Tourist porn, childhood homes, the museum shuffle and a man named Guy

Jeff here - Guten Tag from Paris!

Are you familiar with food porn? It's a social media trend of people taking pictures of food, usually predicated on it being a unique preparation. Walking around Paris, I coined the phrase "tourist porn" to represent the uber pictorial qualities of this beautiful city. From buildings to tree lined streets, the Seine to the Eiffel Tower, and the wealth of museums and churches, there are countless things to photograph.

I don't think the pic I have attached counts as tourist porn per se, but it was fun to take. As many of you know, my friend Christian spent his formative years in Paris before his family moved back to the Pittsburgh area where we met in 6th grade. Kevin and I went to see the house he lived in. HIs front door opened onto the back of the Grand Palais - a large historic site, exhibition hall and museum complex on the Champs Elysees. Definitely a change from where we grew up in Bethel Park.

Kev twisted his ankle before we came and while he's had to wear a brace to support it, he has been getting around like a pro! What's interesting is that when we are out and walking, he's fine. When we're in museums, it starts to aggravate him. We call it the museum shuffle. It's that sort of sideways shuffle as you walk horizontally looking at paintings and sculptures. In this city, with it's preponderance of museums, I'm sure it's a common malady.

Kev's already told you about our arrival at Guy Savoy and getting to meet the chef himself. The food was nothing short of phenomenal! They had a variety of offerings for dinner - you could do the 12 course tasting menu, do a traditional starter, main course, and dessert offering, or a customized tasting menu of 6 - 7 courses. We chose the latter for a couple reasons: (1) the food is rich! (2) while they say it's 6 or 7 courses, there were all sorts of special interludes from the chef. An example which encompasses both reasons - the chef made a pumpkin soup which had a few slivers of white truffle in it. We took a taste and while it was tasty, it also was very rich.

Here are a few of the things we ate over the 3.5 hours at the restaurant:
2 amuse bouche
Chestnut soup with roasted chestnuts and black mushrooms
Scallop carpaccio
Soft egg on a cauliflower broth
Roasted lobster
Artichoke soup with parmesan and black truffle
Veal sweetbreads
4 -5 different desserts
As you can see, we definitely did not go home hungry!

I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas!