Malaise and Dining in Paris
Observations from a San Francisco restaurant+tech nerd
France: so hot right now. Or, depending who you ask, so meh. There’s that Maureen Dowd editorial from a few weeks ago, and the Time piece describing how Paris’s rainy springtime caused the French more misery than usual this year — and even detailing how many citizens are leaving the country for greener pastures elsewhere in the EU.
On a recent trip to Paris, I didn’t get so much of this malaise, though I was pleasantly surprised by something I find uncharacteristic: chefs and restaurants experimenting with different styles, concepts and ingredients. French restaurants and cooking styles are deeply rooted in tradition; with years of fame and success, these specific dining experiences have persisted through generations of restaurants. But in June, this Californian felt oddly at home among a sea of nouveau French cuisine focusing on local ingredients and simple preparation. Thanks to my pet project, Chefs+Tech — weekly news reports and commentary about chefs and restaurants plus digital and social technology — I spent my time in Paris especially in-tune to both of these things.
Food-wise, I managed to avoid stereotypically French high-sauced, ingredient-heavy dishes, and instead watched through windows as young chefs in open kitchens prepared dishes like pappardelle with rabbit ragu (the best thing I ate all trip), burrata and pesto, trout in a light vegetable broth with fennel and potato, and a lovely pea and broccoli chilled soup flavored with feta and beets. I stayed in the young and vibrant Canal St. Martin neighborhood in the 10th arrondissement in northwest Paris, a hub of new openings and young talent, from traditional staple Le Chateaubriand’s second spot, Le Dauphin, to coffee houses run by Australians (the best place to find anything resembling my beloved San Francisco latte) to awesome boutique shopping. No surprise that chefs and restauranteurs have set up shop in the area, with more to come — I even heard rumblings of a fresh-pressed juice bar coming to the area later this year. The scene is reminiscent of what it must have been like to be around the farm-to-table movement in California, when chefs like Alice Waters and Thomas Keller and Jeremiah Tower so famously changed the game.
Social tech-wise, though, restaurants in Paris are nothing like their digitally-savvy American counterparts. Frenchie, arguably one of the most American-like restaurants in Paris (partially because of its English-speaking staff, but more likely because Anthony Bourdain visited for the last episode of No Reservations), has a solid Twitter and Facebook presence, even offering up last-minute coveted reservations through social channels. But it has a fraction of the followers of a similar spot in the states — and it’s one of the best examples in Paris. In fact, few restaurants even accept reservations online; in the American market, OpenTable makes it too easy not to accept them.
To bring my thoughts full circle: I’m curious if the trend toward more “California” style French cuisine will help blaze the trail for other changes to the dining landscape; namely, the embrace of chef and restaurant social channels. Pre-trip, my gut told me that the French were too stuck in their superior mindset to embrace new technology; post-trip, I see a huge market and a ton of potential for promotion and creativity as the perhaps-ambivalent French start to explore new and creative ideas.
For this San Franciscan, visiting in what feels like the eve of a technological boom for Parisian restaurants exuded excitement and promise. And watching new, young, and newly successful restaurants begin find their footing in a medium now so critical to American success makes me hopeful for the next wave of (California-influenced!) French dining innovation.
