Les Papilles with Clara and Claudia

June 13th, 2018

We were so pleased to host some  good friends visiting Paris this past weekend.  Glenn has known Clara Chan longer than he has known me---they met as freshmen at Harvard in 1983---and, after being introduced to Clara five years later, I also became fast friends with her.  In fact, we lived together as graduate students, while I was getting my PhD in economics and she was getting hers in math.  (In addition to being a brilliant mathematician, she is also an amazing pianist, and I have been lucky to hear her perform many times over the years.)

After our PhDs, we went separate ways, Clara moving first by herself and then with her husband and family to Japan, Chicago, Virginia, and New Jersey.  We kept in touch with the occasional card or email until, to my great joy, she and her family decided to move back to the Boston area, and they settled less than a mile away from us in Newton!

Clara is one of the kindest and most generous people you will meet, always opening her home to large groups of friends and trying to connect people whom she thinks will enjoy meeting.  And it's really sort of amazing how many people she knows.  Her children are also talented and remarkable and kind.  And I shouldn't forget her husband, Eric, also a good friend of ours.  After a PhD in physics, he decided to enter finance, now has his own hedge fund, and has decided to go back to school to earn a law degree at age 50!

The four of them could not arrange a time when they could all visit us in Paris, so Clara decided to bring their daughter Claudia for a long weekend trip.  They packed a lot of activities in on their own, but were able to share a few meals and some time with us.  One of the highlights was our lunch at Les Papilles, a bistro in the 5th pretty close to our apartment.  (We had been meaning to go to there ever since we arrived, but various factors conspired to prevent it.  Mutual friends of ours, Chris Avery and Liz Rourke, had recommended it months ago, so I was determined to get a reservation while Clara and Claudia were visiting.)

Les Papilles did not disappoint.  They serve the food family-style (without a menu) and have a large wine selection to choose among.  Our first course was a pureed cauliflower soup with a garnish of crispy cilantro and lardons.  Then came the pork tenderloin, gently roasted and served with spring vegetables in a thyme and orange reduction sauce over Parmesan polenta.  Amazing.  Then we each received a small wedge of a local blue cheese served with confited plum.  Finally, the meal ended with a fresh strawberry panna cotta.  Everything was delicious.  

The meal was much larger than any of us are used to eating for lunch, so we decided to walk some of it off around the Quartier Latin and at the Panthéon.  The sun was out and the afternoon could not have been lovelier.