Dec 12

Next Stop, Colmar

Yesterday we took another train from Lyon to Colmar, in Alsace. Colmar is about 45 miles (70 km) south of Strasbourg. Colmar was spared some of the wartime damage that affected Strasbourg and other cities in the area.

Since Alsace has been swapped between Germany and France for centuries, the cuisine is a hybrid that tends toward German. Lots of potatoes, sauerkraut, pork, sausage, and the like. On our first night in town we went to the Winstub Schwendi, a very typical Alsatian restaurant across the plaza from our hotel. I had a vegetarian roesti, a shredded potato and cheese concoction, and vin chaud (hot spiced red wine); Julian had a pork roesti. Mine was a bit on the bland side.
Colmar has a Christmas market that stretches for blocks. Most of the offerings are made in China trinkets or local baked goods, along with the ubiquitous vin chaud. The city also had a craft sale in the old customs house. Some of the jewelry and pottery were quite impressive. The giant Advent calendar was also interesting.

Today’s main activity was a visit to the Musée Unterlinden, housed in a former convent. The highlight of the museum was the altarpiece of Issenheim, a multilayered, multi-panel painting of scenes from the life of Jesus and Saints Anthony and Sebastian. Pilgrims suffering from St. Anthony’s Fire (otherwise known as ergotism) used to pray in front of the altarpiece. One look at the accurate depiction of Jesus’s suffering, and the pilgrims realized they didn’t have it so bad. (A fun fact: Ergot derivatives have been used to treat migraines.)

Dinner was at Le Petit Schlossberg, another typical Alsatian restaurant. The specialty of this restaurant seems to be nontraditional meats. I had a venison ragout. You could also get ostrich, zebra, and kangaroo (non!) to cook on a tabletop grill. My ragout was almost black in color. I wonder if they used blood as part of the thickening. Julian ordered a gizzard torte. We split a bowl of three sorbets, which Julian said was the best food so far of our visit here.

This critter was looking over Julian’s shoulder at Le Petit Schlossberg.

I think we’ll go for something a little more tame on our last night in Colmar.

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Dec 12

Pho in Alsace

After two weeks on the road, my blood fish sauce level was getting extremely low. In addition, the heavy Lyonnais and Alsatian food was wearing on me. We’d seen a restaurant down the street from our hotel that served pho, Restaurant Chez Thuy. We went back there for lunch today.

The menu was a mashup of Alsatian, Thai, and Chinese. The only Vietnamese items on the menu were pho and deep-fried spring rolls (nems). At first the waiter said there was no pho, but the chef said that there was and she’d make it for us. It took a while, but two bowls landed in front of us. It was obvious that she’d made the beef fresh – most of the pieces were rare. The broth had the all-important star anise and cinnamon notes. There was a bottle of sriracha on the table to spike things up.

When the chef came by to clean off our table, Julian asked if she made bun bo Hue. As with most Vietnamese folks, she was quite surprised that we knew about that soup. I explained my discovery of bun bo Hue in New York and that several restaurants in Seattle serve that soup – and I’ve been known to cook it.

Although Restaurant Chez Thuy wasn’t the most transcendent pho we’ve had, the soup was enough to replenish my fish sauce level, at least until we get back home.

Permanent link to this article: http://ediblethoughts.com/2017/12/12/pho-in-alsace/

Dec 10

La Fête, Last Day (for Us)

The crowds descended in earnest on Saturday. We went to the open-air market on the quai to scrounge up breakfast goodies for two days. We picked up some tangerines, yogurt, St. Marcellin cheese, and two briks, North African pastries stuffed with meat or tuna. Both were good.

We did our main shopping of the Lyon trip this day. Julian had lost one of his gloves, and my gloves weren’t up to Lyon’s cold and damp, so we walked up to the North Face store to get replacements. We also did another load of laundry, then took a walk down to Place Bellecour. We found a cookbook store, In Cuisine, where we had caffeine and a snack. I also picked up a small French-English Lyonnais cookbook.

We walked over to Vieux Lyon to check out the chances of going to the installations on the top of the hill. Several brass bands were stationed throughout the neighborhood. These buskers are usually dressed in crazy attire and play tunes not associated with a standard brass band. Some groups were better than others. When we saw the crowds in the streets of Vieux Lyon, we figured that going to see the installations on Fourvière hill was not in our cards. We went back to the hotel and made dinner reservations at a Korean restaurant down the street from the hotel, Gang-Nam. I was worried that it was just a gimmicky joint and we’d have our eardrums blasted out with K-Pop tunes. Quelle surprise – it was a serious and good restaurant. We had the bul gogi menu for two. The meat and mini bi bim bap bowl were excellent. The kim chi was on the bland side. I wonder if they had to tone down the capsaicin for French tastes.

