http://www.fraicheyogurt.com/

The best option is the full fat version, in my opinion. It is terrifically creamy and the flavor is unbeatable (just have less if you’re worried about the fat content). We like it best with sliced bananas, Fraiche’s homemade granola and local honey. Add in a freshly made cappuccino and it’s virtual heaven for me.

The best part about something like this is where it takes me mentally: back to Italy or Greece. We love traveling so much and try to relive our experiences through small weekend rituals (usually related to food!). It’s a relatively cheap price to pay compared to plane tickets, don’t you think?

I had a great conversation with my friend, Nina, on Saturday night. She mentioned how much she and her husband, Dan, love their daily cappuccino ritual because it reminds her of our fabulous trip to Italy this summer (he makes her one every morning – isn’t that romantic?). They didn’t start drinking them until after they got back either. One sip and they are transported to Bar Dante Alighieri in Radda. That thought just makes my day!!

It was an incredible start to an AMAZING lunch. On June 30th, we headed to Montalcino to tour Poggio Antico winery and enjoy a leisurely lunch at their award-winning restaurant (I don’t know exactly what awards they may have won but I assume a Michelin star or something like that; it really was to-die-for).

We were a group of 14: eight adults and six under 18. The Bessers, Jevons’, Lodge-Gutierrez’ and GutierrezHouseholders bonded over our mutual love of Italian brunellos, fine food and conversation. We were also celebrating Mica’s birthday (29 again… lucky girl with those youthful Gutierrez’ genes!). Unbeknownst to us, Francesca (Mica’s sister) and Bill (Mica’s husband) had arranged a surprise cake for the birthday girl. The bigger surprise came later when we discovered they had quietly taken care of the bill, which I’m sure was substantial given all we ate and drank.

Thanks, Francesca, Mathew and Bill for treating us to such an incredible lunch; it was truly unforgettable! Here’s just a peek (I was only photographing dishes at our end of the table):

Mathew’s egg appetizer. Some how it was soft or medium boiled, removed from its shell, then dipped in bread crumbs and deep fried. Those potato chip looking things are made from black truffles, I think.

Tate’s beef carpaccio appetizer; lucky for us, he shared with Mom and Dad!

Dane’s tagliatelle al ragu (his main course).

Tate’s agnolotti pasta (his main course); he traded most of it for the lamb chops Paul and I had (as did Dane).

These were cooked to perfection. Our boys each ate two.

Tate’s salad course. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a salad presented more beautifully in all our trips to Italy. The corner drops were aged balsamic vinegar. I got to eat quite a bit of this when Tate became interested in my lamb chops.

Mica’s surprise cake: a heavenly combination of berries and chocolate.

I don’t think we left a morsel of anything, except for the remainder of Mathew and Francesca’s GIANT bistecca alla Fiorentina. They finished it one night for dinner.

Comments, anyone?

2. Live like the Italians do.

3. Cook using local ingredients.

4. Avoid the tourist hordes.

5. Slow down… isn’t that what vacations are for?

We just got back from another glorious trip to the Chianti region in Italy. Two weeks of relaxing in the Tuscan countryside, with meals on the terrace, morning excursions to our favorite coffee bar and remembering how joyfully the whole of Italy embraces food, wine and conversation.

If you haven’t rented a villa property abroad, I highly encourage you to consider it for a future vacation. Not only is it cost effective (especially if you go with another family), it takes you out of the typical tourist experience of hot, crowded cities, (sometimes) overpriced meals, and the need to cram in as much as possible.

Staying in an Italian home allows you to adopt a much slower pace.

Views, views and more views

It starts with the quiet of a country morning. The only sounds are distant roosters and cicadas in the trees. The morning sun is warm and inviting; almost everyone in the house is still asleep. I like to sit on the terrace and soak in the spectacular views. It’s like a postcard come to life and occasionally, the effect is startling. Take, for instance, the view from our bathroom window (below).

