Asian Restaurants in Paris

This is a report of five different restaurants in the two Asian sections of Paris. Representative countries are Laos, Thailand, Vietnam, China. There are literally hundreds and hundreds of Asian restaurants in Paris, most of them terrible. However, if you land upon an authentic one (usually discerned by the length of the line outside), you have hit upon a jewel.










The first photo you see represents a luncheon offering of the soigné Lao Lane Xang 2 which is one of the few restaurants in the 13th arrondissement (the main Asian section of Paris) that has a pleasant decor, a Bib Gourmand, and elevated prices. It is not expensive, however. My friend; Françoise ordered the luncheon which consisted of three dishes and jasmine rice for 10,50 euros. She had a spicy Thai salad with shrimp and shredded green mango, a sausage dish in a lovely sauce full of tiny corn, an excellent dried beef salad and the rice. I ordered à la carte, and was not sorry. For a few euros more, I had a wonderful spicy angel hair noodle salad with luscious bits of chicken and whole shrimp. My main course was a Thai red curry with coconut milk and duck. Both of our dishes were truly delicious. The ingredients are fresh and of very high quality and that is reflected in the flavor of the dishes.

At this point in my life, I have been to several cosmopolitan Asian cities, and once outside the restaurant, I was struck with how much the street theater resembles the hustle and bustle of Bangkok or Hanoi or a city in China. People are milling about, selling their food wares on the street and moving in and out of the zillions of restaurants of all Asian nationalities that you can imagine. We went into Tang Frères which is the giant Asian grocery store chain to look at the food. I thought to myself that an Asian family could live in Paris and never eat French food--ever. For me, the myriad of things that we could buy was tantalizing and we made a mental note to return when we had more time for another lunch and a trip to Tang Frères.

With my new enthusiasm for the 13th arrondissement, I suggested to my friends, Pascale and Suzelle, that we try a place known for Dim Sum. Pascale had read about Tricotin 2 (Tricotin 1 is Vietnamese and Thai, whereas 2 is Chinese and larger), the oldest Chinese restaurant in the city and known for its steamed fare. I was game. It was a great meal. The three of us shared three types of dumplings and buns (i.e. bao and baozi), and although they were good, they don't hold a candle to the real thing that you can only get in China. We had pork buns, raviolis with shrimp and pork, and delicious duck and shrimp crepes with bamboo. The latter, with their interesting combination of ingredients were the best. Tricotin 2 is known for its soups and noodle dishes and my friends each ordered crunchy noodle dishes with various pork combinations. Later in the month, I went back and had an excellent sauté of seafood on the crunchy noodles.

The restaurant is huge and lacks for decor, but this is par for the course in most of the restaurants of this ilk. People go for the food and not to hang out in the surroundings.

I actually learned about the next restaurant on You Tube when a French chef in Paris was asked what places he really likes in the city. As soon as I heard about it, I had to try Wen Zhou which is on the rue de Belleville in the 20th arrondissement. This is an area that has a more varied ethnic population with Chinese and North Africans living side by side. After the famous morning market where one can get very cheap produce, fish and meat, we walked up the hill to look for the restaurant.

While on the quest to find THE Wen Zhou, someone told me that the word means Paris in Chinese, and several restaurants next to one another have the same name. The one we chose, Restaurant Wen Zhou at 24 rue de Belleville, seemed to be the place we were looking for. In any event, it was very good and very cheap.

I am on the quest for the perfect buns (baozi) after having fallen love with these delicious items when I was in China. The ones here, filled with spicy pork, were fantastic!! The place was a real find. People come in off the street just to pick up a baozi or two. At the tables, there is a full menu. I ordered hot and sour soup (known as soupe Pekinoise in France), and that was great. However, we were most taken with the dumpling-bun bar and so shared steamed shrimp dumplings (great) and steamed raviolis stuffed with pork, ginger and celery. Who could resist the enormous crèpe stuffed with vegetables and pork? It was folded in a triangle and big enough for three. A copious lunch for us all came to 20 euros. I can't wait to go back.

One of my friends recommended a Chinese restaurant near to Tricotin 1 and 2, called Hao Hao. This place is also very popular and serves authentic Cantonese food. That cuisine is my least favorite of the Chinese regional cuisines, but it is the most popular as it is not spicy. However, I was game to try it as I was told that real Chinese people love it.