After dinner we went back to the quai so Julian could record the light show on the basilica, cathedral, and the Palace of Justice. The spot where he set up the camera offered the best view, but the sound was muted. So we recorded the sound near one of the speakers, so he could splice them together when we get home. I’ll have the songs played during that light show as earworms for weeks. We chanced one look at the Théâtre des Célestins installation. Unlike the earlier evening, the sound system was working. The chants were very interesting.

Going back to the hotel was akin to swimming in a large school of fish. We managed to get out of the crowd and pick up some brioche for breakfast the next day. Once we returned to the hotel, it was time to pack for our next stop – Colmar.

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Dec 10

Words from the Wiseacres, 2017 Edition

So you want to come to next year’s Fête des Lumières? Based on our experience this year, here’s what you need to do:

  • Book flights and hotel rooms EARLY. Julian did so back in February. The Fête is centered around December 8, so you may want to try for a room between December 6-10 next year. We recommend two hotels. Hôtel des Célestins is a more traditional hotel. It was booked solid when Julian called. This year we stayed at Hôtel des Citadines, an apartment hotel. Our room was a studio with a kitchenette. Both offer breakfast as an add-on expense. Staying on the Presqu’Ile is the way to go. Not only is it closest to most of the light installations, it’s the best part of the city for shopping – especially for cute shoes.
  • If you want to eat at some of the more popular places, book reservations early (3 months or so).
  • Don’t rent a car while you’re in Lyon for La Fête. You’ll have a hard time finding a place to park, and you won’t need a car to get around the city. Subways are free during the evenings of La Fête.
  • Bring warm clothes, a hat, and gloves. While we didn’t have snow this year, night time temperatures were in the low 40’s (Fahrenheit). I brought layers to wear underneath my coat.
  • Wear sensible shoes with flexible soles. Some of these cobblestone streets have seen better centuries. I suffered through our first day walking around town in my closed heel clogs. I switched to my trail running shoes for the rest of the visit. Many attendees were wearing sneakers and hiking shoes. As I said earlier, Lyon is much more casual than Paris is.
  • If you’re claustrophobic, bring your anti-anxiety medication. There WILL be crowds stuffed into narrow streets. Saturday night was the worst for crowds, although Friday had its bad spots (the top of Croix-Rousse).
  • As with any large city, expect to see people looking for a handout. Also, expect that there will be people wanting to separate you from your valuables. Exercise caution, and leave your bling at home.
  • We felt reasonably safe from a terrorist attack. Most of the locations were scrubbed of cars parked on the street, and there was a security perimeter at which you had to open your backpacks and other large bags. Soldiers and police officers armed with assault weapons patrolled the streets.

We’re big fans of Lyon, but we probably won’t visit next year. We have many other locations on the bucket list.

Permanent link to this article: http://ediblethoughts.com/2017/12/10/words-from-the-wiseacres-2017-edition/

Dec 09

La Fête, Jour Deux

We didn’t get a very early start on Friday. We had a pasta brunch at the restaurant across the street, then did laundry. After that we took the tram up Croix-Rousse. Dinner options on the hilltop were spotty, but we found a Japanese restaurant, Yoshi. Most of this place’s business seemed to be in takeout and delivery. I had udon soup with beef skewers and two shrimp nems (egg rolls), while Julian had a bento box with duck.

The purpose of going up to Croix-Rousse was to go through the fête installation going down the hill by Le Montana, the North African restaurant where we had lunch earlier. This was a nightmare for a claustrophobe like me. The crowd was funneled down a narrow stairway with movie music and mirrors on either side of the path. The safety side of my brain was thinking that if someone panicked, there could be some heavy duty injuries. Luckily, nobody did.

We continued down the hill along with several thousand new-found friends. It seemed as if each block had several entrepreneurs selling vin chaud (hot red wine), cocoa, and snacks for the crowd. The French aren’t much for street food, but they made an exception for the Fête.The most interesting display of the evening was the Spider Circus, light tubes set up to resemble spiders scampering around a circus ring to appropriate music. Very cute. We wandered back to the hotel to have some pastry I’d bought in the morning and crash.

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Dec 09

Dirty Laundry

At some point on a vacation. one must do laundry. Some very light travelers advocate doing hand washing in the hotel sink and drying things overnight. This may work well for undies, pantyhose, and summer shirts, not so much for jeans, heavy socks, and sweaters.

There are several options to get clean clothes while on the road::

  • Have the hotel do it for you. This can be costly, but if you’re more focused on sightseeing than laundry this can be worth your while.
  • Sometimes hotels have coin-operated washers and dryers for patrons to use. The hotel we stayed in in Lyon had that option.
  • If you’re going to be somewhere for a week or more, rent an apartment that has a washer and dryer. Vacation apartment rentals can be comparable in price to a hotel, especially if you factor in the price of eating out and doing laundry.
  • Find a laundromat. Most laundromats have the ambience of a Medieval dungeon.They’re hot, humid, dirty, and often windowless. The reading material, if any, dates from 1997. Sometimes in Europe you can find a laundry where you can either do it yourself or the proprietor can do it for you. On our first trip to Seattle in 1994, we found a laundromat/restaurant called Sit and Spin in the Belltown neighborhood. Unfortunately, it’s long defunct.

