Tomato Kumato

Whoa… found these pictures archived from the day I got to Paris and forgot about them.

The day I got to Paris, I tried, as I always do, to avoid jet lag by acting as though it didn’t exist. I walked around my new neighborhood, the 7th arrondissement, getting a feel for what was around. I found Rue Cler, my new foodie home, which is a pedestrian street within spitting distance that has all variety of foodie shops. I picked up a few things… some bread, cheese, pâté, the ever present tomatoes, onions, and garlic, and of course some wine, before walking back to my new apartment… and crashing.

For some reason it didn’t work this time, and jet lag crept up like the bad guy in a slasher film. I woke up around 8, disoriented, groggy, and starving. I walked over to the fridge and filled a plate with pâté and goat cheese, grabbed jars of cornichons and mustard, broke my baguette in two, and poured myself a glass of wine. And there, on my new couch, I had my very own French picnic.

So I’m sorry for the quality of the pictures of my first dinner in France, but I was too tired to adjust the lighting to make them pretty. What counts is that it was all delicious, and I liked the wine so much that I’m keeping the bottle. I am a walking stereotype, and I love it.

So… last night, I was a little bit depressed about fall. I know I posted all happy and excited about baklava, but the truth is, in comparison with last summer, this summer was pretty amazing (actually… three months in Europe and one basking in the sun is better than most summers…), and so I’m kind of sorry to see it go.

This morning, I woke up too late for breakfast, and instead had to vault out of bed and go directly to my cousin’s house, where I had stored my suitcase for the summer. By the time I got home, I was cold and hungry, so I decided to go for one of my favorites: scrambled eggs.

I’m usually a coffee and toast kind of person in the morning. Very low maintenance. Sometimes just the coffee. I’m high maintenance about coffee. But sometimes, when I don’t have time for a real breakfast, and I don’t notice until lunch is rolling around, I’ll make myself some peppers and fried eggs, or else scramble a few with lox, cream cheese, and shallots. This morning, however, all I had were the shallots. Grumbling about my empty fridge, I fried up the shallots in some olive oil, added salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper, and then reached for the eggs. I cracked one in the bowl and stopped short. This egg was bright, fluorescent orange. How curious. I cracked the second, and it was the same. As I beat them with the only dairy product I had, some 1% milk, I watched them turn from bright orange to a pale, agreeable orange-yellow. I added them to the pan and slow-cooked the whole thing together. I moved them to the plate and realized what I had made myself for breakfast.

A plateful of sunshine.

SCENE: Evening.
You are seated at a long wooden table at a small, intimate restaurant in Paris, illuminated only by candlelight, waiting patiently for the waitress to arrive.

“How would you like it cooked?”

This is the ordering experience at L’Entrecôte in Paris, France. No, the waitresses are not telepathic; there’s just only one thing on the menu: salad, fries, and steak, cooked any way you like. And you want it rare.

This is an amazing steak. L’Entrecôte doesn’t take reservations because they know they don’t have to: by 7:30, the restaurant is full; obscenely early for a Paris diner. After the table has “ordered,” the waitresses bring by huge serving bowls of salad, simple greens, simply dressed. Quite delicious, but it doesn’t hold a candle to what you are about to experience.

The steak is always cooked to perfection, the fries are crisp and flavourful, but the real goodness? The sauce.

Lucky me, my mother fell in love with it too, and after a lot of experimentation on us, her guinea pigs, she figured it out, as she always does.

And now I’m here to share it with you! Don’t be taken aback by the pinkish hue… it’s amazing. We have yet to figure out how the Parisians acheive a more muted color… I’m convinced that it has to do with fresh tarragon. At any rate, it tastes the same, and if I close my eyes, I feel like I’m back in Paris.

L’Entrecôte Steak

Season a room-temperature steak liberally with salt and pepper. Heat olive oil in a frying pan until almost smoking, and then add the steak. Cook until desired doneness is acheived (ahem. rare). Remove steak and keep warm. Add a tablespoon of Tarragon Dijon Mustard. Whisk in a quarter cup (approximately) of good, dry red wine. Return the steak to the pan and coat both sides with sauce. Serve with extra sauce on the side.

Naturally, this can be doubled, tripled, quadrupled… it’s worth it. It’s best served with fries, but if you’re feeling lazy, as I was, some toast rubbed with garlic and olive oil will do nicely.