Tour de Gastronomie

Despite allll the fabulous food I indulged in while in Paris, I somehow managed to return three pounds lighter...

Croissants and Pain au Chocolat breakfasts...goat cheese on baguette and croque-monsieur lunches...truffles, French macaroons, crêpes, and chocolat chaud along the way...wine soaked, blue blood dinner hours each night...and yet, a deficit...

How is it possible to dine on traditional Parisienne fare at Restaurant Astier...

Including an all you can eat cheese course and beaucoup Puligny-Montrachet and, not walk out with your shoes suddenly two sizes too small for your snausaged toes?

Why, even the check had a caloric presentation...

There was Chestnut soup with bacon (translate lard in French) and ravioli of foie gras, roasted cod fish and mashed potatoes with black truffle and Vacherin glacé et framboise at Mon Vieil Ami on Île Saint-Louis...

Sancerre and Cobb salad at Ralph's on Saint-Germain, where I was darn lucky to nab this lone pic before Capt'n Babe and Sgt Amy of the Snob Patrol dove over their burger and lobster salad to confiscate my offending camera...

Le Grand Colbert, where my my attention to Babe's Grand Marnier crêpe served flambé was hijacked by Amy's Île Flottante, with nary a regret for sharing her lurking flu germs along with her spoon. If ever a dessert was worth a stomach flu...

How did I manage such indulgence, including eating my weight in Laderée and Pierre Hermé macaroons? Could it have been all the walking I did in my shopping frenzy? Did the shear excitement upon spying Ina Garten in the Saint-Germain Hermès stoke the coals of my metabolism? Orrr, maybe all the second hand smoke curbed my appetite? Whatever 'twas, sadly did not make it through customs...

Kindness of Amy and her father for all their fabulous restaurant intel. I anticipate a rude awakening if ever we travel without the Michelin Fahrenkopf Guide to dining...XXOO

Mandatory Respite

I've been coming and going or otherwise mentally occupied and run down for over a month and the natives are getting restless. So, I've promised Babe and the Ti-Babes a weekend full of quality family time with mandatory recouping pour moi. None of my type A compulsions, only relaxing allowed...



Sooo, I've booked myself a massage, had our special croissants overnighted from Williams-Sonoma, and I'm working on getting Babe's The Rape of Europa movie request filled. All I need are a box of those Patrick Roger truffles and a wee online Hermès purchase and I juuust may start to feel like my old self again...

Kindness of Babe for knowing when I'm outta gas and forcing a refuel. And, Amy for her The Rape of Europa recommendation during our afternoon at the Louvre. I'll be buttering up a croissant, sipping my tea avec crème and mentally narrowing down my silk and cashmere shawl picks while enjoying a li'l art history with the fam...XXOO

Allie von Chocolate Whisperer

Fly on the screen peering at a gmail exchange between moi and, a currently in Paris, Mel...

...and, i don't remember the name of the chocolate shop, but it was across from the saint-germain polo on the left side of the adjacent street. i had the truffle that was dusted in cocoa powder and 'twas theee BEST piece of chocolate i have ever put in my mouth! for once, one WAS enough...XXOO moi

...was it the Roger Patrick chocolate shop? that's where i go when i'm in st germain and it's right by polo...xoxo, m

yes!!! 'tis the exact same chocolate shop. hows about them apples? XXOO moi

...ah, i love that chocolate shop - you have great taste! my friend, whom i often travel with, had an apt in paris for 14 years. she said it's the best chocolate in the entire city...xoxo, m

Same fly later eavesdropping on a conversation between me and Babe...

(in my itoldyaso singsong voice) Melissa C. Morris said that chocolate shop I dragged you into across from Polo was the best chocolate shop in alllll of Pareee...

"The Titanic."

THE TITANIC?!

"Yup. Looked like a boat inside. Felt like I needed some of those Goyard steamer trunks."

Well, you can just get me some of those steamer trunks Mister so I can load up on those truffles the next time we're in town cuz it turns out my li'l Patrick Roger discovery was once named "Best French Chocolatier". I triiied to tell yaaa it was the best piece of chocolate I'd ever had...

Kindness of Babe and Amy who will now and forever more defer to the expertise of my palate wherest all chocolate is concerned. In fact, I prefer y'all to address me as, Allie von Chocolate Whisperer...XXOO

The Paris Haul

Fly on the twitter wall...

melissacmorris
at the mothership thinking of @summerisaverb (@ Paris Hermès)

summerisaverb
@melissacmorris wish i was there w/u instead of driving thru a blizzard while just ON paris time. let my last dying words be, hermès silk and cashmere shawl...XXOO

melissacmorris
@summerisaverb amen sister. and mine will be: lanvin flats, in assorted colors

Although, the Hermès silk and cashmere shawl was not one of my Paris purchases, I'm doing a fine job of living vicariously through Amy's til I get my hot li'l shaking hands on one to call my own...