It was a pleasant surprise last week when Julian and I did laundry in a laundromat near my mother’s apartment. Mom has a small washer, but no dryer. There were windows on three sides of the building. The tables and chairs were clean. There was even a television on site so we could watch the football game while our clothes were spinning away. We were impressed. Chances are we’ll never see that anywhere else.

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Dec 09

La Fête, Jour Un

La Fête des Lumières started December 7. We started the day by taking the subway and tram down to the Musée des Confluences, where the Rhône River meets the Saône. There were numerous student groups in attendance. Julian took pictures of lycéens (high school students) with their teachers on the Only Lyon sign at the museum. He also took shots of the architecture. The glass and metal structure of the museum is reminiscent of the Seattle Public Library, but the architects were not the same.
We went to three temporary exhibits at the museum: the Lumière Brothers; the history and current uses of poisons; and the Tuareg people of north Africa. The Lumière brothers invented the public movie projector in Lyon, and many of the installations at La Fête pay homage to this heritage. Most of the items on display were from the Lumière Museum, which we visited last year; however, the exhibit was much more interactive. The poison exhibit included the usual suspects: the Borgias, chemical warfare, poison darts, and the like. It also went into some of the science of poisons, including the discovery of anaphylactic shock (extreme allergic reactions that can be deadly) and finding beneficial drugs in snake venom. The Tuaregs have a history of poetry, geometric jewelry, and reserve in dealing with other people. The men are actually veiled to prevent displaying their emotions. (The veils also keep sand out of their teeth.)

After a quick dinner in the neighborhood of the hotel, we set off to see the lights. Our first stop was at the Place des Jacobins, where the statue had been enveloped in a plastic bubble to imitate an old clock. At precisely 8 pm, the “clock” came alive with lights and music. We then went down to Place Bellecour, which was awash with illuminated flowers, cattails, and butterflies. A ferris wheel kept churning, and provided a light show of its own. Some of the illuminations were little more than lights synchronized to beat boxes; others were much more imaginative. The Théâtre des Célestins had a colorful display on its façade, but no music when we were there. By far the most ambitious display involved the Basilica of Notre Dame de Fourvière, the Cathedral of St. Jean, and the Palace of Justice. Every ten minutes or so, lights would pulse in synchrony from these structures and the hill below the Basilica to music with a distinctly Middle Eastern flavor. The last display we saw was set in a fountain on the Rue de la République. Two puppeteers manipulated smaller versions of Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade balloons resembling birds. I thought the birds looked like starlings; Julian said they looked like giant slugs with wings. The rain had held out for most of the evening, but started in earnest at the end of this last stop, so we decided to hike back to the hotel.

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Dec 09

La Moule, Toujours La Moule

Mussels (or moules in French) are the least expensive bivalves around. We make them regularly, either with a standard French prep of white wine, garlic, and parsley, or with Chinese black bean sauce. Penn Cove, off Whidbey Island in Washington, grows the bulk of the tasty critters for West Coast consumption.

One of the few restaurants we’ve visited repeatedly in France is Léon de Bruxelles, a chain that specializes in mussels and fries. Last night we went to a branch around the corner from our hotel for a quick bite. As with many of the restaurants in Lyon, it had “special prices” for the Fête des Lumières. We opted for the Lyonnais prep, with local sausage, bay leaves, parsley, shallots, and crème fraîche. It was quite good. In addition to ketchup and mayonnaise, the table had a “Sauce Samourai” for the fries. It was basically sriracha mayonnaise. The menu also came with a waffle for dessert, festooned with powdered sugar and whipped cream.

Making mussels at home is very easy. First, make sure you’re getting live ones. Tell the fishmonger you don’t want any “yawners”, i.e., dead ones with open shells. Two to two and a half pounds of mussels will feed two people amply. Get them home reasonably fast and store them in the fridge until you’re ready to cook. Chop up some garlic, shallots, or onion, along with some parsley. You can also add some tomato, bell pepper, or hot chile. Uncork a bottle of dry white wine. Wash the mussels and pull off the beards with a small paring knife. Now heat some olive oil in a covered pot. Sauté the alliums and other vegetables in the oil, then throw in the mussels with a little white wine. Cover the pot and let the mussels steam until the shells all open, about 5-7 minutes. Discard any mussels that remain closed. Sprinkle in the parsley and serve with pasta, crusty bread, and a salad. If you make French fries at home (we don’t), you can have those. Mayonnaise is not required. Bon appétit!

