1998
April 1st: Janet, our son Justin and I flew to Paris. We met with our great friends Proal, Connie and the children Rebecca and Matthew. A Family Vacation!! The first night we dined at ‘L’ Ami Louis’ on the 2nd. It was coming down in sheets when we arrived and knocked on the locked door. The staff was finishing ‘family meal’. It was 8 p.m. Soon we were in the softly lit bistro with coats hung on the walls. Our server came and offered menus. We ordered the classics. Every single one of us loved it! Johnny Apple has probably written the finest essay on this legendary place and I urge you to look for it.
We dined at ‘Alain Ducasse’ on the 3rd. (The kids didn’t go to that one). The Chef’s Menu was ‘A Celebration of Spring‘, which featured a feast of asparagus and morels in eight courses. It was the most expensive dinner of our lives up to that point, but what bliss!
On the 4th we drove to Italy/Tuscany. It was dazzlingly beautiful out in the vineyards that surrounded the place we had arranged to have lunch, ‘Castello di Ama’ with the winemaker, Lorenza. Justin was allowed to go in the kitchen after a few questions he had on making pasta to see it first hand by the lovely Lorenza. The next day (7th) we went to the street market in Florence. In the hustle of the streets Justin got lost. It was very scary! In the longest hour of my life the police found him and reconnected us. On the 8th we did a wine tasting with Marc de Grazia whom Proal and Connie had known from the wine trade they were in as well. That night he made us an authentic Bollito Misto in his seemingly ancient home in Florence. On the 9th we visited the town of San Gimignano. The teenagers wanted pizza! On the 10th we went to Siena. We let the kids (ages 16, 17 and 18) stay at the home we were renting and Proal, Connie, Janet and I went to a two star restaurant named “La Tenda Rossa”. When we got home the kids were drunk as skunks! Amaretto .. so that kind of drunk. Rebecca was in the shower throwing up. Proal… who almost never loses it … lost it. The owner of the home lived downstairs and he was pissed! Italian pissed which made it incompressible to me but pissed transcends all languages. I was getting sick of the rain in Italy by then. Our so called ‘villa’ (in the brochure) was a far cry from one. No stove, merely a toaster oven. The next day I bellowed, “That’s it!”. We drove to Cannes. Proal and Family had stayed in Italy. I wanted to salvage the rarity of a vacation! The sun came out as we crossed the border, praise God. We checked into the Hotel Carlton. We ordered room service, (cheeseburgers!) lounged on the huge bed and watched an old movie. Ahhhhhh. On the 12th the three of us wandered the streets of Cannes. We ate at a sidewalk café that had a range and quality of seafoods that rocked me. Elegant ladies with tiny dogs on their laps smiled at the three obvious Americans but all in good spirit. The next night we dined at Roger Vergé’s “Moulin de Mougins”. He was an early hero of mine. Some said that with the great chef’s retirement the restaurant had lost its edge. We stayed there at the inn overnight. I could hardly sleep thinking of all of the history that happened within these walls … the enormous lessons the young cooks obtained learning from him.
The following day Proal and Family rejoined us. As was planned months in advance by Proal and Connie we had lunch at the home of Lulu Peyraud of the famed winery Domaine Tempier. I have felt the way I did upon entering the home as I did when we first entered Chez Panisse. It is a sense that a life long memory is going to be forged that very day. After warm greetings all around Lulu allowed us to gather in her kitchen. I was about leveled taking this all in! She rolled heads of garlic expertly, peeled them fully and placed them a tall container of olive oil. She dipped a large ‘wand’ of rosemary into that and brushed the infused oil on the two legs of lamb hanging by thick twine from rustic tripods placed within inches of her wood burning stove. I was slack jawed I’m sure. Then she escorted us to her cozy dining room. We were seated around the dining room table. We had bread made by a local baker and a salad she dressed with elegance in a huge wooden bowl from a side stand. Then red wines were poured. The lamb was presented. Roasted potatoes, carrots and onions with the lamb’s drippings were also served. We drank their exquisite wines, talked and laughed. It seemed Lulu flirted. With the wines of Domaine Tempier we are all in love.