Cornichon.org

Francophobia

FRANCE COMES TO SEATTLE IN SEARCH OF AMERICAN TOURISTS

I'm getting a fresh perspective on the state of French-American relations from a bar stool in Belltown.

Pro wrestling is on TV. The villain wears a beret and a Jean-Claude Van Damm sneer. He taunts the crowd by unfurling the French tricolor. When he gets roundly trounced by good guys in Desert Storm fatigues, the emcee shouts, "What a great time to be an American!" Deafening cheers.

The faux Frenchie's nom-de-ring is Rob Van Damm, from Battle Creek, Mich., no less, who's managed to turn his Muscles from Brussels character into a pitiful Pirate of Paris. The audience may have little sense of geography, but even here at the tavern they need someone to boo and hate, non? Mais oui. "Fuck the French," the guy to my left growls into his Fat Tire.

Time warp to Rover's and free-flowing champagne two days later...

France is fighting back with a 15-city media tour to promote a new tourism campaign ("Let's Fall in Love Again"), wooing local travel writers with the traditional enticements of food and wine.

No one knows quite how we got from a simple fact of the French making their own call on invading Iraq to the notion that they hate Americans. Yet here we are. A downtown Seattle attorney says his firm's senior partners are choosing alternate destinations in the Mediterranean. Several Jewish friends cite isolated attacks on synagogues and cemeteries as evidence of "government-sanctioned" anti-Semitism in France. A woman from Spokane tells me she's never going back to Paris. Sylvain France, the French trade attaché in Seattle, recalls speaking with a local couple who canceled their trip because they heard Americans were being attacked on the streets. Aside from the gratuitous posturing by people who weren't going to France at any rate, the Chirac government is worried about any decline in tourism by rich Americans?hence this effervescent media tour, the grab bag of discounts available only for American visitors, and some new TV ads to dispel the notion that Americans are unwelcome.

Thierry Rautureau, Seattle's "Chef in the Hat," watches approvingly as white-jacketed waiters cruise the room bearing oysters with caviar, seared foie gras, and lobster salad. "France is all about love," he says, as Robin Massée of the French Government Tourist Office cues up the new promotional film. Wait till you see Woody Allen stammering about "freedom-kissing" his wife, or the New York City firefighter gushing about French hospitality.

NOW, I'VE ENJOYED the grace of French hospitality for decades, but tourists and travelers are fickle. With more vacation choices than ever and more reasons to not travel at all, folks are scrutinizing their portfolios and bank balances, listening to the gloomy forecasts, and finding plenty of reasons to stay home. Maybe this is the year for that face-lift, honey. So the plastic surgeons are doing fine, thank you. It's the leisure-travel business that's in les toilettes.

When I founded a boutique travel company called France in Your Glass in the mid-1980s, France still rhymed with romance, and meandering 'Merkins were eager to explore fine wine. On the hoof, glass in hand, amidst the vineyards of Margaux and Romanée-Conti. First growths and grand crus were the holy grail. My starry-eyed guests would arrive with a checklist of famous domaines to visit, a cheat sheet of the best vintages, and a matrix of scores from leading wine critics.

Sometimes I'd find myself turning into a French waiter, looking down my nose, and scolding, "Monsieur has ordered the calves brains with chocolate sauce." Still, they kept coming. An elegant Web site, designed by a family genius, brought business from around the globe, though more from Singapore than Seattle. (Local enophiles seemed loath to cough up top-end rates for the privilege of lunching with aristocratic château owners, surrounded by dusty bottles from the ancestral cellar. "I'll just rent a car at the airport and wing it," I heard more than once. Might works in Napa, mon ami, not in Burgundy or Bordeaux.)

THEN THE PERFECT storm started brewing: the dot-com bubble. The 9/11 trauma. The market collapse. The run-up to Iraq. Iraq itself. Post-Iraq. SARS. The 20 percent slide in the dollar. Dubya's insane campaign to vilify the French for their presumption of political independence. The recession that's rapidly becoming a depression.

A depression for me, at any rate. France in Your Glass is broke. I guaranteed all those lines of credit, so I'm broke, too. Thanks, George. Merci, Jacques. Maybe I can get a job with Thierry.

This account was originally published in Seattle Weekly in June, 2003. Cornichon's alter ego, Ronald Holden was the paper's executive editor in 1979 and 1980.

Copyright © 1997-2003, Seattle Weekly and Village Voice Media. All rights reserved.

