Bunny Rabbits, Thumper, Little Bunny Foo Foo. Do I Really Have to Do This?

After recovering from the stomach virus to end all stomach viruses, it was rabbit day.  I had been pretty much dreading this day since I saw it on the calendar in the first week and my friend told me they come with their heads on.

I arrived at school at 8 for our demonstration, got changed into my uniform, and took a seat with my friends in the back row like the cool kids that we are.  As the chef began his demo, he held up the rabbit for a photo op and sort of made it dance around on the table.  Oh the horror!  After butchering it, he held up its head with pride, and pulled out the rabbits tongue, laughing all the while.  Pas bien propre.

Time for our practical.  I walked into the kitchen and there were two bunnies on my board.  Not one, but TWO! After a momentary freak-out I realized one was Ali's and I promptly handed it off.  Now began the butchering.  First, cut out the liver (and save it of course; always save the liver!) and pull out each kidney.  Save these bad boys for the rosemary skewer we'll be making later as a garnish.  Now, cut at the waist and use both hands to crack the spine.  EEK!  Cut off the saddle and both front legs.  In the upper part of the chest were the lungs and heart that I obviously had to take out by hand.  Then take the cleaver and... BAM! Off with his head!  I'm not going to lie, it took a few minutes of washing my hands and knives plus several deep breaths to recover from that.

Now that the rabbit no longer looked like a rabbit (did I mention it came with its teeth and eyes in tact?) I was ok to work with it.  First we dusted it with flour and cooked it in a hot pan with oil and butter, basting it with mustard.  (I will later come back to the wonder than is french mustard- yum!)  After browning the outside, we removed it from the pan, made a sauce with stock, shallots, rosemary and wine, returned the rabbit to the pan and finished it in the oven.  Finish the sauce with some cream, of course, and voila! Lapin. Let's just say I won't be eating any of that for a while...

After a rather traumatizing day we all needed a good... serving a vegetables.  My dad was still in town as he had gotten stuck by one of New York's billion blizzards this winter.  He offered to take some of my friends to dinner, so Ali and Alex (another new friend) met us for dinner at a small italian restaurant called Olio Pan Vino in the 1e.  Obviously their special that night was pasta with rabbit ragu.  No thank you!  We ordered antipasto and salads with one, two, three bottles of wine.  A digestif to finish?  Sure! Why not?

On to meet the boys at a bar in the 5e for some beers and strange vodka, grenadine, tabasco shots.  Just enough drinks to cloud the memory of the day's butchery.  Just another day of culinary school in Paris.  Oui, chef!

Market Tours and Stomach Viruses: Pas Bien Propre

Three weeks into school it was time for my group's market tour.  We met at school at 8:30 to walk over to marche du something in the 15e.  It was freezing!  We saw coquilles st. jacques, chickens with their feet and heads, stomach lining, salt cod, cabbage, radishes, horse meat (ew), breads, cheeses, nuts, and the list goes on.  We went into a cheese shop filled with every variety of smelly cheese you can imagine.  It had that putrid yet fantastic smell that only a room filled with really good stinky cheese can have.  The chef bought a variety of fromage and we were on our way.

Back at school we had a feast.  Amazing breads, cheeses, charcuterie, red wine, and clementines (which for some reason are extra delicious in paris).  Several of the chefs came to join us, including the very handsome and tall chef Patrick who chatted with Ali and me for a bit (ahhh....).

Despite the amazing food, the highlight of our lunch came from one of my Korean peers.  Backstory: We've taken to calling him Kim Jong Il because he's Korean and very angry and yells a lot in the kitchen.  He doesn't speak french or english but refuses to let the other Korean girls in our class translate for him.  He's very angry and quite intimidating. Knowing what you now know about KJ (as I'll call him for short) you can understand my surprise when he bought oysters at the market to share with our class.  Everyone was afraid to go near them for fear of what KJ might do.  In an attempt to get us to dig in he said in very very very broken english, "Eat the oysters.  I eat oysters because I have bad vision and oysters are good for your vision and your sperm."  Excuse me?!  Needless to say I laughed so hard I almost peed my pants.

Later that day my dad and Steve arrived in Paris to visit for the weekend!  I met them at their hotel in the 1e and we went to visit L'Orangerie, a museum at the end of the Tuilleries.  What an incredible spot! This small, modern museum has two rooms of 360 degree Monet.  I won't even attempt to describe it, you'll have to visit and see for yourself.

After a short cultural detour it was time for food again.  I brought Dad and Steve to Laduree which, to my disbelief, they had never heard of!  We had hot chocolate which is so thick it's essentially warm chocolate sauce, a framboise napoleon, and a hazelnut chocolate tart.  It was the perfect amuse bouche to our later dinner at La Cordonnerie on rue St. Roch.  What a cute restaurant!  It is family owned and is now run by the son of the original owners.  The Kitchen is completely open and the chef comes to your table to make menu and wine suggestions.  We had an amazing mushroom mousse appetizer and swordfish with a citrus sauce.

