Fraise et Tomate

One of the lovely dinners we had in Paris was at Maceo, which was celebrating high July with a summer prixe fixe menu of strawberries and tomatoes. Chef Thierry Bourbonnais' focus on fresh and seasonal could not have come through more clearly, with luscious strawberries in every market and the first tomatoes ripe.

We started with a cold soup with the scent of berries and a delicate tomato flavour and revelled in the spacious room of pale wood. I loved being there in the pretty dress I had bought in London, earlier in our trip. Princess time!

Then we were served shrimp with berry-dyed alfalfa piled in a rosy heap with shreds of preserved lemon. With this pink swirl, it seemed perfect to be drinking the recommended rosé. Maceo is a sister restaurant to the famous Willy's Wine Bar and it's omnivorously wineophile owner, Mark Williamson, and the sommelier at Maceo did indeed seem to know his stuff. The menus on the website are a free mental vacation: http://www.maceorestaurant.com/

Our entree was lamb loin with the fat cap well crisped, served over roasted tomato slices with a pile of tiny sauteed mushrooms. Pure umami on a fork; this was Hubby's favourite course. Evening was falling, the breeze through the open window was cooler, we were enjoying ourselves and our dinner.

Always happy to eat dessert, I was excited at the plating of this one: wee dehydrated strawberries were scattered around a collar of nut tuile, which held tiny fresh berries. A quenelle of tangy creme fraiche ice cream lay along side. Too full for more dinner, I nevertheless demolished it.

We tumbled out onto the street after our leisurely meal and happily made our way to the Opera subway station, along with a strong minority of other well-dressed people - tourists, most likely, since Parisians flee the city in the summer. We were enjoying being alive and well-fed on a beautiful July evening in the City of Lights. Hubby kissed me on the platform; we laughed like we had a secret.

Flop pie

Mmmm...peaches. My second favourite fruit.

While on vacation, I had read Jeffrey Steingarten's 'The Man Who Ate Everything' and was inspired by his obsessive, perfectionist research to make traditional pie crust again. I've been using Edna Staebler's 'speedy pat-in pie crust' for a long time and although there's no top crust, a great streusel topping compensates in ways that mean no one notices the non-traditional bottom. My brother, in fact, believes it's the real thing. People don't make real pie crust much any more and it's been so long since they've tasted it that even those exposed to my mother's superior pies have apparently forgotten the unbearable lightness of crust. Great fruit and ice cream compensate for a lot.

Oh, but the crust. As much as I love peaches, and find them superlative in pie, great pie means great crust. Thinking of that lardy, flaky, tender pastry makes my mouth water, so maybe it's time to make my own again.

Steingarten consults - a soft word for the kind of obsessive pastry stalking he pursues with singleminded focus in person, via phone and fax - with Marion Cunningham, author of the Fannie Farmer Baking Book. After weeks of making pie he comes up with what he thinks is the definitive version - simple enough for an amateur, delicious enough for a gourmand.

Okay, I'm in.

After carefully reading the 8 pages of directions - not including the 6 pages on fruit fillings - and working my way through the process with strict obedience to detail - I had a non functional crust. As in, too dry, falling apart, with no structural integrity. I know to adjust baking recipes for the dry conditions in Calgary - flour is absent humidity here - but it can be hard to know how far to go - and clearly I had not gone far enough, even though I went to Steingarten's max. I wet a tea towel and spread it over my rolled dough, leaving it long enough for moisture to absorb into the crumbly crust, and managed, with the help of a scrubbed binder cover, and despite gritted teeth, to lower the two crusts into position around a peach filling.

But the proof's in the pudding, right? Unfortunately, post bake, despite an adequately browned top, the pebbly appearance turned out to continue on to the mouth feel. Can I tell you how disappointing it is to be all set up for pie nirvana and find inadequacy?

Hubby and guests - sharply warned that this was flop pie, and I didn't want to hear anything but happy comments - dutifully nod with appreciation. Okay, so it was willingingly finished in short order, but that just goes to my point about people no longer remembering good crust.

Perfect pie - still AWOL.

Bakery Breakfasts, 7th arrondissement

We never set up the dining table for breakfast in Paris. Instead, Hubby would hike the 6 flights down to our local bakery (how I love that man!) and climb back up with a bag full of my requests. He would make dark, strong coffee, I'd prep some fruit and we'd read and nibble and sip and enjoy the morning on the couch. Sunday every day!

I love pain de chocolat, and ate a good many of these, but I had an exhuberant fling with the chausson aux pomme, a flaky pastry filled with tangy apple puree. I wish it could have been a lifetime relationship, but I haven't found a Calgary version. For breakfast with fresh cherries - sublime.

Sometimes Hubby brought a goat cheese and tomato tart, which we would share, and he would have a croissant as well, and I would have pain de chocolat, each of us hoarding our favourite. There were no offers to share.

Strawberries were in season, tiny, thin-skinned, juicy and voluptuously fragrant strawberries. Strawberries like I remember eating from the garden, and finding no where else in my adulthood of hard, pink, scentless blobs from Safeway. Why does Europe still have devastatingly good strawberries while we eat tasteless styrofoam? There should be an inquiry. It's a national scandal, but most of us have forgotten what we're missing and don't complain. Well I'm complaining now. I'm mad at North American strawberries and I don't know if there's anything they can do to make it up to me - short of giving up their hard-hearted ways and becoming real strawberries again.

I topped the lightly sugared berries with a healthy dollop of creme fraiche - just to round out our food groups - and gloated that such a thing was available at the corner store.

If I could eat breakfast like this everyday, I'd stop skipping it. I'd become a devoted, enthusiastic, evangelistic breakfast eater. All hail the continental breakfast! Okay, maybe especially when eaten on the Continent.