suddenly becomes a source of childish amusement.”Look, kids, Mommy’s nose just went splash!”
Usually you wake up the next morning feeling fantastic (and dreadfully embarassed). I did not. So I called SOS Medecins at 21h on a Friday night. Dr Uzan was at my door a mere 45 minutes and within an hour I had ‘scripts for a full blown sinus infection, laryngitis and the beginning of a bronchitis. A three for one. It was like I’d won the cold/flu season lottery.
So now it is Monday, this post is utterly daft and I am off to find me a chicken to make my chicken soup. Stay healthy everyone and avoid me like the plague, I’m contagious!!!
I love fashion. Don’t ask me why, because I am hardly a fashionista and when you check out the fashion crowd it is clear, I don’t belong. Not that I really want to, because looking that great is a LOT of hard work. 
I know because I tried it for a while in the 80’s. Turns out that I am really not that great at it, although I still think I looked absolutely fabulous sauntering around NY city in a plaid Grandpa nightgown with a wide black, elastic belt, black leggings, Richelieu shoes, shoulder pads and a widow’s hat.
True fashion, not the silly things I threw together as a teen, is way out of my starving artist 
budget, and I can’t say I have the lifestyle to wear any of it if I ever did indulge. On the plus side, fashion has no fat and its calorie free, so as long as I am only looking, great fashion is a decadent treat I indulge in daily from time to time, just like chocolate!
And right now is prime time for a little indulgence. n case you haven’t heard, it’s fashion week in Paris. And if you don’t FB or Tweet, you couldn’t possibly know that I’ll be going to a fashion show next week. A real live, international fashion show for the designer Elie Saab. I am thrilled to itsy bitsy little pieces.
When I re
ceived the email telling me that I’d be an insider this year, well I was OVER THE MOON. What does a girl do when she is that thrilled? She tweets it, to tell the world. People tweeted back, “Whatchya wearing to the show?” “Aren’t you stressed about what to wear?” Zut! You’re killing my unabashed joy, here, people! I am usually pretty confident in fashion circles (I did learn something from the 80’s debacle); black top, black pants with a killer pair of CFM pumps, preferably in red or with some kind of metal attached et voilà! You’re good to go.
But this is Paris Fashion Week, even the French capitalize each noun, so all of a sudden, I was feeling intimidated. I decided to go check out what was happening at the shows.
Which is when my good friend Mary Kay from Out and About in Paris comes in. We met up after I’d already seen the scene at Guy Laroche and Belmain. She “just happened” to be at the Place Vendôme and I was heading to scope out the Barbara Bui crowd at the neighboring Westin.
“Let’s go in” Mary Kay suggested.
“What? Walk into the hotel? Just like that?”
“Yeah, I had no problems doing this last year at the Ritz when I saw Beyoncé.”
Ritz? Beyoncé? I am IN. And I was, everyone assuming we were just a couple of clueless American tourists or part of some buying team. We sat in the plush, cosy lobby, cameras discretely in their totes, waiting out the show. Suddenly the music stopped, the doors swung open and ZOOM, the two of us were bobbing up and down like two buoys at sea, with prime spots for shooting the fashion crowd as they left the show. Ab-FAb, I am telling you. I was so excited, I lost my voice.
I’ve noticed that the insiders leave the show with expressions of thoughtful contemplation, or frantically texting away on their iPhones. Not a lot of smiles to be seen, although mine was so daff looking I got a huge one for a stunning woman in fantastic glasss. This is BETTER than being a kid in a candy shop. Next year, MK, we’ll order champagne as we wait. The drinks are on me!!!
Satrapi window at Bon Marche
I have a thing for the Bon Marché. Sounds shallow and frivolous, but lets face it, I grew up listening to Madonna, so I seem to have “Material Girl”. But my crush on this store goes much deeper than that. It begins with Emile Zola and his novel “Au Bonheur des Dames” which chronicles the life and times of the shop girl Denise. It is a romance, but it is also a testament to the times and freedom that industrialization brought women, for better and some times for worse.
Boucicault, the force of nature behind the world’s first department store, was a marketing genius, coming up with ideas to get people into his shop that are still being used today, like the regularly held art exhibits at the Bon Marche. His wife a socialist before socialism, carefully looking after the well-being of their employees. They made a difference in society that is still felt today.
The Bon Marché is 160 years old this year and to celebrate they are throwing a party that seems to have leapt from the pages of Zola’s novel. Some of the most famous brands in the luxury world have created special limited editions to celebrate, all proudly displayed in a pop-up shop designed by the graphic novelist Marjane Satrapi. Satrapi’s illustrations also fly above the large open space, in the form of montgolfieres, bi-planes and Jules Vernes-like contraptions. Inside most of villages there is merchandise for sale. Fabulous designs to celebrate the Bon Marche’s 160th with inspired limited editions. Everything from iPhone covers to handbags, Baccarat crystal to Repetto ballet slippers.
In one area there is a documentary by Loïc Prigent, as he follows the city’s icon, Catherine Deneuve to all of her favorite Left Bank haunts. One of those haunts is Gerard Depardieu’s fish shop, Moby Dick, and its the film I saw them working on earlier in the year. I checked, and nope, I didn’t make it into the background, but it was very fun to see what had made the final cut!!!
Satrapi is the artistic force behind the film Perspolis. Her lines are bold and brilliant, the perfectly modern foil as her art continues outside, featuring more scenes of Catherine at places like her fish monger’s, the Café Fleurus and the Place Saint Sulpice in a specatcle that draws people in, and would make Boucicault proud.
Picard roast veggies - still frozen!
