“I could go on and on about living in a city with streets lined with chocolate shops and patisseries, where it’s perfectly acceptable to enjoy lengthy wine fueled lunch rather than racing to work. When summer means picnics by the Sienne accompanied by icy glasses of rose’, and no meal is complete without a platter of spectacular cheeses, a baguette or two and dessert afterward. I could keep going but I’ll stop because you might start packing your bags and move here too. Which would jack up the apartment prices even further.”- David Lebovitz
Living in Paris is a dream for anybody who has read about it or seen it in movies and specially if you have visited it as a tourist and got fascinated with the culture, food, beauty and pace of life! I remember after visiting Paris, my daughter too was very enamored with France and even followed up on her enchantment and did a summer internship in Metz, France. But every place has its delights and disasters like David Lebovitz writes in his book “L’Appart – The delights and disasters of making my Paris home”. In this book the author talks about life in Paris in relation with his arduous and challenging experiences in apartment buying and renovation, but he intercepts and sugars his rants with stories about French food and culture and ofcourse his recipes.
The Renowned chef, and cookbook author, Lebovitz’s, style of writing is very conversational (which some have said about mine over the years) hence I found it engaging and entertaining with the titbits of French life from an expat point of view.
Lebovitz finds delight in how the French are obsessed about food. “….in France, everyone seems to be either 1) talking about what they had eaten; 2) eating; or 3) talking about what they were going to eat. Food is everywhere …in windows of charcuteries, and boulangeries, at the sprawling outdoor markets, and on the tables of the cafes and restaurants that line the sidewalks of Paris.”
Interestingly he says the obsession of living in Paris may be a dream of any American or any other world dweller. But he says the rêve(dream) of many Parisians is to live in United States! From his perspective of having lived in both countries he says, if the French can boast of excellent health care system, America he says offers the best customer service, and ofcourse a very easy way of finding and buying an apartment or home compared to France.
Comparing two countries, he rants that in France there is no common MLS listing of homes or apartments so very difficult to find an apartment on sale. He says the French have different ways of selling their homes-he has walked into homes which are leave alone staged( like the American way ) but are downright messy- with dangling undergarments, over flowing closets, piles of towels on bathroom floors, dinner plates and wine glasses left over on tables, dirty dishes in the kitchen sink etcetera….
His tirades include the French rules about the strict offer price for buying the home; the French way of going through a medical examination before getting a home loan or mortgage; difficulty in buying quality appliances in France ; harrowing remodeling process with contractors having a laissez faire attitude; ….
Finally after buying his 850 square feet apartment it (apparently large by average Paris standards), and remodeling it, he settles with all his requirements and American appliances- a kitchen with new ovens, farm style sink with sprayer, double sized refrigerators ( huge for paris standards), Ice maker, washer dryer, large countertops scattered with laptop to write while cooking, baking ingredients, stand mixers, cake pans, tart rings, cookbooks …..
He is happy till he gets an exorbitant electric bill and has to go through a distressing phase-two of fixing the electric glitches made during remodeling…… and almost starts making plans to return to America!
But “Baking again, writing about France and cooking la cuisine Francaise in my kitchen eventually helped me remember why I had moved to Paris and why I wanted to stay ….Living abroad I learned and acclaimed to different ways of doing things
End of every chapter is a recipe and I have bookmarked a few good ones to make. Lebovitz’s -Thai curry with lamb and haricots verts/green beans (Curry d’ agneau aux haricots verts); Beef stew with olives, Chocolate Soufflé and Swedish chocolate oatmeal cookies. I know the first on my list to try is the Swedish chocolate oatmeal cookies, since my American children would love this for their after-school snack 😉
To wrap up like a Parisian who Lebovitz says are less enthusiastic and neutral about everything, I will say the book was pas mal( not bad though I like it ) The book was an easy read because of the conversational style and would have helped if it was edited to a shorter length. But if you want to know about life in Paris from an outsiders point of view, it gives good perspective.
- Book: l’appart- The delights and disasters of making my Paris home.
- Author: David Lebovitz
- Reviewer: Birjis Rashed
- This book was received by me from the publishers at Blogging for Books.