Boulevardiers on the Boulevards
Due to circumstances within our control – Paris encore une fois – we’re heading for Queer Street adjacent. We’re not over the moon about it but such is the price of expended ebullient social energy. Well beyond the faded tapestry of dawn, long after lunch, we will witness the slow transition of dusk; silver planes will be seen escaping, bright in the last sun above the darkening city. The streets will lose colour to the night. “The French take their pleasures very seriously; French chic is a high art form,” writes Ada Louise Huxtable in The Eighties, New York Review of Books, 6 April 1995.
The 9th, to coffee in Lazu (Comptoir), lunch in Lazu (Restaurant), pray in Notre Dame de Lorette (Church) and play in the bars around the casual Place José Rizal, far away from the carefully pollarded symmetries of the Jardins des Tuileries. We’re here super early in this restaurant so it’s quiet: front of house is acting waitress and sommelier. She’s fab. This is going to be a terrific lunch. Les Vins Blancs list is divided into Provence, Savoie, Alsace, Jura and Corse. It might not be ski season just yet but we’re feeling Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes so order the perfect sip from that prefecture. Domaine Louis Magnin Roussette de Savoie 2018 is bright, fresh, smoky, sharp and very good. It appears nacreous in the soft noon light. Fly Me to the Moon sung by a chanteuse is playing in the background. This is going to be a totally terrific lunch.
There are four entrées, five plats and five desserts on the menu. Our new multitasking friend produces the favourites of the day board but we’re glued to the menu. We’re always versatile so go vegan starter, pescatarian main and vegetarian pudding. Holy cow! But first a creamed cauliflower on parmesan cracker amuse bouche to commence our culinary adventure. A sack of bread and cayenne dusted butter quoin stones put the rustic into rustication.
Tartelette sablée au parmesan, pickles de girolles, Romanesco, champignons séchés, courgettes au safran, carotte et vinaigrette algre doux. A noble theme. Wow! Fillet de cabillaud Skrei rôti, cocos de Paimpol, vierge de radis roses et noirs, emulsion raifort. Wow wow! And the Norwegian Atlantic Cod even comes with our favourite bow to Michelinism: foam. As Hervé This scribes in Molecular Gastronomy: Exploring the Science of Flavour (2002), “Low in fat because they are essentially made of air – foams came to prominence with the rise of Nouvelle Cuisine in France in the 1960s and then gained broader popularity as a consequence of the growing interest in lighter foods on both sides of the Atlantic. Today, with the advent of molecular gastronomy … they are very fashionable among connoisseurs.” Mousse au chocolat Lazu: éclats de chocolat, fleur de sel et piment d’Espeletter, huile d’olive. Wow wow wow! A coconut shortbread surprise, more nuanced than a triple entrendre, ends our gourmet voyage.
What does Monsieur Michelin have to say about Lazu? “The Chef, who was well schooled (Bruno Docuet’s second at Le Régalade), composes a well crafted bistronomique cuisine with judicious associations. While the menu changes every week, specialties such as carmelised sweetbreads and potato pâté en croûte have been enjoyed since the opening.” We say witness this materiality, solidity and substance! Well, well, how did we miss those favoured sweetbreads? Return visit required. The baked chocolate pudding served straight from the pan at our table with a side portion of olive oil is return visit worthy in itself. On y va!
Rémi Lazurowicz appears halfway through lunch for a chat even though the restaurant is now filling up with staff and customers. The charming Head Chef owner dashes across Rue Marguerite de Rochechouart from Le Comptoir to join us, full of the joys of comptoiring and restaurateuring and living. “I wanted to become a chef first and foremost,” he relates. “My cuisine is all about honesty, simplicity and freshness. I do want lots of textures and contrasts as well. I get quite a lot of English customers as we’re close to Gare du Nord.” With food, as with faces, there are moments when the forceful mystery of the inner being appears. Inwards and outwards, the lunch’s character with its inherent beauty, is in its portions and its sureness of style.
We’re entrenched in a metaphoric city continually reinventing itself to remain vital, a constant layering of cultural atrophy. Pushing beyond that immediate hinterland of desire, Eden restored. Everything tastes better in Paris. Wind inducing cauliflower becomes the breezy taste of autumn. Everything sounds better in French. Take “bricolage”: so much classier than “DIY store”. Valorisation is easy. Recalling our lunch in the 9th is like freeze framing that key moment in a film around which the whole of the narrative pivots before a spiral of hypnogogic descent. You witnessed it through us, dwellers in history. Now look: summer has turned, autumn has dropped. Lazu the moon.
