It's been a few days (since 11 may) the lockdown has been lifted in France, people can now leave home without a printed self-declaration Attestation de Déplacement Dérogatoire listing the allowed motive, which was very restrictive, the main reasons letting you go out being going to work, going shopping for essential items (mainly food, and in the closest possible shops or supermarkets) and exercise (no more than 1 km from home and no more than an hour). Now we can move around without having to print/sign this paper, we can go up to 100 kilometers from our respective residence, keeping of course social distancing rules in shops and public space. For those stuck in big cities and small appartments this change was welcome especially for students and young people who often live in cramped appartments of 20 square meters [215 sqft] or less. And the apéritifs that are so popular along the Canal Saint Martin resumed overnight with many young people relaxing in a summer-like weather and not always keeping a safe distance from each other. Picture shot on 21 may.
Another way to enjoy being together with a drink during this stage-2 of the coronavirus pandemic is to buy booze somewhere including to restaurants who try to stay afloat by selling bottles to go. Here on rue de Lancry near the Canal Saint Martin the iconic natural wine restaurant and cave Le Verre Volé was closed but other venues near there were selling bottles so that people could enjoy their drink together on the sidewalk.
The authorities cracked down on these apéritifs along the canal a day after the lockdown was lifted because rthey considered there were too many people. Instead of banning people from going there right away (like it was ridiculously done for beaches around the country) the Paris Préfecture ordered that no alcohol be consumed there, which was a welcome moderate answer to the problem (although the virus doesn't care if you just drink coca cola or tea...), and the police (seen patrolling along the canal 10 days after lockdown was lifted) just tries to instill cautious behaviour to the people there, just lecturing the few people who hadn't hidden their booze before they walked by...
This picture was shot if I remember day 2 after the lockdown was lifted and as a biker you could enjoy empty streets in Paris, but since it has changed and the streets and boulevards are back to the usual traffic jams, especially that the mayor has jumped on the opportunity to convert full lanes for bicycles only (never let a crisis go waste) supposedly for those willing to avoid the risk of being infected spending hours every day the Métro and commuter trains. But Paris and its suburbs cover a very large area and commuters often come from far away suburbs to work on the other side of Paris and thinking you pretend to have them switch to bicycling is pretty bad faith and contempt for working people. There's been no measure from the mayor's administration to instead let people use scooters and motorcycles as a way to get to work without being infected, the city administration could have for example signaled that for the next few months it would tone down its repression against scooters/motorbikes that are parked on the sidewalk and not in the scarce designated areas, but I guess it's politics as usual and ideology precedes health and pragmatism...
Like in many countries the bars and restaurant seem to be the last to be allowed to reopen (with the theaters, concerts and festivals resuming even later), although there could be ways to salvage this important sector of the econmy that employs so many people by letting them open like the other shops on may 11 with enlarged terraces (as the next few months' weather will make it possible) and for bars maybe having people bring their own glass. Here again it is contempt for these businesses and their employees who live paycheck to paycheck, I feel the authorities (who live on tax-funded salaries) don't realize the urgency of the situation for this vibrant but fragile private sector. Some restaurants try to limit the losses by selling wine direct at the door, like here Au Bon Endroit near the Buttes Chaumont, a restaurant with a natural-wine list, but I'm not sure it can pay the rent.
Au Bon Endroit opening hours these days : Tue-sat 5pm to 9 pm.
I opened this bottle to celebrate, when the lockdown was lifted, this is a magnum of Jean Foillard Beaujolais Nouveau 2010 that I had kept aside in the wine fridge in Paris all these years. Consider that, a 10-year-old Bojo Nouveau (all right, technically rather 9 and a half) ! It certainly lost a bit of its stamina since those years but man, it was so good and what a lively color ! Still this liquid food with nerve and juice, enjoyed to the last drop along 3 days.