Rather than look in the mirror when brushing and flossing, I am transfixed by the view. This is why we stay at L’Aiolina, a farm property outside Siena. Owned by a charming couple, Piero and Rosalba, it offers stunning vistas, peace and quiet, and the ability to commune with both nature and people.

Live like the Italians do

Staying at L’Aiolina (in the lone house on the property, Il Fienile) allows us to pretend we’re natives, even if just for a few weeks. We start most mornings as the locals do, with an espresso or cappuccino. One of the best may be found at Bar Dante Alighieri (Radda in Chianti). About 15 minutes drive from our house and it’s time for coffee and conversation. Note that this is the region of the “strada bianca” – unpaved country roads that spit up tons of white dust – so it’s a short distance but a slow drive.

The proprietors, Fabrizzio and Carolyn, are delightful. He’s Italian, she’s British and they’ve been together 20+ years.

Standing at the bar, watching them pull perfect espresso shots and conversing in a mix of Italian and English is pure heaven to me. This trip, I discovered macchiato – espresso with a dollop of steamed milk. One sip and I was hooked! To me, espresso in Italy is smoother and creamier than in the U.S.; Paul swears it’s less caffeinated, too.

The boys were bummed they no longer serve gelato. Fabrizzio is the one who initiated our custom of “breakfast gelato” for the kids (which allowed us to slowly savor our coffees). Luckily, Bar Dante Alighieri has amazing cream-filled croissants to fill the void!

Cook using local ingredients

Speaking of food, we spent HOURS at the local shops, delightfully perusing the produce, meat/cheese and fresh pasta sections. Our friends, Luis and Becky (who shared the house with us along with their teenage son and daughter) jumped right into our “cook like Italians” mode. Becky even BAKED using Italian ingredients. One day, she whipped up light and airy pancakes from the items below. That girl has an Italian soul… don’t you think?

Avoid the tourist hordes

Most of all, we were able to cherry pick our visits to picturesque Tuscan villages. In the day time, many hill towns like Siena and San Gmignano are overrun by exhaust-spewing buses and endless tour groups lead by people holding umbrellas. By taking a more leisurely approach, (for instance, heading into town in the late afternoon or evening), we were able to enjoy more relaxing experiences. We also tried to have one or two meals at home each day; leaving time to lounge around the pool in the afternoon or watch the kids hunt fireflies at dusk.

Slow down

In short, renting a villa in Tuscany allowed us to do what we most needed to do: slow down and savor the experience. In the past, we’ve returned from vacations exhausted from cramming in too much (influenced by what tour books say you shouldn’t miss). These days, we don’t worry about seeing and doing everything. Hopefully, we’ll get back to Italy again and cross a few more items off our bucket list!

To inquire about short-term stays at L’Aiolina, visit their website at: http://www.aiolina.it/eng/home.html

Paris in April is such a cliché but I really wish I was there right now!

This brief visit was no exception. Tate lost no time sampling all the bath products and the hotel-monogrammed bathrobe (see photo). Lucky for us, because he probably hadn’t showered in days… we tend to practice what we preach, i.e., dirt is good. [Although I can’t imagine this would have held true if we’d had girls – who knows?] Anyway, the boys got nicely spiffed up for dinner because we were about to make a pilgrimage to the restaurant of one of their culinary heroes: Bobby Flay.

As luck would have it, we did not run into him at Mesa Grill that night. We really didn’t expect to given that he’s on television so many times a day but we hoped it would happen anyway. In his absence, however, the restaurant was flourishing nicely. We started with a bowl of perfectly spiced tomato soup (my pick) that came with charred corn, blue corn tortillas, avocado + queso fresco – everyone loved it. We then shared three entrees: pan roasted shrimp with creamy green chile rice + chipotle garlic butter (Dane’s pick), roasted ‘hacked’ chicken with five-chile mole, pickled red onions + roasted tomato tamale with key lime butter (Tate’s pick) and New Mexican spice rubbed pork tenderloin with bourbon-ancho chile sauce + sweet potato tamale with crushed pecan butter (Paul’s pick). We were almost too full for dessert but managed to power through a pineapple upside down cake that I really liked but the others were just ok with.

