A Love Affair with the Perfect Food
MEET PARIS OYSTER is an engaging exploration of the Parisian love affair with the world’s most sensuous shellfish. It centers on Huîtrerie Régis, a tightly packed oyster bar in the heart of the City of Light, with an opinionated owner and a colorful cast of regulars. Part cultural journey, part cookbook, and part slice-of-life play, this book introduces readers to the appetites (gastronomic and otherwise) of Paris and its people. Beyond Huîtrerie Régis, the French oystermen, and the other characters in pursuit of the oyster, Mireille Guiliano shares information on the best oysters around the world, their nutritional value, the best wine pairings with them, and a dozen mouthwatering recipes that will have readers craving, buying, and preparing oysters with confidence. So take a virtual trip to Paris — indulge and enjoy!
Reader Reviews
For the oyster lover as well as the oyster newbie, “MEET PARIS OYSTER, A Love Affair With the Perfect Food”, by Mireille Giuliano, is a happy sojourn along the byways of oyster eating. Along the way, the spirit of France and especially Paris, is charmingly revealed to you. You will learn the differences among the various French oysters, from the fine de claire to the pousse de claire, and where they come from, and the “farmers” who grow and harvest them. You will learn how to open them, season them (or not), and numerous wine pairings.
Ms. Giuliano tells where to eat them, from the humble Huitrerie Regis (20 seats), to the grand, meta art deco La Coupole Montparnesse. For those who may be diffident about rawness, there are recipes that will send you to the kitchen. Included, too, are the nutritional benefits of oysters, with a salute, of course, to their reputed aphrodisiac power. (Conspicuous by its absence is the old joke about the man who, upon learning of this latter quality, ordered two dozen and then later complained that only one of them worked.) You will love this book about oysters, France, and its people.
Bill and Mary Kiriakis, Novato, CA
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