Roland and I decided to share three dishes the night we went to Hao Hao. The menu is very long with lots of choices and when you are there you wish you were a regular and knew what the specialties are. I adored the salt and pepper fried softshell crabs. They were not at all greasy, beautifully seasoned and just delightful. Less successful was the mussel dish with a sweet and sour sauce, and Poulet Si-Chuan (Szechuan chicken) which was lightly breaded chicken served in a brown sauce. I think the thing I like least about some Chinese food is the fact that when cornstarch is added to the sauce it gets thickened in a way I find unpleasant and artificial. There are other dishes at Hao Hao which would not suffer from this phenomenon but the mussels and chicken were not those. Roland, however, liked everything.

On the way home, I walked along the main Avenue de Choisy and made mental notes of the places that had long lines at 8 in the evening. I was very curious about Pho Banh Cuon 14 which was very crowded, and asked my friend Sayaka if she would join me there. She told me that this place is truly authentic Vietnamese and has the best Pho in the country if not in Western Europe. I could not wait to try it.

I had a lot of Pho in Vietnam and it is a dangerous soup for me indeed, as usually there is a lot of cilantro in it. However, I never had a problem there, as I knew how to say "no cilantro please!" and had a card with instructions in Vietnamese. Here, I speak French and the staff was eager to help me out. The wonderful noodle soup is so authentic that I could not eat it. I can see that for a cilantro lover it is superb, but there was not just cilantro as a garnish that they could leave off (which they did), but the broth was totally flavored with that herb. I had to content myself with enjoying the other dishes we ordered, like the made-to-order egg rolls (without cilantro and safe) and the squid salad. Everything in this restaurant is of a high caliber and if you close your eyes, you are in Vietnam. I would go back there for any of the other things on the menu.

Japan is noticeably absent from this report but that is because it is the Asian cuisine I know the most about and one I have written about in this blog several times. I am always discovering new and wonderful places in Paris and will write about those at another time.

Two New Restaurants in NYC

ABC Kitchen, the latest in the Vongerichten empire, is a terrific new American restaurant; and Robata ya, on a street in the East Village lined with Japanese restaurants, is an authentic Robata (grill) unlike any I have seen outside of Japan.







I can always rely on my foodie cousin, Jenny, for the best recommendations in NYC. She seems to be the first one in every new and interesting restaurant as soon as it opens. Her suggestion that we try ABC Kitchen on our last outing met with my great enthusiasm.

Unlike his other fancy French or authentic Asian restaurants, Jean Georges Vongerichten has opened a quintessential American which is supplied by local organic farmers. The menu is a simple but attractive list of the daily offerings and on its back are the names of all the different producers from where he gets his ingredients. A varied à la carte menu is easy to navigate and one can order a number of small tasty appetizers to share for a lovely lunch, or move on to the main course dishes which are more substantial. The list of wines is also representative of different regions in the USA.

Jenny and I had a delicious lunch of five appetizers and two rich all-American desserts. The stunning crab toasts with lemon aioli were spectacular. Jenny had had these at another meal and I was happy that she was up for trying them once again. We also had a dish of raw diver scallops with sea beans, serrano chile, lime and a salty succulent seaweed that I know in France: salicorne. roasted beets with home made yogurt could not have been more attractive or more delicious. Two more salads followed: Roasted carrot and avocado with crunchy seeds, sour cream and citrus (this one was a bit too sour for me), and a phenomenal sugar snap pea salad with parmesan dressing and fines herbes.

With this meal, I had a glass of a Handley Cellars Chardonnay 2009, from Anderson Valley, California.

We had been so "good" with our salads, that I suggested we splurge on desserts. I was not sorry. The all-American carrot cake with cream cheese butter cream was sensational, as was the rhubarb almond crumble tart with rhubarb whipped cream. It is no wonder that Jenny enjoys going back to this place again and again.

Several days later, I met another cousin, Becca at Robata-ya. As I am interested in all things Japanese, I was intrigued when I read that on 9th Street in the East Village, a Japanese restaurateur had opened several new places. I chose Robata-ya because I love the robata grills and they are few and far between outside of Japan.