The next morning, we got up early to search for the previously elusive Wafels and Dinges truck (http://www.wafelsanddinges.com/). It took a bit of asking around before we found it in the Financial District since I could not decipher Thomas DeGeest’s heavy Belgian accent no matter how many times I listened to his recorded phone message (this from someone who has lived in Belgium!). In case you are interested, you may get up-to-the-minute info on the truck’s location by calling 1-866-429-7329. Direction difficulties aside, the Liege-style (crispy outside, tender inside) waffles were well worth the effort. Paul had his with spekuloos spread (kind of a warm, graham-crackery flavor) and it rocked! The secret of the waffles’ exterior crunchiness is pearl sugar which I am still trying to find locally (if anyone knows where to find it in the Bay Area, please let me know).

Later that day, we be-bopped up to Levain Bakery again and emerged with about 10 pounds of warm cookies to haul home to California. I just want to say “damn” about twenty-thousand times that we cannot get these in our area! It’s a compelling reason to move to New York to be sure.

We also made a very brief stop at Daisy Mae’s BBQ in order to devour another mammoth beef rib and collect a prize to bring home to our darling mutt, Scout. She cried over this bone, I kid you not. We raced from Daisy Mae’s to the hotel, picked up our bags and headed home. Overall, another great chapter in our culinary adventures.

The best experience, however, was the 6-family spontaneous BBQ at their neighbor’s house. Kevin and Donna were so sweet to host everyone at the last minute (thank you, Kevin and Donna!). Dinner was hilariously mish-mash: we were leaving for Maine the next morning, R&R were leaving for the beach (somewhere south, I can’t remember). Other families were either coming from or going on vacations. I think everyone brought odds and ends to help clean out their refrigerators!

Nonetheless, everything was delicious and the adults drank many, many bottles of wine and talked late into the evening. The boys held a party on the trampoline, the girls took over the kitchen for a while.

I spent a delighful hour in the kitchen with the pre-teen girls and tried to give them a little advice (the same advice their moms might give, but from an outsider, who they might listen to). I told them to hold a single drink all evening at a party (taking casual sips every now and then) and to play hard to get with boys: keep saying no, be nice but elusive. In short, use the ‘rules’ to maintain their self-respect (i.e., don’t give it away). I illustrated my point with a story from my UCLA days: Rob Lowe had once asked me out and I turned him down [technically, his assistant came over and asked me out (for him) while Rob stood about 10 feet away pretending to be interested in the books on the bookshelf – the primary reason I said ‘no thanks’ was that he was a well-known player but the very strong secondary reason was that I was insulted he didn’t think he needed to do it himself!]. Well, they didn’t listen much after that, they were too busy squealing that I had been asked out by Rob Lowe! I know my ‘cool’ factor had risen considerably but I wasn’t sure they really registered the message inherent in the story – oh well, I tried.

On to Maine, and… lobster! I might have mentioned before that our younger son, Tate, is obsessed with lobster. This was actually the impetus for the trip (that and his 25-page Maine state report). We had taken a similar East Coast trip two years ago when Dane wrote his 25-page Massachusetts report. I think I covered a bit of our Maine visit in the ‘dirt now on both coasts’ post (a week or so ago), but I don’t know if I mentioned the great lobster experiences we had. On this trip, we discovered mainenirvana: a warm lobster roll. The Lobster Dock in Boothbay Harbor is justifiably famous, not only for its lobster rolls. Their crab cake actually beat Bobby Flay’s entry in a ‘throwdown’ a few years ago. Paul ordered it and it was excellent. But Tate and I only had eyes for the warm lobster rolls. We went there every day of our visit and everyone got their favorites. Dane discovered a new brand of rootbeer (he’s always searching out obscure brands and trying them), and Paul explored the menu as much as he could. In short, happiness was all around.

