I Prefer Paris

Bonne Année

Dear Readers,
I want to thank everyone for taking the time out of your busy day to read Eye Prefer Paris in 2006 and your kind and generous comments were greatly appreciated. I hope you have enjoyed reading as much as I did writing and sharing with you the joys of Paris.

Eye Prefer Paris has some new and exciting things lined up for 2007, including the January launch of my new website, Eye Prefer Paris Tours, which are personal walking tours led by me, that include many of the places I have written about.

Wishing you a joyous, happy, prosperous and healthy New Year.
I look forward to writing for you in 2007.

Kiss from Paris,
Richard Nahem

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Le Chic Dentiste

My dentist, Stéphane Brun, is good looking, charming, stylish, an artisan, and a perfectionist.

His office in an unassuming small building, located on rue Pierre Lescot next door to Joe Allens, is more an art gallery and mid-century modern furniture exhibit than a dentist's office. When you walk in, his lovely assistant greets you, takes your coat, and escorts you to the waiting room. She closes the door and you are left in a room ready to be on the cover of Elle Décor, filled with Bertoia chairs, a Frank Lloyd Wright-esque fireplace, a Mies Van de Rohe black leather club chair, and a dramatic torpedo-like light sculpture hanging from the ceiling all against warm teal blue green walls. There are stacks of the latest art and design magazines and I arrive early, so I can read all of my favorites that I am too frugal to buy.

After testing out all the chairs and catching up on the art & design dish, Stephen is ready for me and I go into his state of the art office with large computer screens, a Mac, and a futuristic purple and white dentist chaise right out of the Jetsons.I slid into the chaise and he worked on my two root canals, one extra large filling, and two caps. He took X-rays of my battered teeth, which instantly appear on the screen in front of me, and he also has a cool device that looks like a pen but is a video camera that gives you a tour of the inside of your mouth. For all of his gadgets, he is an expert craftsman and I have never been to a dentist who was so thorough, as he worked tirelessly for hours making sure everything was perfect. It’s like having an artist work on your mouth. To make you feel at ease, he has a jazz radio station on, so Ella, Miles, Sarah, and Louis are serenading you and drowning out the drilling. When we are finished, we go into his office and he sits behind his white 70’s hard plastic desk and we talk. He is warm and charming and I find out that he is also an art collector. He then shakes my hand, escorts me to the door and says “A'bientot!”

By the way girls and boys, he’s taken: he has a wife and two children.

Dr. Stéphane Brun
28 rue Pierre Lescot 75001
01 42 36 63 20

Happy Holidays From Paris

Wishing everyone a warm, wonderful, and joyous holiday.

With love from Paris,
Richard Nahem

 

To Market,To Market: The Raspail Bio Market

After months of sleeping in and lounging on Sunday mornings, I made the extra effort to leave the house by 10:30AM to finally get myself to the Raspail bio (organic) market.

Located on Boulevard Raspail at rue du Cherche Midi in the chic upscale 6th Arr., I heard this was where snobby women in fur coats and bourgeois yuppie families did their weekly marketing. Truthfully, the motivation to go was the rumors of being able to spot Catherine Deneuve squeezing melons and tasting the chevre. So in my search for St. Catherine, I discovered my new favorite food market.

It was a crisp sunny day and the market was teeming with the above-mentioned crowd. The first food stand I came upon had a man making hot potato and onion galletes/latkes and I immediately joined the long queue to buy one. I ate it as fast as humanly possible, and it was yum, yum, yum, and yum. Sated from my latke, I was now ready to tackle the crowds and explore the market. I found another stand with a leftover Woodstock hippie selling home baked pumpkin muffins and brownies in individual mini-loaf pans. I tasted, sniffed and perused the rest of the stands selling smelly cheeses, canards and turkeys, farm fresh milk and eggs, pumpkin tarts, squash, turnips, pressed apple cider, carrots with the dirt still on them, and warm bread.

One of the things I liked most were the stands that sold organic and natural products besides food, including hand milled soaps, homeopathic remedies, hand knitted scarves and gloves, and health oriented books and magazines, and organic wine.

I will now be a regular but will have to dress-up in Hermes casual chic rather than Gap & Nike.

Next time, maybe I can help Catherine pick a ripe melon.

Raspail Bio Market
Sundays 8:30AM- 2PM
Metro: Sevres Babylone, Rennes
 


Bourgeois Baby in Fur Hat

An American (Diner) in Paris

Whenever I crave real American hamburgers, pancakes, and bacon, I head over to Breakfast in America, a small, cozy diner on rue Mahler.