When I reserved, I knew that it would be important to sit at the counter. So often in Japanese restaurants, sitting at tables is much less interesting and exciting than at the counter, where one can see the preparation of the food.

At Robata-ya, all the ingredients are arranged around the customer-side of the counter, and of course, the chefs are behind it. when you order, it is not unusual to see a chef jump on to the counter to reach the fish or the vegetables you have chosen. The food is then grilled, and the chef "hands" it to you when ready on a large paddle with a long handle (see photos). With our meal we had boxes of cold sake, and frankly, could not have had a more fun and delicious time.

To start, our neighbors at the counter recommended that we try the goma kanpachi which is sashimi of yellowtail (my favorite) dusted with sesame seeds. After that, we chose kaki karaage served in a lovely cool broth. This is a dish of succulent fried oysters and they are truly excellent. I suggested grilled corn on the cob, and a variety of grilled Japanese mushrooms. We had grilled el hire--dried stingray that you dip in mayonnaise. Our pièce de resistance was a whole grilled rainbow trout which was wonderful.

Ordering is made easier both because all the ingredients are in front of you and also because there are many photos in the menu itself. Informative as well as the recommendations from the other people at the counter.

As with all Japanese food, the meal was simple, beautifully prepared and practically fat free. So there was definitely room to order a light dessert: green tea ice cream with malt powder.

Robata ya is a wonderful place to go for a great meal and an amusing show. It makes dining out a lot of fun. I could have sat and watched the chefs jumping on the counter and serving the food for hours.

Boston: An Old Favorite and Two new Middle Eastern Gems

The Daily Catch, a staple in the life of two old friends; Oleana and Sofra--two popular places in Cambridge, MA.








When Carol came to visit me in Paris, she told me about her favorite seafood place in Brookline, MA where for very little money, one can get perfectly cooked fish and shellfish. It is a casual hole in the wall and lots of fun. I knew it from my many years living in Boston before I moved abroad, and was eager to try it again. My next trip to Boston provided the perfect occasion.

We were all old friends that evening at the Daily Catch, and had to wait until a table large enough for all of us was liberated. (This is a "no reservations" restaurant.) Definitely "no frills", many of the dishes are made and served in the blackened bent frying pan in which they are cooked and this adds to the fun atmosphere of the place. Calamari is a specialty and we tried a cold squid salad to start. Ed and I ordered one of the specialties of the evening, written on the blackboard. This was braised monkfish with littlenecks, mussels and calamari in a spicy tomato Fra Diavolo sauce. It was served over black pasta. Susan and Carol both chose the sensational fluke which was sautéed with mushroom, fennel, sundried tomato picata and served over linquine. Eric ordered the signature calamari sautéed in a white wine, herb and garlic sauce and served in the fry pan. The wine was a simple white from Sicily and everything was very good.

There are three Daily Catch restaurants in Boston and this attests to the popularity and success of the place.

Oleana has been a big Cambridge fave for years. Middle Eastern food is served in mezze-sized portions and it is fun to order several so as to be able to taste many. Everything is fresh, beautifully presented and flavorful. The combinations are quite creative and interesting as well.

I also went to Oleana with my old friend, Richard, his daughter Sophie and a friend of theirs, Gemma. I was game to order many things, and as we were four, we were able to taste a variety of dishes from the menu. I satisfied my creative gastronomic yearning with round flat bread (lamejun) with pink crushed red pepper, grilled peaches, cubes of roasted Haloumi cheese and a beautiful green salad to start, followed by spinach felafel with tahini, yogurt, beets and crinkled watercress. Gemma and Sophie sprung for skewers of octopus and olive served with a smoked wheat salad and skordato (a garlic sauce). Richard had a dish of beautiful summer vegetable crudités and a warm Tuscan olive oil with green herbs and garlic. This was followed by spicy fideos (crushed toasted vermicelli) and chick peas with green chard and orange aioli. As the menu reads, it is truly inventive with a utilization of so many different ingredients that are not usually seen on Middle Eastern menus. We were seated in the atmospheric outdoor courtyard and had a thoroughly delicious and pleasant evening.