We discovered another brand of happiness at the local gelato shop (Boothbay has a few amazing restaurants to counteract the proliferation of fried food offerings and 5-scoop minimum ice cream parlors). One was a relatively new gelato stand just down the hill from Topside Inn. One of the choices was actually a sorbetto and it was on par with anything you’d find in Italy. The flavor? Strawberry/balsamic! In the past, we’ve served really expensive, aged balsamic on strawberries and this was that, only frozen. Wow, wow, wow is all I can say.

If you ever plan a trip to Maine, you won’t be disappointed culinarily-speaking. There is a really strong movement among Maine’s talented chefs to use locally-sourced, sustainably harvested items. We didn’t venture outside Boothbay to try some of the incredible restaurants near Portland but maybe next time!

After a brief nap, we took a moderately expensive taxi ride to Brooklyn so Tate could realize one of his 2010 goals: eat a BLT at Choice Market. Fans of “The Best Thing I Ever Ate” will remember this small restaurant from the ‘with Bacon’ episode. Our friend, Dave, who lives nearby, met us for lunch. Five BLTs were ordered and quickly consumed… delicious! To this day, Tate still describes the sandwich with a combination of awe and longing. Dinner that night was at my favorite NYC establishment: Balthazar. The boys were excited about the fries, dubbed the ‘BEST’ by Bobby Flay in the ‘Totally Fried’ episode of “The Best Thing…” They didn’t disappoint, neither did the perfectly cooked steaks and my selection of spring pea ravioli.

The next morning, we raced down to Clinton Street Bakery, made famous (at least to us) in an episode of “Throwdown with Bobby Flay” (most of our tv-watching is on the Food Network, in case you didn’t notice). The Clinton Street Bakery makes, hands down, the best blueberry pancakes I’ve ever eaten. That, plus the sugar-cured bacon, was enough to make me pre-diabetic, but it was so, so good. Later that morning, we decided to double down on the sweets and try to find the Wafels and Dinges (Belgian waffle) truck. Even though we were in the right place, we missed the truck by about half an hour (they sold out early). So we found a cute little lunch place (also a chain, I believe), Financier. Everyone had salads (Greek, Italian, etc.) and we resolved to find the truck on our return visit the following week.

In hindsight, it was better we didn’t find the waffle truck just then. In the afternoon, we trekked over to the upper West side and went to Levain Bakery to sample their chocolate chocolate cookies (favorite of chef Rocco Dispirito). The taste (and calorie content) were off the charts! We ate them fresh from the oven and they were crispy on the outside and moist/chewy on the inside. It would be so nice to know how they do this but it is a closely guarded secret (that not even Rocco or Bobby Flay can get out of them… a bummer for those who live on the West Coast).

That night, we had an early dinner at Daisy Mae’s BBQ on the recommendation of TV Chef, Michael Symon. He raved about the beef ribs in another “The Best Thing…” episode so it was definitely on our culinary radar. We walked up to the counter and innocently ordered two beef ribs and two sides without looking at the price list. When the woman behind the register said, “Eighty-three dollars,” my jaw dropped. Each 20-oz beef rib was a whopping $38. We quickly re-thought things and decided to start with one, just in case it was too much for the four of us. Turns out, it was just enough! Tate insisted on saving the 10+ inches of beef bone for our dog, Scout, and we wrapped it up to go (we carried the bone to Connecticut for a few days and then to Maine, finally throwing it out just before returning for a last, 24-hour stop in NYC).

My apologies for the lack of photos; we brought our little Nikon Coolpix camera instead of the multi-lens Canon Digital Rebel and I don’t like to photograph food with a point-and-shoot.

To be continued…

The other olive oil, Premiere Pression Provence, is from a new store in Paris; I read about it on the hipparis blog and stopped in during one of our daily walks. (http://hipparis.com/2010/04/09/premiere-pression-provence-the-new-parisian-mecca-for-fine-olive-oil/)  These oils are very fruity and delicious. Sadly, we are on our last of the 3 bottles I bought.

