The Great Culinary Scavenger Hunt

Charlie has come to Paris with a shopping list of the kitchen accoutrements and reference materials that he intends to acquire. For the majority of these things, they either cannot be found in the US at a reasonable cost or cannot be found at sufficiently high quality to meet the chef's standards. This morning he is giddy as he plans the route we'll take from store to store, collecting each item in his culinary scavenger hunt.

We start at E. Dehillerin, one of the most famous kitchen stores anywhere. It's known for its no-nonsense layout and even less nonsense staff. As we walk in, I immediately recognize the humorless bearded man who instructs Charlie to leave his backpack near the counter before proceeding into the depths of the store. The place is drab and dark, with high shelves covered in every possible tool you could think of, and some you'd never even conceive of if you weren't in the industry. As we switchback through the aisles, I keep picking up gadgets and asking Charlie what they are. While standing at the checkout counter, Charlie makes a joke to me in English about getting the "duck press" in the front window. I don't know what the hell a duck press is but the stern bearded man smiles and asks, "Duck press?" to which Charlie jokingly replies in French, "For home, of course!" Then they discuss the price of such a thing, which ranges from $1,150 to $2,300. Afterward, Charlie points it out to me and explains that it's exactly what it sounds like: a vice-type contraption for making pressed duck, a traditional dish from Rouen, France.

Charlie at culinary Mecca.

Our next stop is A. Simon, a store resembling something like Williams-Sonoma with twice the pragmatism and half the pretension. They carry enough everyday, non-specialized items that even I'm able to pick out a thing or two for our home kitchen. Around the corner we find G. Detou which, like the other stores we've been to, looks like it has been named after someone. But in conveniently homophonous French its name is pronounced "J'ai de tout (I have everything)." We are specifically hoping to pick up some of the Madagascan vanilla beans that we had found there at a steal several years before, but the price appears to have quadrupled since then. Instead we leave with a couple of hard-to-find types of peppercorn. Lastly, we step into the Librairie Gourmande so that Charlie can get his hands on the newly released Le grand livre de charcuterie penned by three MOF chefs: Nicolas Arnaud, Fabian Pairon, and Christian Segui. He also grabs a beautiful hardcover of a book simply titled Pâte en croûte by Sonier and Lastre.

Now that Charlie has mostly fulfilled his wishlist, we walk back toward the newly renovated Les Halles area. It was under construction the entire time we lived in Paris, but is now a lovely green space next to a large shopping mall and the busiest transit station in the city. As we approach, we find ourselves at the back of the beautiful Gothic church of Saint-Eustache, easily my favorite church in Paris. The last time I visited, it was a grey drab ghost of a building, nearly empty and unused, all of its paintings faded. It was cold and echoey, with a crumbling, abandoned feel. It really showed its age, a quality I adore in historical buildings. As we enter this time, it is clear that a lot of restorative work has been done. On one side, the afternoon sun sparkles through refreshed stained glass, casting rainbows on once dull frescoes that now shine brightly. The center of the nave is equipped with chairs for services and concerts, and the huge beast of an organ looms magnificently above the main entrance. There is still much work to be done, but the progress is clear. And even though its character has changed profoundly, inside and out, Saint-Eustache remains one of my favorite buildings on the planet.

Saint-Eustache glitters in its new coat of paint.

Tall columns and arches leading to the altar

Play "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida!"

Gotta love the Goths.

We leave through the south exit of the church and find a place to sit on the esplanade there. We nibble on sandwiches, and watch insistent pigeons get up close and personal with anyone who appears to be eating something that could fall on the ground. People sun themselves, chat, cuddle, and smooch in view of the formidable Gothic architecture. It is all very idyllic until a woman walking a large dog down the central path allows it to take a giant crap right on the pavement. She digs through a nearby garbage can to find something with which to pick up the dog's leavings and then disposes of them. However, I suspect if she didn't have an audience of a hundred lounging Parisians and their judgmental glances, she wouldn't have bothered.

Charlie is starting to the feel the burden of his loaded backpack, so we go back to our AirBnB. There he unpacks and handles each new item and flips through his books with the excitement of a little kid on Christmas morning.

Charlie (in his Escoffier t-shirt) reads about liver sausage.

After a short nap, we go out for a walk in the seedy Quartier Pigalle and Place de Clichy. The former is the neighborhood of the famed Moulin Rouge and is known for being somewhat unsavory. From our time here before, we knew the district was home to sex shops, prostitution, and other vices, alongside eateries, tourist trinket shops, and the (now defunct) Museum of Eroticism. The area now seems consist primarily of the baser establishments with little else to offer. Both sides of the street are now lined with almost nothing but sex shops and poorly disguised brothels, interrupted by the occasional closed grocery store or fast food place. Hoes gotta eat too, I guess.

My batteries suddenly run out and I find myself tottering behind Charlie in a fog of thirst and exhaustion. We return to Café Marguerite, where we had eaten at upon our arrival, and have a couple plates of decent comfort food. Feeling recharged, our final stop of the day is to pick up a few snacks from the grocery store to get us through the awkward morning hours when we're likely to be awake before the shops open.