Skinny food

I was invited to a cocktail/dinatoire on Thursday. It was intelligently planned, for the couple live in a strategic location in the heart of St. German des Pres, near rue du Bac. It was la Soirée de la Mode so they could escape the usual fines that would ensue by placing tables outside to allow guests to spill to out onto the street.

There are strict and severely enforced laws to that effect. One is allowed to use the sidewalks for walking and window shopping and I suppose, a bit of loitering. But one is not allowed to use the sidewalk in front of one's house to place a table, not even for one exceptional night.

Still it was your typical Parisan soiree. Although the hosts are friendly and obviously love to entertain, they made no effort to introduce strangers and encourage more commingling. The whole downstairs is organized for maximum traffic flow, with a huge open kitchen for cooking for large numbers. They must entertain alot, so clearly it does not seem to be part of French custom to welcome strangers openly.

Being a foreigner and knowing no one, I was pretty much ignored all night. Perhaps the guests all knew each other and so didn't notice the stranger amongst them. The attempts I made to introduce myself just petered out. All french are not unfriendly, but it is a pretty safe bet that attendance to many a native Frenchman's soirée will leave you with as many acquaintances at the end as you came with.

Maybe they are just shy. I'll never understand what appears to be the lack of curiosity and openness to include others.

Meanwhile, the mode for food has become downright unfriendly and inedible! French cuisine has always been reputed for healthy small portions, which I applaud. Nouvelle cuisine taken up a notch: hors d'oeuvres passed around in esthetically pleasing perhaps, but impossible to eat from, dishware.

Most of the food could be labeled highly 'creative', taking the "what-on-earth-am-I-eating dilemna" to new question marks. Impossibly long and narrow glasses for some version of gazpacho-the glass too narrow to drink from nor scoop with a spoon. Deep spoons held some kind of unidentifiable creamy mixture. The first bite was manageable but the only way to finish it was to stick a tongue deep into the spoon to scoop-very awkward.

Even the waiters found it hard to describe the menu when pressed. Frothy mousses, hot pink rondelles and other unsavory shapes and colors. it all looked pretty enough if you were the adventurous gourmand. It just didn't look like anything you would want to eat, especially considering there were no instructions on how to negotiate the utensils.

I hope this mode passes quickly. I have never liked to see cheese and crackers at a cocktail party as Americans do, but it might have made me happy on Thursday.

All in all, it made for an interesting sociologically ruminative evening, but one that I don't care to repeat for quite some time.

Paris-most convivial

Now that spring is well on its way to summer, every neighborhood in Paris seems to host its version of what we know as block parties. Festive neighbors lay out tables and linen and line them with mash-ups of food and drink- bottles of wine in assorted colors, soft drinks, evian and enough food to think about skipping dinner. From cocktail snacks to home-made quiches and tourtes, ham slices, cheese through to desserts-the occasional American brownie and fruit tarts.

Neighborhood galleries and shops host their versions with free-flowing champagne, sometimes on concurrent nights, making it impossible to see everything in one go. Not that it is ever possible to take in all the art on display, but some try. I gave up long ago.