Feel Good Friday

This afternoon's run around the lakes of the Bois de Boulogne.

Happy Friday my lovely readers. This week has been exceptionally feel good for me, I hope it has been the same for you? If not, the weekend is just around the corner so please recharge your batteries, if you can, by doing nice things with nice people that make you feel positive and good about yourself...and life.

Can I share with you my feel good week?

- I have managed 3 runs during my lunch break this week (10k, 7k and 8.3k) and we have been very very lucky with the weather here in Paris because it does not feel like winter at all. I'm going to try a long run this weekend (thinking of hitting 15k) and so I should also do some hip-opening yoga routines. A particularly feel good song at the moment on my playlist? "Inner Ninja" by Classified (feat. David Myles). I discovered it via Strala's Strong Fall playlist.

- On Wednesday, so many good things fell from the sky at around the same time. I got to meet Meg, a fellow expat blogger based in Paris. Meg has kindly agreed to be my next interviewee for "LouLou meets..." so it is a huge understatement to say I'm very excited about receiving her answers and publishing that particular post.

Meg is a self-proclaimed beer nut so I joined her for a drink at the beer bar Express de Lyon. New territory for me, as I'm a huge fan of the vin.

I was very happy to try something new, the service was friendly and the waiter happily answered Meg's questions about the brews. The lady herself was an absolute delight: funny, engaging and with a real joie de vivre.

- Some more big news that I received on Wednesday evening. *Drum roll please* I have been contacted by a company to participate in sponsored events throughout 2014. This will involve some travel, as well as meeting new bloggers from several European cities. I'm very grateful for such an opportunity and believe the whole experience will be a fantastic learning curve for me and my blog. Watch this space guys. Literally.

- This wouldn't be a true blog post without some mention of food. This week I discovered these yummy  meringue fancies which originate from the north of France (Lille to be precise). There are six flavours in total. JB and I sampled the Merveilleux and the Incroyable and I will definitely be going back to try the remaining flavours. You can find their addresses here (for any Londoners out there, there is a shop in South Ken.)

- I have found a piano teacher. My first lesson will be in mid-March so this weekend I have to start practising again. My new teacher has asked me to prepare some Chopin, so I'll decide which nocturne/étude/waltz to begin with...

Take care of yourselves and have a bon week-end.

Lou
xxx

Feel Good Friday

It's Friday and in Paris the sky is clear and blue. I wish I was outside enjoying it but I'm happy to make do with seeing it from the office window. So once again, the weekend is almost upon us. This is helping me feel good about the fact that today is Friday. What do you have planned? What have been the highlights or lowlights of your week?

Something I have been doing a lot more of this week is listening to Classic FM, in particular to John Suchet and Jamie Crick. I've also started trying to find a piano teacher - it's not so much about learning the piano as I did plenty of that at music school - but I want to have some motivation to practice at home and have conversations about music again. Who knows, it may even lead to some chamber music opportunities! But I shouldn't get ahead of myself...

As for the weekend, well I'm very much looking forward to a bit of cooking and baking. I've been a little more active on Pinterest recently - it's a wonderful source for recipes. In particular, healthy recipes. Here are my choices which I'll be trying out this weekend.

Roasted cauliflower and kale pie with potato crust

Image source and recipe

Naked chocolate cake

Image source and recipe

I'm also going to be meeting Hannah, an American blogger in Paris, for brunch at Rose Bakery. I'm excited to hear Hannah's story and how she ended up in Paris. Rose Bakery is wonderful  - I really like this place! They do wholesome and healthy food and the cream cheese on their carrot cake - well, let's just say I would marry it if I could (sorry JB.)

I've updated my Paris board on Pinterest, with some of my favourite places to eat and drink. With each discovery I'll be sure to update my board so feel free to have a look for ideas on where to go in Paris. Finally, something which perked me up this week. I got a haircut! It's the shortest I have gone in a while but I really really like it :)  

FACE

Have a happy and healthy weekend folks! Lou xx

Le Dauphin, Paris 75011

Last weekend, The Accidental Londoner came to visit me in Paris. I always enjoy having friends visit JB and I in Paris, one of the reasons being that it provides me with an opportunity to dust off my tourist shoes and walk the streets of this incredibly beautiful city, seeing it through the eyes of my friends. Plus, belly laughs and thoughtful conversations with good people are great for the soul. I find that it's easy to be swallowed up by a big place and I'm guilty of forgetting sometimes that there's more to life than the routine of métro/boulot/dodo (tube/work/sleep).

In amongst a weekend of strolling the streets of central Paris, chatting about anything and everything, stopping to take a photo and respecting the hour of the apéro, Flora and I had dinner at Le Dauphin and I feel that it is my duty to share this address with you because it is a very special place. Be sure to go here in excellent company, like I did and intend to on all future occasions.

Le Dauphin is the wine bar/restaurant by the same owner of Le Chateaubriand, a renowned dining experience in Paris. Both are run by chef Inaki Aizpitarte and fuse French, South American and Asian flavours to ensure an unforgettable culinary experience.  The portions are perfect for sharing and we did not hold back in ordering as many plates as we could, eager to sample as much as we possibly could.

The space is so chic. Marble walls and floors and mirrors. We were sat at one of these cute tables.