An off-shoot of Oleana is Sofra which recently opened next to Richard's wine store (Violette) in Cambridge. Sofra is a bakery, take-out, eat-in place where one can get a terrific lunch or afternoon coffee with pastries. The mezze there all follow suit from Oleana and there are a variety of daily offerings. The cakes and cookies are sinful and delicious.

The old friends I went with were two women I have known since I was a baby. That's the perfect definition of old friends. Janet ordered several plates of small things so that we (Carol, Janet and I) could all try everything. The seeded bread was wonderful. We had beet tzatziki (a mixture that is delicious and of a gorgeous purple color), pepper and spring onion salad; smoked eggplant with pine nuts; whipped feta with sweet and hot peppers and zucchini pancakes with yogurt. I had to have some espresso-hazelnut coffee cake (it was my vacation after all), and also an Earthquake: a chocolatey cookie with chocolate chips dipped in powdered sugar. The day this place opened, it took off. Despite the fact that there are very few tables and a small outdoor porch with a few seats, we had a very comfortable lunch.

Oya--a wonderous restaurant in downtown Boston

In 2008, Frank Bruni, the then culinary critic at the New York Times, named Oya the best new restaurant in America. It has kept up its reputation. Below is my review.





Frank Bruni (the New York Times' restaurant critic) said that Tim and Nancy Cushman, the couple who conceived of and run Oya, play two important roles. Tim dazzles and Nancy comforts. This description is correct. Here are two Americans who have nailed the preparation of creative "American style" Japanese food and who have created a lovely welcoming space in which to experience it.

(I say "American style" because it is only in America that you find such creative combinations for sushi and sashimi. The Japanese are 100% purists.)

For the comforting aspect, Nancy and her staff are available and reassuring to clients, going out of their way to make for a relaxed and welcoming atmosphere. I won't go into the ups and downs of the complicated pilgrimage that I experienced getting to Oya. Just to say that I endured flight cancellations from NY to downtown Boston on a day when thunder was predicted on the east coast. Throughout the ordeal, the staff was attentive and helpful when I called (several times) to tell them my progress at the airport. It was unclear as to whether I would leave NY at all and I have to say that I was most upset about missing my reservation. So, when I did walk into the restaurant with my friends John and Phil, I had to pinch myself to make sure I was really there. And there was Nancy with the sake menu and her offer for us to choose our apéritif which would be on the house.

Nancy is the sake maven which is quite a title for an American woman. She has developed an extensive and beautiful list and we were able to try two excellent sakes with our apéritif and later with our meal.

Tim dazzles: there is no other way to describe it. Although there are hot dishes, this chef's menu is concentrated on the on sushi and sashimi offerings, which are totally unique and delectable creations. Each exquisitely fresh piece of fish is garnished with something miraculous. Tim conceives of the combinations, and the Japanese sushi chefs are in charge of the execution.

We were immediately served a wonderful sashimi of Kumamoto oyster with watermelon pearls and a cucumber mignonette. This was another house offering. After that, we were on our own to order to our hearts' content. Everything sounds so wonderful that we were relieved when our waiter offered to guide us to what he thought were representative and delicious choices.

We had a sushi of scarlet sea scallops with white yuzu sauce and yuzu tobiko. Tobiko are flying fish eggs and yuzu is a Japanese lemon and so its marriage with the seafood was lovely. Next came Kindai bluefin maguro (tuna) with soy braised garlic and micro greens. Another Kumamoto oyster came, this time in a tempura with yuzu aioli and squid ink bubbles. Needless to say these bubbles taste of the essence of the food they represent. Hamachi(yellowtail)-spicy banana mousse followed. Other choices were wild ivory king salmon with a spicy lemongrass curry sauce, toasted garlic and sesame; a lovely warm eel dish with exotic flavorings, and hamachi with ginger and a verjus (a special French wine) sauce and spiced chile oil. At the end, our waiter wanted us to taste the diver scallop with sage tempura, olive oil bubbles and Meyer lemon so he ordered it for us and it too was offered by the restaurant.

The Oya tasting menu is both extensive and expensive. We preferred and thoroughly enjoyed exploring the menu in depth and ordering many things with our helpful waiter.