One morning after realizing a croissant just wasn’t going to cut it anymore as my only source of breakfast, I ordered the 2x 2x 2 – 2 scrambled eggs, 2 delicious light and fluffy pancakes (which I smothered in maple syrup) and 2 pieces of perfect, crisp bacon. (If you want to pig-out have the 3x3x3). Other breakfast specialties are steak & eggs, omelettes with cheese, Swiss & mushroom or New Mexican style with salsa & cheddar, and thick-cut French toast. You can skip the too authentic bland, tasteless American coffee.

The interior of red pleather chairs & banquettes, black & white tile floor and stainless steel toasters at every table, is cute but not cutesy and inviting. There’s a counter in the middle with authentic steel and red pleather revolving bar stools. The service is American friendly and the waitresses speak better English than French, so you don’t have to be intimidated by formal French waiters when you try and order. The crowd is half American and young hip Frenchies in their 20’s.

Their burgers, good but not great, are still better than most French ones. Their midi formule is a good value: 10 euros (7.50 if you are a student) gets you a burger or cheeseburger, lots of good fries or a heap of creamy Cole slaw, a Coke and dessert (a warm chewy chocolate chip cookie, donut, or muffin). Burger choices include chili, veggie, cape codfish, and grilled chicken.

I have not tried most of the other things on the menu but the Nachos, chicken nuggets, chili and BLT sure looked yummy.

I met the owner Craig Carlson last year when the diner first opened. He’s a down home friendly American guy from Connecticut who was a screenwriter and director. He decided to open the diner after living in Paris for a while and missing fast food from the U.S. This is his second branch, after the success of the first one by the Sorbonne. His partner Darren, from New Zealand, is equally nice and runs the rue Mahler branch.

Breakfast in America
4 rue Mahler, 75004
Open 8:30AM-11PM 7 days
Tel. 01 42 72 40 71
Metro: St. Paul

17 rue des Ecoles, 75005
Open 8:30AM-11PM 7 days
Tel. 01 43 54 50 28
Metro: Cardinal Lemoine

Babies in Toyland, Galeries Lafayette, and Printemps

Babies in Toyland: rue Tiquetonne

From Galeries Lafayette and Printemps with their traditional festive windows to the quirky ones at small Paris boutiques, here is a sampling of some Holiday window displays.

Noel de Reve at Galeries Lafayette

rue Bonaparte: A Little More Easter than Christmas

Printemps

Vincent Gagliostro’s Deleted Scenes (7) Verboten) Show at NeC Gallery

Vincent Gagliostro’s, Deleted Scenes (7) Verboten exhibit of photographs at NeC Gallery explores the predatory nature of the artist's eye, in this case, exploitive, vulnerable, and obsessively attracted to the promise of beauty.

Gagliostro, a former New Yorker now living in Paris, is an artist, filmmaker and graphic designer. On vacation in Munich in 2004, for him, the beautiful boys on the streets of Munich, became Munich, and with that, began a sort of propositioning of them with his camera. The result is a an arresting series of color and black & white photographs sensing the voyeuristic nature of the artist.

NeC Gallery started by Alain Chiglien (French) and Roger Nilsson (Swedish) in 2001, is a unique gallery that combines contemporary art and mid-century furniture, located in the chic northern part of the Marais.

Deleted Scenes (7) Verboten
Galerie NeC (Nilsson & Chiglien)
117 rue Vielle de Temple, 75003
Monday- Saturday 11AM-7: 30PM
Sunday-3PM-7PM
Through January 7th, 2007
Sunday-3PM-7PM
Tel 01 42 77 88 83
Metro: Filles du Calvaire

Watch the video that accompanies the show
http://web.mac.com/gagliostro/iWeb/Site/Verboten_c.html

December Eye Need To Do’s:Doisneau,Colette, Hotel de Ville,BHV, and Mary Poppins on Ice

Doisneau: Paris en Liberte
Robert Doisneau’s “The Kiss at Hotel De Ville” is one of the most iconic and popular photos of Paris ever taken. A new exhibition of 280 of his black and white photos of Paris cityscapes is at the Hotel De Ville.

To February 17, 2007
Hôtel de Ville, 5, rue Lobau, 75004
Open daily except Sundays, from 10am until 7pm
Free
Metro: Hotel de Ville
Note: Be prepared to stand in line for at least 30 minutes

Colette
A boy called Michael, A girl called Britney, and a boy called Elton by popjustice, are a series of scathingly funny set of children’s style storybooks written for adults based on you-know-who. A perfect Xmas gift for your jaded know-all-the gossip-already friends.