The Poilâne grey sea salt bag was relatively heavy but I wanted to bring back a souvenir that would last longer than a 5+lb loaf of their famous bread (gone in record time). If you live nearby and want some for your own use, contact me… we have plenty! If you are a bread lover and find yourself in Paris, head over to the main Poilâne store in the 6th arrondisement – you won’t be sorry (especially if they have an open basket of crispy cookies to sample – seriously yummy!).

That’s all from Paris…à bientôt!

I will go into a PAUL shop and order a simple cup of tea then stash about 10 sugar packets in my purse. I can’t help myself. My husband, Paul (!), is a wonderful barista on our Vibiemme machine and we love hosting monthly coffee mornings for our friends (breakfasts are the new dinner parties). Maybe it’s the Martha Stewart in me but I am tickled every time someone wants sugar in their cappuccino or latte and I get to haul out our ‘house’ sugar.

I especially love the clean, simple lines of the logo (of course, we have an official PAUL sugar cannister and bread bag). Kathi scored the last PAUL burlap shopping bag one morning and sadly every other store we visited was sold out. Oh well, I know at least one other person now shares my obsession with PAUL.

Before (and during) our Paris trip, I started following a really cool blog, http://hipparis.com/. It is run by Haven in Paris, the boutique rental agency we worked with (http://www.haveninparis.com/). By the way, if you go to Paris and want to rent an apartment, I cannot recommend Haven in Paris highly enough. Not only do Erica and her staff hand pick the most amazing apartments, they truly understand customer service. They were tremendously helpful when we got stuck due to the volcanic ash airport shutdown; Erica instantly tracked down an available property and offered it to us – giving us immediate peace of mind. And if I didn’t mention it in a previous post, the apartment we rented near Parc Monceau was incredible – spacious (really!) with understated, elegant decor and every consideration given to comfort. It was perfect for two girls looking for a haven…not that we mind the clutter that comes with husbands and sons, but stepping into a virtual magazine layout was pretty incredible!

Any-hoo, I especially enjoyed reading Maggie Battista’s ‘hipparis’ posts because she likes to eat as much as I do; I figured her advice would be well worth taking. Thank you, Maggie! Café des Musées was everything you said it would be and the pommes frites were, hands down, the best I’ve ever had in Paris. Kathi is not a potato eater and even she could not resist them! Kathi also tried my ‘chevre chaud’ salad and was immediately hooked. Here are the details in case you are in Paris:

Café des Musées
49, rue de Turenne (3rd)
Tél: 01 42 72 96 17

http://hipparis.com/2010/04/16/paris-foods-you-must-eat-part-1/

kathy

p.s. Did anyone celebrate Bastille Day today? I went to my client’s store in Woodside: Emily Joubert Home & Garden. You can see the pictures we posted on their Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Emily-Joubert/101312312858

We walked over around 7pm to find the staff busily preparing for the night’s service. After ascertaining we did not have a reservation, the maitre d’ asked us to wait a few minutes while he determined what he could do. We stood there and watched them consult the reservation book, look around, then consult the book again. I was sure they were going to turn us down but, amazingly, they brought us to a very nice table in the center of the room. We split the entree (note that the fish in the photo is a half portion) and ordered a side of pommes frites. We asked for a wine suggestion and our lovely waiter recommended a white burgundy. It turned out to be a perfect compliment to the crispy, lemony fish. Kathi surprised me when she suggested we order dessert, she had totally embraced the spirit of Paris – eating well!

We had great fun over dinner, then took a taxi back to the apartment rather than walk (too far and too dark). On the way, our taxi driver asked about our evening. When we told him where we’d dined, he immediately said, “Mais, President Obama a juste mangé là!” (Apparently, President and Mrs. Obama had dined at La Fontaine de Mars during their recent visit to Paris). Funny, huh?

La Fontaine de Mars
129 Rue Saint-Dominique
75007 Paris, France
01 47 05 46 44

Subway: École Militaire