The city of Nancy in northeastern France has one of the best claims to macaroon supremacy with a story that includes a pair of defiant 18th-century Benedictine nuns going into hiding at a local doctor’s home and baking macaroons on the sly. … Read More
You know you’re in the right establishment when your hotel room is on the cover of one of France’s leading design magazines. The recent opening of La Villa 1901 has generated much buzz and stellar press, including a recent … Read More
Macaroons are the cupcakes of France: they’re everywhere – and all through France, claims are made as to which “macarons” are the ones with pedigree or the royal stamp or the best-loved by the locals. The city of Nancy in … Read More
The next time you’re thinking of a week in Paris, think about spending a weekend in nearby Reims, the center of the Champagne region and home to one of the three most beautiful Gothic cathedrals in the world (the other two being Chartres and Amiens). … Read More
By now you’re savvy enough to know: true Champagne can only come from the Champagne region of France. Hence the uppercase. If the word “champagne” is in lower case or accompanied by the words “méthode traditionnelle,” then you’re looking at … Read More
Renovated in 2011, the three-star Campanile Reims Centre is located within a five-minute walk to the center of Reims. The modern rooms are a bit like an adolescent boy’s bedroom, painted in Granny Smith apple green and furnished with a … Read More
In the year 1912, the world’s largest ship made her maiden voyage sailing from Southampton. Meanwhile in Paris, a butcher in the 4th arrondissement purchased a neighboring restaurant and gave it his name: Benoit. Who would have imagined that one … Read More
The first time I went to Paris without a chaperone, I wandered the Left Bank, clutching a dog-eared copy of Hemingway’s “A Moveable Feast” in one hand, a baguette in the other. I was a walking cliché of an American … Read More