This was a memorable meal. One would not find these dishes anywhere else--they come from Tim's heart and soul. I have been to American translation of Japanese restaurants many times, but this one WAS truly dazzling and one dish after another was surprising and wonderful.

Return to Bigarrade for a sublime gastronomic experience

Review of one of THE BEST restaurants in France!










When we arrived at Bigarrade, we knew we were in the right place: a warm yet dignified welcome. As I had been there several times, they knew me, but were pleased to see that I had brought friends from Los Angeles: Rusty and Joel.

I have written about Bigarrade before and could continue to wax eloquent about the creativity of the chef, the wonderful ambiance of the restaurant, the rhythm of the meal, and the delicious creations we sampled for the 3 hour meal. The chef, Chrisophe Pele, really outdid himself this time. And Philippe, the director of the restaurant and wine expert, was ready to pair wines (very reasonably priced) with the various dishes.

Everything was wonderful. The beautiful meal is comprised of small plates of both shellfish and flatfish dishes, exquisitely prepared vegetables, and finally a poultry or meat dish. Inventive techniques and combinations result in a myriad of wonders on the plate: clams that were blow-torched, paired with a fragrant olive oil and served with a knife plunged into the clam, making it easy to open; skewers of grilled mussels paired with a Japanese sweet mustard, karachi; spicy turbot broth with fresh peas and flowers; a beautiful piece of turbot with green mango and grilled peanuts; a just-picked stunning spring leek simply deep-fried like tempura; and finally a luscious piece of rack of lamb garnished with a bit of anchovy, succulent greens, tamarind jam and a paper thin leaf of squid. Desserts included a beet and wild strawberry granita; a shot of mango, mint and chlorophyll juice to drink all at once, lemon cream with a bit of kohlrabi; a delicious cherry ice cream with mushroom powder and a ginger wafer; a gorgeous dish of shaved coconut atop melted caramel; the requisite chocolate tart with sel de Guérande (a special salt from Brittany); etc. etc. and ending with luscious creamy dacquoise macarons. In all, there were over 20 small courses. The chef's creativity was not only interesting and mind boggling but also wonderful! Even the most far-out combinations were delicious.

Bigarrade is very different from many other ultra-creative restaurants I have been to. Here, things are delicious to eat first, and then amusing and interesting. One wonders where the chef gets his ideas, but one always wonders that with truly creative people. As the dinner progresses, the excitement builds and the diner is truly dazzled throughout the experience.

We were lucky to get a table right in front of the open kitchen. Joel, Rusty and I changed places so that we all had some time to view the preparation of our wonderful meal. The chefs were very focussed and quiet, and the kitchen was miraculously shiny and clean throughout the meal. After the lamb was served, the staff thoroughly scrubbed the stoves and counters and made ready for the creation of the desserts. 22 dinners of 20 courses are served in a perfect rhythm--like a gastronomic symphony.

I left Bigarrade thinking about the next special occasion for me to celebrate there. That is a sign of a great restaurant: leaving one with the desire to return.

Le Chateaubriand: The 9th Best Restaurant in the World: are they kidding?

Le Chateaubriand: A review of an established modern bistrot in Paris that is of world renown.






I was amazed to read in the Herald Tribune that Le Chateaubriand, a restaurant in my neighborhood which I have always thought was a hole in the wall with a "genius" chef won a top mention on the annual San Pellegrino list of Best Restaurants of the World. Inaki Aizpitarte tops Robuchon, Gagnaire, Passard, Keller and many other brilliant chefs who create delicious dishes. His reputation over the past 10 years has soared and he is considered to be the one to watch and one of the best chefs in France.

After he received the award, I knew I had to see for myself, and the occasion of a visit from my LA friends, Joel and Rusty was just the moment to do so. Reservations are taken exactly 14 days in advance between the hours of 3 and 6. After a few busy signals, I was in. This was in contrast to the number one restaurant on the list which apparently receives 26,000 calls on the day reservations open. Destination dining is now the new trend.

We arrived at 8:30 PM which is early by Paris standards and we were surprised to walk into a fully packed house. We were rudely received and the waiter who led us to our seats reprimanded me for leaving my first instead of my last name to reserve.

A set menu consisting of three to four amuse-bouches followed by three courses, two desserts or cheese at 55 euros is offered. At least it wasn't more expensive.