Annnd, I have also added her Couvertures et Tenues de Jour silk dip-dyed scarf purchase to my post Paris lust list. Babe will ruuue the day he was virtually doubled teamed abroad, for clearly two Hermès heads are better than one...

He can barely manage this team of one for on my inaugural Saint-Honoré Hermès recon mission, my eyes zeroed in on the Soirée de Gala scarf...

I couldn't wait to phone Amy's room later that evening and ask if she was accepting visitors and their Hermès purchases from her sick bed...

The scarf had made it's way from the box to my neck prior to dinner which now freed up my arms for carrying the rest of my haul along for Show and Tell visiting hours...

Although...my Roger Vivier Chips flats had also managed to lead a short box life...

And, 'twas only for a lack of tan that I managed not to break the seal on these gold babies. Unless...pairing them with J. Crew flannel jammie bottoms and prancing around the hotel room counts as a seal break...

Babe held firm against all of Amy's and my wishes to buy for him, managing to deflect every Louis Vuitton cashmere scarf, Vilbrequin trunk and Tod's loafer we threw at his wallet. It was only after Mr. Fahrenkopf lured him into club Bvlgari tie that a habit was born...

Make that two habits born in Paris...

Kindness of Babe for being sooo generous in Paris. I would, however, like it noted for the record, that I walked away from the Hermès Cape Cod Double Tour watch. Which, according to my tactical play book, leaves the ball in my silk and cashmere, Goyard tote court...XXOO

Home Again, Home Again, Jiggity thud

Four days, five states, three cities, two colleges, one sick niece, too many sunrises, beaucoup Venti Soy Lattes, a big ole speeding ticket, and one predawn, white knuckle drive through whiteout conditions and, looong sigh, I'm finally home. Filthy, beyond tired, dangerously close to developing scurvy but, home...

I did muster enough energy to snag a very reduced in price Ralph Lauren Black Label cashmere Circle Sweater at the South Park Polo during my 12 hour pit stop in Charlotte. Now, if I had known, when I donned it at 3am the following morn, that I was facing a death defying drive through a blinding blizzard with a strooong possibility of a rendezvous with the jaws of life, I may have thought twice about pairing it with bleached out old cords, a sports bra, and bedroom slippers. I would have at least tossed on an Hermès bangle or two for the Rescue Crew...

Kindness of everyone for allowing me this brief respite from the Paris posts while I helped my sister caravan the girls back to school and then chauffeur her highness back home through the blinding snow storm while she sipped her hot chocolate, did her crossword, and periodically tossed a "MUSH!" my petrified way. And, Babe, who will NOT call asking for a translation of "very reduced in price"...XXOO

Dispatch From The Road

It's been a crazy couple of days and it ain't over yet. It started with karma slinging a sleepless night my way for infecting Hilbils with my flu. So much for my sister and I escorting the girls back to school with a 6am start. More like, all of us up helping a très sick Hilly til 5am and a 24 hour delay in hitting the road. Sooo, an alarm clock reset followed by Greenvulle, Columbia and a brief respite in Charlotte til we hit the road again trying to outrun mother nature...

Babe's been keeping my exhausted spirits up with boatloads of incoming pic texts and dispatches from home...

Ohhh, what I'd give to be curled up in a ball asleep...

Kindness of the bff Kimba for hosting us tonight at Casa Howlin. Although, not sure if it actually counts as a "night" with Mother Nature forcing a 3am checkout...XXOO

The Grand Palais des Champs-Elysées

We were très fortunate that Amy's father managed to snag the five of us tickets to the sold out Monet exhibit at The Grand Palais des Champs-Elyées...

Sooo fortunate, in fact, that two in our party with the stomach flu roused themselves from their sick beds just to go. And, let me tell ya, I later came down with that very same flu and wouldn't have been capable of that feat if Claude Monet himself had been there walking the step and repeat...

I left with a couple additions to my virtual masterpiece wish list; Les Dindons 172 x 175 cm, which made me want to jump up and down with glee...

And, La Rue Montorgueil 80 x 48.5 cm...

The rest of them are in a bidding war for the Red Kerchief. I saw snow through those french doors, stuck my nose in the air and walked on...

But, alas, we had one casualty at The Grand Palais. Mere minutes after I had been loving petting admiring Amy's mother's stole it was deftly slipped from her neck by a baaad person with good taste. Somewhere in Paris is a well dressed pickpocket...

Kindness of Mr. Fahrenkopf for getting us the tickets that allowed us to breeze past the queue of hundreds just hoping to make it in to see the exhibit. Now, had he known the cost of admission would be 12€ per person annnd a Louis Vuitton Mahina stole, there may have been a steep service charge for us freeloaders...XXOO