A Bad Meal In Paris

Why now ? After all, Cornichon is supposed to tell you what's good and why. But here we are ... a rant about a bad meal in Paris.
Scene: the Place des Vosges, one of the most harmonious squares in Paris, in the heart of the Marais, a newly fashionable place to live. And popular with tourists.

Time: lunch hour. Place: a restaurant called Guirlande de Julie, where I'd eaten twice before. Specialty is that hearty cold-weather dish, pot-au-feu. A simple boiled dinner. Beef brisket, broth, fresh winter vegetables [carrots, leeks, onions, potatoes]. With mustard & cornichons. Cornichons in a little crockpot, with wooden tongs to extract them. Ah yes, except that there were no cornichons.

Still, looked great when served. Looked OK on the plate, too. [The French say "in" the plate, perhaps because their plates are more concave than American dishes.]

But yikes, the meat ! Supposed to be meltingly tender. Barely need to approach with knife, it falls apart. Not this time. Tough as a straw mattress. Felt glued together. Almost inedible.

Complained to waitress, Nathalie, who'd already let me know she was a student in economics. Wants to work in tourism, could I help ? Not a chance, sweetheart.

After all, you didn't even remember to bring the cornichons !

Soif Quenches a Thirst in Santa Cruz

Thirsty again, I'm clomping awkwardly along the streets of downtown Santa Cruz on Saturday afternoon in a pair of mark-down sandals from Long?s Drugs, having trashed my tennies in the surf. Fortunately, beachwear was on clearance, so they let me walk off in these for 35 cents a toe. I round the corner at Pacific and Webster and find, in my path, a Sign. Heaven-sent, it seems, to slake my parched palate: Soif.

Somewhere in my youth or childhood, I must have done something to deserve this.

In I go and hop onto a stool facing the four-cell, sixteen-bottle WineKeeper. My toes feel better already.

My senses tell me this is a real wine bar for real people. They've just finished a tasting of half a dozen rieslings, any one of which I could still try for $2 a taste. Or a flight of four whites from north-central Italy for $11, or five Tuscan reds for $20.

Blackboard lists seven small plates available for $3.50 even when the kitchen?s closed ? as it is this afternoon, being well short of the 5 PM dinner hour. No matter. Five sparkling wines by the 2-ounce taste or 5-ounce glass. A dozen more whites, from Mount Eden's chard grown in the Santa Cruz mountains just out the door, or the Loire, or South Africa or Austria or New Zealand. Sherries from Spain. Another dozen reds, from nearby Zayante Vineyard to the distant Rhone to Australia. And another dozen dessert wines, from a 5 Puttonyos Tokaji Aszu to a 1964 Madeira. I?m in heaven. No, make that Heaven with Capital H. Spelled www.soifwine.com.

High, high ceilings, walls painted wine-red. Open just about a year now. Two-thirds of the floor space is given over to the wine bar & restaurant, the remainder to an impressive retail store. You can buy any bottle from the store and drink it, from Riedel glassware at your table for an extra $10. Is that a deal or what ? Which of the 50 choices to try ?

Start with 2001 Greco di Tufo from Umbria, taste for $3.75, glass $6.50. Straw-colored & refreshing. Would be ideal with some seared tuna, but the chef?s on break so I order something already plated up: asparagus with aioli. Perfection ! Bright green spears on a dazzling white plate, offset by nugget of garlicky, lemon-yellow mayo. Paradise. Ready for another glass, shift to sherry: 3-oz. pour of Hidalgo La Gitana manzanilla, $4. Yum ! My kind of sherry, dry & smooth. Ideal for transition to stronger flavors of crostini topped with hummus. Again, nothing on plate to distract from the morsels or detract from focus on wine.

Move on to a red: Ninth Island pinot noir from Tasmania, $3.25. Juicy, reminds me of Oregon pinot more than Burgundy. Had thought about cheese, but it?s still in the fridge and owner Ted Pearson won?t serve it cold. So I go for a bit of the pâté de campagne, thin slices of intensely flavored meatloaf, and a taste of Jean-Louis Chave?s excellent Saint Joseph, $3.50. Polish off the bread. By now I?m ready to drink a toast to my quenched thirst, a flute of sparkling prosecco. Here?s to Soif ! May all our thirsts be slaked with as much elegance.

Kitchen opens as I exit. Fire marshal says he'll allow the next 76 lucky souls to occupy the premises, no more. Hurry in ! Hurry !!