The small appetizers started to arrive, and they made a special ceviche for me, without cilantro but with the fish marinated in blood orange juice. Nothing to write home about. Next came a bit of grilled rouget en tempura--not exactly tempura but rather the fish coated with crunchy puffed rice. The fish was good but the rice detracted from the dish and added an unpleasant texture and burnt flavor. Thin noodles in a parsley coulis on a bed of raw casserons (baby squid) followed. This combination didn't work although the squid was quite tender. An earthy soup followed. It was a duck broth flavored with anise and tarragon with bits of mushrooms floating on top. I liked this very much and thought it was a high point. For my friends, the anise flavor was too pronounced.

Two fish courses followed: raw mackerel marinated in white wine and then sauced with red wine and a variety of red berries (!?) and baby carrots; Bonite de St Jean de Luz (a type of tuna) barely seared with grilled fresh baby asparagus and fresh lima beans along with different types of crunchy seaweed and tiny rolls of cucumber slivers. This dish, although good to eat, was strange in its presentation with an unappetizing film of transparent seaweed on top of everything. It looked like some algae-covered detritus you might find at the beach. The mackerel, on the other hand, was both ugly and inedible. Finally, the savory part of the meal closed with a tough piece of beef that had been seared in tandoori and served with amaranthe leaves, braised Trébon onions and toasted grains. The presentation was quite unpleasant to the eye and likely so to the palate. The amaranthe leaves left a bitter aftertaste.

Desserts were very strange: first strawberries with a fresh pea purée and small fresh peas (the best of the three), and Cerise Sabayon which was a dish of beautiful macerated cherries covered with a sabayon and a few salty olives. The olives really didn't work for me and made it unbearable to eat the whole dish. It was topped with two pink wafers (they looked like pieces of ham) that I could not identify (see photo). The final "sweet" was a cube of repulsive, stringy rhubarb sprinkled with colored bits of Indian spices.

In general the food is extremely poorly presented and unpleasant to the taste. Nothing looked appetizing and it was difficult to find something that was good to eat. I was at first a victim of the hype and left thinking that the food was very interesting and not bad. In retrospect I realized that I had succumbed to the Emperor's New Clothes Syndrome. Who rates these restaurants anyway and who really can say what is the BEST restaurant in the WORLD? You would not leave Le Chateaubriand thinking, "I must get that recipe for the raw mackerel-fruit dish" and nothing was truly delicious. My friend Joel thought that the best things were the few grilled vegetables on the tuna plate. Although Le Chateaubriand is considered by some to be one of the best restaurants in the world and therefore the best restaurant in France, I heartily disagree.

Vietnam and Shanghai

Highlights of my February trip to Asia. The best restaurants were the ones that are not for tourists.










How will I abbreviate three weeks of eating all over Asia? I'll start with Vietnam where I discovered aromatic, flavorful and complex food everyday. I found that the best places to go are not the ones in the guide books. If you tell your hotel concierge that you are really looking for authentic cuisine, he will send you to simple and very cheap places where you will discover gastronomic treasures.

In both Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, you can't go wrong with Nha Hang Ngon. Sitting at communal tables and perusing an endless list of wonderful dishes, you can just choose and be assured that you will be served something delicious. Of course, I have the cilantro problem but with the card I handed to the waiter written in his language, I had nothing to fear. Meals are cheap and excellent. The first night I discovered the restaurant was during the Tet holiday (Chinese New Year) which consists of 10 days of joyous celebration, dancing in the streets, riding around the city on noisy motor cycles and days off from work. I started with Banh Xeo which was a large and tender Vietnamese rice pancake filled with mung bean sprouts, shrimp and exotic lettuces, served with a spicy dipping sauce. The people who sat at the table with me lucked out with a half coconut that had whole fresh shrimps hanging off its side. I continued with Bun Cha Gio: vermicelli and fried spring rolls served with an herb and fish sauce. Next came gorgeous pork rolls that were crunchy with a sugar crust. You dip the rolls into an aromatic peanut sauce. Finally, skewered beef that also comes with its own wonderful sauce. Is it possible that with the New Year's supplement charge my bill came to $7.50 ??? I pondered this question throughout the trip.

