Healthy, Simple and Delicious Food

L'Atelier de Joel Robouchon -- Meal of my life.

It happened on a balmy Spring night at a small little restaurant in the heart of St. Germain called L'Atelier. It was an experience that I will never forget. Each patron is sat at a bar surrounding the kitchen; it is performance art -- the art of creating very fine cuisine. The best of the best preparing food that brings it's patrons to tears.  My neighbors were a lovely couple from Sydney, who, like me, love food. We sat together for over three hours conversing as if we had known each other for years. The food and the company created a symbiotic alignment of food and new friends... food truly has the power to transcend. No matter who you are with or where you are in the world, we are all alike in our appreciation for how good life can be.  Because words cannot properly define my experience that night, I will let the highlights of this ten course extravaganza say it all... OH MY!

What we saw as we dined -- the gorgeous kitchen.

First course: Crab Royale. Looks as pretty as it tastes.

Caviar avec creme fraiche. Yes, this was life changing.

Egg at the bottom, morelles and a bit of foam -- oh lala

Red mullet. We never get fish like this in LA!

Asparagus soup

Not to forget the wine. I had to do the pairings, I mean come on. This was my favorite.

Quail, Robouchon's infamous mashed potatoes covered in shaved white truffles.

Dessert: This was ALL edible --Chocolat Araguaini, glace au grue de cacao, biscout Oreo.
NO idea what this all means as it was en francaise.
But... Oh. My. God. It was glorious!

I don't think I will ever have a meal like this again and I constantly remind myself how lucky I am to have had this experience. As I sit at my desk at work, I daydream about this night -- pinch myself! Good food, for me, is most often found in a great burrito, amazing cheese or a piece of great toast even. I don't crave fancy food.  But I really appreciated the love that went into creating this glorious meal and moreover, how uniting food can be. I will be forever grateful for this memory and remind myself often that this wasn't a dream; that it happened one night in Paris.