Colette
213 Rue St.-Honoré 75001
Monday- Saturday to 10AM-7PM
Metro: Tuileries
8 euros per book

Hotel de Ville: Ice Skating and BHV
Come be a kid again or bring your kids to the Hotel de Ville or both. First, rent some skates for 5 euros inside the cool igloo, then do your best Brian Boitano moves on the rink. After you are spent from skating showing off at the rink, walk across the street and see the tacky but amusing holiday windows at BHV.

Ice Skating Rink at Hotel de Ville
Monday-Thursday 12PM-10PM
Friday, Saturday 12PM-12AM
Sunday 9AM-9PM
Free, skate rental 5 euros
Metro: Hotel de Ville

Mary Poppins on Ice
Speaking of ice-skating, this concept is so over the top, it has to be good. Just to see Mary Poppins on ice skates, balancing her carpetbag, the big umbrella and her long skirt is enough of a draw for me.

Mary Poppins sur Glace
Through 12/27 At various locations in France

Pommes Frites at Café de la Musee
The perfect frites- crispy, a little crunchy, and not too greasy.

Café des Musees
49 rue de Turenne 75003
Open 7 days lunch & dinner
Tel. 01 42 72 06 17
Metro: St. Paul, Bastille

Life's Just a Bloggers Cocktail Party

Last night’s Paris bloggers party:
A smash hit, a great success, a meeting of the bloggers minds, a lovely, lively gathering, and great fun.

The party started at 8PM and the mood was festive, and sexy with low lighting (the first thing I did in my new apartment was install dimmers) and sultry music by divas Sade & Mary J. Blige. I served red wine and Cosmopolitans (very Carrie Bradshaw/Sex in the City circa 2001). I made a huge crudités platter, crostini with Brie and cucumber, and assorted puff pastry hot hors d’ouevres to absorb the booze. Dessert was my yummalicious coconut macaroons and David Lebovitz’s lay-down-and-die brownies.

Meg/LeBlageur & Cosmopolitan

By 9PM most of the 20 guests arrived and I even let a few non-bloggers in to spice up the mix a little. Petite Anglaise came with her own bottle of gin and 3 cans of tonic. She left me her unused lemon as a gift, which I will treasure forever. Amy and her friend Little Shiva were the literally the most colorful ones in the room: Amy with her red hair and orange top, and Little Shiva with her acid yellow going - to-red flaming locks coming half-way down her back. Laurie Pike arrived fashionably late with bottles of Champagne wearing a chic DVF like print wrap dress with red Converse sneakers. Many of the men were elegantly dressed in sport jackets and suits. Some of the bloggers couldn’t help themselves and crowded around Vincent’s Mac to login to various site/blogs. I hope no one was checking their stats or posting.

Amy/Advice Goddess & Elliott Hester

Catherine/Petite Anglaise

I worked the room effortlessly like a good Park Ave. socialite, making conversation with all my guests. Amy and my boy friend Vincent both said, “I’m the Pearl Mesta of Paris/the Paris bloggers.

12 bottles of wine, one bottle Champagne, and two pitchers of Cosmopolitans later, the party ended at 12:30AM.The last guests Petit Anglais, LeBlageur, and No Place like were still in a party mood and went off dancing on a disco bateau that was playing 80”s dance music.

I’ve been told I give great party and this was no exception.

Laurie Pike/The Paris Blog

The Guest List

Hillary Keegin & Aaron Ross -13
Terence Gelenter -Paris-Expat.com
Eric Tenin -Paris Daily Photo
Catherine- Petite Anglaise
Matthew Rose- Collage by Matthew Rose
Seth Weintraub- The Paris Times
Pascal Fonquernie-Paris Marais
Heidi Ellison- The Paris Update
Polly Lyman- Polly Vous Francais
Amy Alkon- Advice Goddess
Susie Hollands & Cesar- Ivy Paris
Elliott Hester- Postcards from Paris/LA Times
Little Shiva- www.littleshiva.com
Jennifer Chevais- No Place Like it
Le Meg- Leblageur
Laurie Pike- The Paris Blog
David Lebovitz- www.davidlebovitz.com
Sue Rinski- http://homepage.mac.com/suerynski
Greg Sutter- Elmore Leonard