In Hanoi, I also went to Nha Hang Ngon for lunch and had a regional dish: Bun Bo Hue. It is a flavorful beef noodle soup: the noodles are what makes the dish. With that, I chose Tom Hap Cuon Banh Trang. My waiter filled each of the paper thin shells with vegetables and steamed shrimp one by one. He was so grateful for the $1 tip I gave him that he offered me a tour of the restaurant. The atmosphere is very upbeat and fun. I could have gone to this place everyday.

The thing to get in Vietnam, of course, is Pho. It's full of cilantro but they can leave it off. A great place to go is Pho 24 which is an excellent chain where they serve Pho from morning until night. You can choose what you want to go into it and the chicken Pho is my favorite. This is the dish to have at breakfast (like croissants in France), but I could never get myself to eat it in the morning.

After ten days in Vietnam with the wonderful cuisine and variety of ingredients used creatively, I vowed to find some good places in Paris. Thusfar, I have come up with zilch.

Off to Shanghai where I have friends and also was lucky enough to find the Pei Mansion Hotel--a boutique Art Deco hotel in a lovely area. As I was only going to be in Shanghai for three days, I requested that the hotel organize a tour for me. Martin and Jimmy spent a day with me, during which we drove to the highlights and took lovely walks. It was unseasonably freezing and so it was hard to stay outside for very long, but I got enough of a taste of the city to promise myself that I would return during a future spring season.

For lunch, Martin chose to take me to a 5-star hotel (The Regal Shanghai East Asia Hotel) where we had a veritable Cantonese banquet. The Chinese tend to order more than anyone can eat as this is the way they express hospitality. I am sure we had 20 dishes and of course, could not finish the lunch. There were spring rolls stuffed with shredded chicken, a baked turnip cake, savory and sweet dumplings. barbecued pork with a honey spicy sauce, fish congee (a rice porridge) with garlic, seafood soup, egg custard tart, pork dumplings, rice flour roll with shredded chicken and black mushrooms etc. etc. Martin explained that some of the dishes were excellent examples of the Cantonese style and ordered them precisely because he wanted me to try them. Foodie that I am, I tasted everything. What a wonderful way to spend an afternoon.

My friends, Robert and Maria took me to the most famous dumpling place in China with branches all over the country. This is a very popular place and even with a reservation, we had to wait, but it was worth it. The name of the place is Din Tai Fung. Basically you order different types of bao (dumplings) and baozi (larger buns) that are filled with wonderful things like pork and vegetables, black truffle with chicken, just pork, just chicken, sauteed cantonese vegetables. You dip each into a vinegary sauce. It is hard not to eat them all. They are served in bamboo steamers and for the bao, you get about 9 per order. The larger baozi come in threes. It is not an expensive way to dine and is truly excellent.

During my travels, I met a Canadian resident of the city. She knew where to go and directed me to Di Shui Dong on Maoming Road. Speaking not a word of Chinese and going alone, I had no trouble finding the place and ordering as the servers were kind and patient and because the menus are a collection of photos of the dishes. This is Hunan style cooking which means very spicy. It was terrific and very cheap. I had Stir Fried Smoked Tofu with Hunan Beans and cayenne pepper--very hot and spicy. With this, I chose stir-fried roasted green beans, egg plant and smokey bacon. Rice cut the fire and I also chose Singha Beer with my meal and green tea afterwards. Two large dishes and drinks came to the equivalent of $14.

I can't resist publishing a photo of the stunning Sweet and Sour Mandarin Fish that Robert, Maria, and I ordered at Song Helou on the Bund. For Valentine's Day we treated ourselves to a wonderful Mandarin dinner in this restaurant with a beautiful view. Other highlights were Stew-Fred River Eel, Four Oil Stewed Vegetables and of course, Steamed Bao with Mushrooms. And we couldn't resist the crunchy Pan Fried Bao filled with Pork. It was a beautiful and lovely way to mark my last night in Shanghai (for now).

My trips to Asia have always been very successful. I find that the people are kind and helpful and I enjoy experiencing the culture and discovering the culinary treasures. As I flew away from Shanghai back to Paris, I made a pact with myself that it would not be long before I took another trip to Vietnam and China (Shanghai).