Bonjour,
Today was all about cooking at the Ritz Paris. Overall, it was the BEST cooking experience so far. Aren't you curious why? Would squid be at the top of your list? I doubt it but it was at the top of mine!!!
We made Vegetable Risotto with Pan Fried Baby Squid With Basil! The female chef was bilingual which was a huge plus. We learned certain techniques about chopping onions, carrots, zucchini and tomato and how to clean and prepare a squid for frying. We "sweated" the onions, stirred the risotto, fried the baby squid and made baked parmesan circular toppings to use to decorate our final dish.
Here are some pictures for the "foodies" out there. After making this dish, we sat in a dining room which was beautifully appointed and ate our creation. They provided wine, bread, dessert and coffee. The students were from Switzerland, France, and the U.S. (Chicago, New York and Los Angeles). We sat around the table and raved about this class and how we're all going to make this dish once we get home. My friend, Laura, who spent a month in Paris at cooking school recently, has a stove like the one in the picture below. And a fabulous kitchen to match!
After leaving the Ritz I took the bus to the Place de Concorde and from there walked to the Musee de l'Orangerie which houses Monet's crowning work, the water lilly series. But to my disappointment, it was closed. I'll return another day. It started to rain so I stopped and had a coffee in a covered outdoor cafe and then took the metro home. I had to change metro lines and I was shocked to see such an elaborate metro terminal at Saint Lazare, which is the end of the line. I'm going to include a picture of it. It was about 6:00 pm and there were thousands of people moving from one metro line to another. It reminded me of the freeway interchange in Los Angeles!
Dinner at home tonight after a hot bath. Another wonderful cool and rainy day!
Love, Judy
PS - Did you know if you "double click" on any of the pictures I've posted, you can view them enlarged?
Hi Judy,
ReplyDeleteI am so sorry I haven't written to you in so long. I have been out of town and just plain ol busy.
Reading about your days make me miss Paris so much. It sounds like you are having the time of your life.
I wish I could have taken classes at the Ritz, What a find, what a treat.
I am so excited to catch up on your blog and with you when you get back (but lets not go there) actually lets not even talk about that:)
Talk to you soon,
xoxo laura