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Dec 06

Lyon Pre-Festival

As I mentioned earlier, we timed this trip to Lyon to coincide with La Fête des Lumières. It’s held every year around December 8, the feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary. As the story goes, her intercession prevented a 17th-century plague epidemic in the city. We figured that we’d have a better chance at a hotel room and restaurant reservations by getting here a couple of days in advance of the festival. So far, so good.

Last night we had dinner at a very traditional Lyon restaurant, Café Comptoir Abel. This establishment has been in business for nearly 90 years. La Cuisine Lyonnaise is hearty, working-class chow. It utilizes all of the offal parts of cattle and swine. We went here last summer and the food was a little heavy for my appetite in warm weather; however, it works well in winter. I started out with an artichoke bottom with green beans, while Julian had the terrine. Dinner was crawfish gratin for him, tongue with a tomato, caper, and cornichon sauce for me. (That sound you just heard was my sister and niece moaning “EEEUW!!” in unison.) I’ve only had tongue a few times before, but this was the tenderest I’d had. Julian’s mother made tongue years ago for him, but he said hers was more like shoe leather.

Café Comptoir Abel.

About to bite my tongue.

Today we took the cog-rail train up to the Croix-Rousse neighborhood in search of a North African restaurant we visited last year. We found it: Le Montana. Julian had hoped to get some fresh sardines like he had there last year, but the proprietor said that was only a summer menu item. So he got a chicken tagine with olives and preserved lemons, and I got a lamb tagine with prunes. I also got a small tumbler of mulled wine, which was very tasty.

Tonight’s dinner was in Vieux (Old) Lyon, at a place called Daniel & Denise. This is a traditional-with-a-twist Lyon restaurant, heavy on the sausage, offal, and eggs. I had pumpkin soup with ham and a poached egg, followed by a veal dish and floating island for dessert. The latter was a huge puff of meringue shot through with traditional Lyonnaise praline atop a pool of custard. Julian had salmon sashimi with a remoulade sauce, sausage in brioche, chicken with morel sauce, and lemon sorbet.

Preparations for the Fête des Lumières kicked into high gear this afternoon. It’s the equivalent of dress rehearsals for a play. Huge light arrays are positioned throughout the city to flash onto various façades. The walk leading downhill from Croix-Rousse is festooned with numerous light displays. The statue in Place des Jacobins is enveloped in a clear dome to resemble an old clock. On our way back from dinner, we waited to see if the light show on the façade of Cathédral St. Jean would be practiced. Unfortunately, no. Julian struck up a conversation with a fellow photographer who took the train down from Paris this evening and will return there tomorrow morning. (Okay, dear, you’re not the most obsessive-compulsive person in town.) We also talked to a Lyon local who was trying to avoid the crush of well over a million people descending on the city. On our way back to the hotel, we watched the light show on the Basilica. It was coordinated with lights on the Palace of Justice and spots on the hill in between. At one point the lights were pulsing like a beating heart.

Despite the preparations and the crowds about to appear, Lyon strikes us both as a working person’s city. It was the center of the French fabric trade, thanks to the invention of the Jacquard loom here. Julian characterized Paris as more of a Disneyland city – everyone seems to be a tourist, especially in certain neighborhoods. Lyon’s also more human scale than its sister to the north. We’re still going to Paris at the end of our trip, but Lyon has grabbed a prominent place in our affections.

Permanent link to this article: http://ediblethoughts.com/2017/12/06/lyon-pre-festival/

Dec 06

France in Mourning

I opened the New York Times website on my computer this morning and saw that Johnny Hallyday had died. For those of you unfamiliar with the name, Hallyday was a popular singer and actor in France. Most of his works were covers of others’ tunes. The Times obituary links to a 1970’s video of him singing “Blue Suede Shoes” in a very Elvis-esque style, down to the sequined jumpsuit and swiveling hips.

As we were walking around Lyon today, I heard and saw numerous homages to Hallyday. A grocery store was playing Hallyday tunes, including his version of the Beatles’ “Got to Get You into My Life.” A music store set up a display window devoted to his work. And the table at the downtown tourist office had a sign: “Merci, Johnny.” France has lost two icons this year; first Jerry Lewis, now Johnny Hallyday. Who’s next, Brigitte Bardot?

Postscript, 12/8/17: Another French icon has passed, but not Bardot. Jean d’Ormesson, who was a member of L’Académie Française, died on December 5. The “Quarante Immortels” (40 Immortals) of the Académie are charged with protecting the purity of the French language. (So how come I see French-English mashup signs all over town?) This Washington Post obit offers an explainer.

Permanent link to this article: http://ediblethoughts.com/2017/12/06/france-in-mourning/

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