My family teases me that I never cook, I only prepare. Ok, it’s not really teasing, more of a relentless nag, but they have a point. While I love a great meal and refuse to eat junk, there are simply other things I’d rather be doing than spending hours in the kitchen making dinner. Anything really, even cleaning bathroom grout with my toothbrush. I manage by preparing very simple meals with the best, most convenient ingredients I can find. In Paris, that means I shop at Picard a bit too much and I get most of my fruits and vegetables at the local primeur, or a market when I have the time, because I don’t mind spending hours shopping (ahem… for a meal).
Recently I prepared a fast, easy meal that my family never gets tired of (they get tired of a lot of my dishes). Here is the recipe which is a really big word to say, here’s what goes in the pot/casserole;
At Picard pick up 2 packages of their frozen grilled vegetables (ok, I know, not from the vegetable guy, but they are 100% vegetables, nothing else added).
crottin de chèvre
At a cheese shop, or a local grocery store I select a large chunk of fairly mild tasting cheese (about 250 grams, or 8 oz) and a bunch of herbs that goes well with the chosen cheese du jour. For example, if I get a ball of mozarella, I’ll probably grab a bunch of basil, herbes de provence are fantastic with some goat cheese and piment d’espelette spices up a mellow comté or Petit Basque. The more cheese you use, the tastier the dish, but less cheese looks nicer on your waist, so I try to strike a healthy balance, usually buying too much cheese because I know the rats at home will eat away at it eventually.
Pick up a baguette on the way home.
et voilà...
Preheat the oven to about 170°c (350°f). Open the Picard bags and slice up the frozen veggies into wide strips. Throw them into a casserole and season with the herbs and some salt and pepper. If the cheese is soft, like a chevre, cut it into rough slices. If it is hard, like a swiss cheese, shred it or shave it off with a vegetable peeler.
Tuck the cheese bits into the veggies, drizzle olive oil over the top and throw it all into the oven to bake for 40 minutes, to an hour.
I serve it in bowls with the fresh baguette I picked up one the way home and a cool glass of white.
NOTE – this dish is fantastic when served as a side with grilled cod or a little lamb’s rib.
For dessert, a bowl of fresh fruit. There were cherries at the market when I photographed this meal. And because this meal is ultra light, there is always a chocolate bar (or 6) waiting in the cupboard for a second dessert. Exactly like a 3 star restaurant. Really, how dare my family complain?
Feeds four and makes great left overs!
1/ I know that franciser* is a word. Further more, I know that its a verb and I can conjugate it without looking in Le Petit Bescherelle, because I know it is in the 1st group of regular verbs (those that end in-er). It comes up when you get your French citizenship and they give you the opportunity to francisé your name. “Yes,” I yelped, “I’d like to be Coco. Coco Chanel.” “Oui, mais non.”
2/ I wear high heels. The first thing I did when I learned we were being transferred to Paris, was to try on a gorgeous pair of CFM heels (Prada, emerald green, croc print if you must know). I promptly fell on my ass in front the entire sales team at Neiman Marcus on Union Square, a team of 3 handsome gay men who nearly fell on the floor beside me in mocking laughter. I’d like to see them try and chase me down in a pair of stilettos today. (Now is not the time to remind me of my Vogue Fashion Night Out fall)
3/ I Dress, with a capital D, to take out the garbage. IN my building. I don’t even have to go outside, but I still put on a proper pair of pants and decent shoes, because I know that if I don’t, I’m bound to run into a neighbor. They’ll think I’m sick just because I’m in pjs at 4 in the afternoon (I work from home, clients contact me online, no one ever actually SEES me!!!). Then, I’ll hear about it from my butcher and my baker as they inquire after my health. And if it is a Saturday, Mr French will hear about it, too, and he’ll know I was in my pjs until 4 in the afternoon. Besides, it is no fun answering, “Non, je ne suis pas malade, je suis feignante.“**
4/ I love sitting in the sun. Preferably in a wicker bistro chair on the terrasse of some café as fabulous people stroll by. In California its all about SPF, sun hats and parasols. Who cares about skin cancer, I’m going to die of second hand smoke.
5/ I enjoy a glass of wine with my lunch. Not everyday, of course, but in my past life that was simply unheard of decadence that would have friends signing you up for AA.
6/ My bra matches my panties. At this very moment, even without planning it. I don’t have to plan it because even the Petit Bateau cotton underwear for kids at Monoprix is sold in sets. Recently a US based friend talked about buying plastic wrapped multi-packs of 10, and WHOOSH!!! was that a startling blast from the past. I don’t even know if those exist in France.
7/ Bad teeth. Yup, my teeth are going brown. Blame it on the café terrasse where I sit in the sun. Fortunately they’ve finally started importing Crest whitening strips, so I’ll no longer have to smuggle them in by the case load.
8/ Late dinners. I can’t imagine having dinner at 6pm. I am going to have to start thinking about it, because we are going back for a visit in a month, but the idea just strikes me as so odd. Mr French is rarely even home before 20h!
9/ I enjoyed Rabbi Jacob and several other politically incorrect jewels of French cinema. It was filmed in 1974, and I’d say the main character is something like Archie Bunker on acid. Even more hysterical is Tati Danielle, who kills her housekeeper so that she can go sponge off family in Paris. How is that for a nice evening in with he kids?
10/ I cut in line. I know, BAD Sylvia, Baaad. I usually try to do it respectfully, with pre-purchased online tickets, learning about side entrances, or getting VIP passes, but if all else fails, I walk to the front of the line like the rest of the world does not exist. To be honest, I don’t even think about it, at some point living in this city it just became Darwinian. Survival of the fittest and all that. (non, I don’t do it at the grocery store and I still respect little old ladies, I am going to be one soon enough!!!)
* To be made more French.
** I’m not sick, I’m lazy.