Image Source

The atmosphere is incredibly relaxed. Some people were dressed up to the nines (and looked amazing) but Flora and I were pretty casual (and obviously looked amazing) and then there were many customers dressed somewhere in the middle (all of whom, you guessed it, looked amazing). So the dress code is whatever you want it to be...

The service is just right, attentive but not overwhelming. We left the drinks decision in the hands of our friendly, capable waitress because the staff are incredibly knowledgeable about both the food and the wine list.

We ordered two desserts, because it felt appropriate. I am also a big believer in living in the present and following your gut feeling which was telling Flora and myself "if you can't decide between the profiteroles and the lemon meringue biscuit, to hell with it and get both".

Thank you Flora, for coming to visit, for being wonderful company and the perfect partner in eating patisserie crime!

All uncredited photos are from Flora's iPhone.

Whatever the occasion, whether it is date night or girls night, I would highly recommend Le Dauphin.
Go. And enjoy. And feel free to share with me your favourite part of the experience.

Lou
xxxxxxxx

La vita è bella / La vie est belle / Life is beautiful

Image source

Rome has been on my list of European cities to visit for a long long time. To go a little further, I've always had this idea that Italy and I will meet and get on incredibly well. I don't think I'm alone on this. The city and the country conjure up so many exciting things: the food, the architecture, the drink, the Italians, the climate, the scooter culture (even though I don't have a driving license)...I've had vague glimpses of Italy through books ('"Where Angels fear to tread", "Don't look now", "Eat, Pray, Love") as well as friends who have visited, which has only contributed to my feeling of ohmygoditsrightnextdoorhowhaveinotbeenyetthisisembarrassing. In some alternate universe I have myself convinced that the pale-skinned, freckly Lou has Italian blood running through her veins.

Well, drum roll pleeeeeeeeeease, my dream is soon to become a reality because JB offered me a long weekend in Rome for Christmas! Neither of us has been before and I am very very excited to experience Rome with him. I've had so many recommendations from friends, I've been lent guide books, and I've been on the internet and my Rome Google Map is shaping up nicely. I'm not being unrealistic and expecting to see THE WHOLE CITY in 3 days, so instead I'm aiming to be realistic about what we do. Most of all I would like us to walk around, soak the city up and eat and drink like they did when the Romans were on this Earth. My gladiator sandals are at the ready!

The main point of this post however, is about discovering good pizza in Paris. Confession time, I've only ever been for Italian once during my whole time in Paris. The restaurant was generic and definitely nothing to write home about. I suppose I'm also the kind of gal for whom a good bottle of Chianti can (literally) drown out the memory of an average dining out experience. Last week, Rachel and I (but mostly Rachel, who has a really great figure but knows where to eat out in Paris, and actually eats out in Paris) decided we wanted Italian but nothing was on the tip of our tongue. Rachel did some research and ended up suggesting the lovely and low-key Maria Luisa. First off, my Italian name is in the name of the restaurant and secondly my French name is in the street where the restaurant is located. That made me pretty confident that this was going to be a successful Italian meal.

And it was! The service was efficient but relaxed, the pizzas were really really good (the dough reminded me of a naan bread), the space was cosy (they have a heated, covered terrace) and the prices were very reasonable. We all left very content and would happily recommend the restaurant to friends.  They don't take reservations but we were a party of 5 who arrived for 8:30pm and got a table straight away.

Restaurant Maria Luisa
2, rue Marie-et-Louise
Paris 75010
Tel: +33 1 44 84 04 01
Métro: République, Goncourt, Colonel Fabien
Opening time: Mon-Fri midday until 2:30pm then 7:30pm until 11pm.
Weekends midday until 11pm

Two other Parisian pizza places I've heard good things about and am looking forward to trying are  Pink Flamingo Pizza and Grazie

Wake me up before you go go

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is on TF1 (BBC1) tonight. I love the Harry Potter series and of course the films. I never queued for the books when they came out but I'd buy them a week later and not do anything for 3 days whilst I read from beginning to end...Team Snape and Team Sirius. 

It's been a lovely weekend which is sadly coming to an end. There's been some yoga, a Kinfolk dinner, lunch at Bob's Kitchen, knitting, brunch with some of my lovely colleagues, testing a new fake tan, Jillian Michaels 30 days shred Level 2 and a walk around Belleville, an area I'm not too familiar with...

Less sad however is that it is now 3 weeks since JB has been away and therefore only one month left until we are reunited. I'm certainly doing a good job of keeping busy which helps the days pass quicker, and I feel like my friends are readily available to hang out during his absence but I do really miss him a lot. Whilst I enjoy being independent and seeing how I get on by myself, 7 weeks is a bloody long time and I hope he doesn't get sent anywhere else soon for more than 2 weeks!

So I've got a clothes wash on, HP just finished and CSI is coming on (George is not aging well at all), I've made lunch for tomorrow (Tara Stiles Veggie Detox Soup) and I think I'm going to have a nice bruise on my leg from my little tumble in the shower earlier.

I'm excited to share with you this week my thoughts on the Kinfolk dinner, as well as introduce you to the delightful Lauren Lou Bate from Folies du Bonheur.

I hope you are all having a lovely evening,

Lou xx