Saturday it was time to do some shopping on Rue Saint Honoree to enjoy les soldes- the best part of Paris in January!  Good thing I got some purchases in on Saturday before "the exorcism" hit on Sunday... Let's just say I got a baaaaaad stomach virus and was not the best tour guide on Sunday.

Monday Dad came to school with me.  Our lecture was on veal paupiettes and duck terrine.  Neither was appetizing, especially in my delicate stomach state.  To sum up, if you want to make a terrine make sure you have handy duck fat, pork fat, goose fat, "fat back," butter and a meat grinder.  Yum!

One Month in Paris: Bien Propre

After almost a month in Paris I have decided to start a blog. A way to make a record of the restaurants I've been to, sights I've seen, shenanigans that have ensued, and my development into a full fledged foodie.

My Parisian adventure began on January 2, 2011 when my mom and I arrived in Paris.  After our over-night flight from New York we checked in to our medieval-style hotel on Rue Bourg Tibourg in the Marais.  Our room was so small my suitcase didn't fit in it.  I could barely stand next to the bed and the "lamp," if you can even call it that, gave off less light than a birthday candle.  We dropped off our things (I took a nap, of course) and began roaming Paris to explore my new city.

While my mom was here we tested out several delicious eateries.  My favorite sit-in boulangerie on the corner of rue Bourg Tibourg and Rue Verrerie, Le Petite Marche on rue Bearn, L'as du Falafel (a staple) on rue Rosiers, and Les Papilles on Rue Gay-Lussac in the 5e.  So far, nothing to complain about- 67 amazing meals in 3 days?  I could get used to this!

During her stay my mom also helped me set up my apartment.  For that we discovered BHV- Bazaar de Hotel de Ville - which is the world's greatest department store, with everything from Maje to shampoo.  At BHV we found everything we needed to make my entirely red apartment feel like home.

On Tuesday, school started.  At orientation we went on a tour of the kitchens, met all the chefs, and got a chance to size up our peers.  There were some serious looking people there and I admittedly got a little nervous.  What had I gotten myself into?  Luckily, there were a few friendly faces in the crowd.  Lee, who I had met in french class at FIAF in New York, walked in with his brother Dani.  We were in the same orientation group which was a nice comfort in this strange new place.  Amy, who I had met through email back in New York, quickly found me and introduced herself.  Another friendly face!

On Thursday things got cooking.  We had our first demonstration and practical: vegetable potage.  With lardons of course.  This recipe was an exercise in cutting vegetables; we cut everything into tiny, thin triangles.  What a pain in the ass.  As this was my first foray into Cordon Bleu cooking, I figured I'd use my own culinary know how to make the dish my own.  Wrong.  I put my lardons in the pan and started to brown them, because who doesn't like crispy bacon?  The french, that's who!  "Pas de coloration," the chef said.  "Oui, Chef," I replied.  Strike one.  Then, on to seasoning.  A little salt, a little pepper... Wrong again!  When the chef came to taste my potage he immediately began to cough, sort of like Ben Stiller in Zoolander when he has "the black lung."  "Cough, cough, il y a beaucoup de poivre! Cough, cough" whispered the chef.  "Oui, Chef," I said.  Strike two.  Oy vey! This is going to be harder than I thought...

Lesson two: lemon sole.  Now this sounded like something I could get into.  I love sole, I love lemon.  Great, can't wait.  Wrong round 3!  We had to take apart the entire fish.  Cut out the gills, scrape off the scales, pull out its insides, chop up the bones for stock, remove the egg sacs, and cut out the fillets.  Gross!  Needless to say, I didn't eat fish for a week after that experience.  The only good thing to come out of lemon sole was Ali.  While hacking away at fish carcass she splattered me with guts and we became instant friends.  We now cook next to each other every day and are pretty much inseparable.  We sometimes even get shushed by the chef for talking and having fun in the kitchen.  Ahh friendship.

Soon-to-be dead crabs.

On to chicken with sauce supreme and rice au gras; an entirely beige meal.  Then pissaladiere, quiche lorraine, puff pastry with leeks, a poached egg and albufera sauce, beef consomme, crab bisque (which entails chopping up live crabs with a cleaver, a la the french chef in The Little Mermaid when he tries to kill Sebastian, and putting their still moving mangled bodies into a scorching hot pan), and grilled salmon with potatoes byron.

So far it's been an incredible immersion into french cooking.  I've killed animals, used more butter in one month than I could have ever imagined, and started to make myself at home in Paris.  As a bonus I get to spend my days with people who love to talk about food and know how to cook it.  Sounds good to me!