There's been a lot of chatting during the lockdown about how a new society would arise based on other values and these two folks embody these debates and wishes. This picture was shot before the end of the lockdown, when our moves were still limited and you needed to have a signed self declaration before going out. With the risk of repeating myself, the general population wasn't really interested in changing the world or revolutionary policies, be they green or heavy-handed redistribution schemes, maybe because the ordinary people are usually the losers and payers in these seducing programs. Beyond what is fashionable to say, I think people long for a return to some kind of normalcy, they want to go out, have fun, travel, fly again, and the only difference is they might show some restraint in the post-pandemic world and focus on important things, realizing the life can be short. One thing I think is sure is that many people living in big cities will lay out plans to move out and live somewhere else. Even before the pandemic Paris had become year after a less pleasant place to live in for the middle class and this could be the last straw.
One of the good thing during the lockdown is we had time for all these memes circulating through Whattsapp and social media, this one is lovely, with a terrified cat fleeing sneezing particles and disinfecting in the bathroom. It was not uncommon to see people looking frightened when about to stumble on you between grocery aisles and almost fleeing sideways. This video sums up well what many of us felt when you heard someone one coughing or sneezing nearby in a street or in a shop...
That was sneezing and cat, but if you're rather into dogs and coughing, this one is great too (could call it coughing freeze), although a bit too short.
Related to this cat drowning itself under disinfectant, I see people jumped into using these disinfectants all the time wether before entering a shop (as encouraged by authorities and businesses) or any time any where, carrying a small bottle like a miracle weapon against the virus. I don't (except when forced by the guy standing at the door of the supermarket), I just clean my hands with regular soap et take extra care with washing what I brought from the grocery, but that's it. Aaron wrote an interesting article, Wine versus Disinfectants, highlighting this disinfection paranoia that is so different from hygiene and has potential harmful effects by creating a void. With this mindset, France has killed its cheese farms by forcing them to go germ free, refrigeration, bleach and white tiles on the walls, which is plain stupid for raw milk cheese, people made cheese this way for centuries and never got sick.
I got this bottle of Pineau d'Aunis 2018 from Paul André (les Jardins de Théséiis) when I met him earlier that year in Thésée. When I visited the vineyards and chai back in 2018 (see linked story) I saw the grapes hanging on the vines, being picked and hauled to the winery. Always a pleasure to drink Aunis !
The bottle in the background was also so good, it is a Montlouis-sur-Loire Clos du Breuil 2013 by François Chidaine, that's what B. was drinking that evening.
I went to the marché d'Aligre, one of my favorites in Paris which is usually open every day from tuesday to sunday but it was closed, although they could well have it allow to open with stall on only one side of the street to prevent packed crowds. The marché de Belleville pictured here which takes place twice a week was open, with only one line of stalls instead of two, leaving a wide space for people to come and go, plus entering (which was only possible at extremities) was monitored for numbers and face mask wearing.
Here is another venue where you can buy wine to go, where Aaron (Not Drinking Poison in Paris) is wine director since february : this is Bruno Verjus' Table Restaurant in the 12th arrondissement, or rather the wine shop (that sells also ham) Table à Coté right next door. Bruno Verjus has been collecting natural wine long before any of us was aware of this thing, since the 1980s. Verjus is the writer at Food Intelligence and he implemented his love for slow food with opening his own restaurant. Aaron will find you gem bottles among the natural-wine treasures of this cave.
Right now it is open wed-sat from 11 am to 5 pm and will change when restaurants reopen, we all wish soon. I'll edit the hours when that comes.
I met Aaron there for the first time since the lockdown was lifted and there was also Abruzzo transplant Riccardo who came along. I met Riccardo for the first
time in Angers (scroll down 10 pictures on this story) at the Greniers Saint Jean, at the time he and a friend were managing Drogheria Buonconsiglio, a wine shop-restaurant in Vasto (Abruzzi) and today they settled in Paris where they opened Solina, making in situ pasta from old wheat varieties from Abruzzo, resulting in pasta that are much more digest with the long fermentation. Solina is just 10 min on foot from Table restaurant.
Aaron opened for this apéro on the sidewalk a bottle of Burgundy white by Renaud Boyer, who started to work in 2004 from parcels of his uncle Thierry Guyot. This was a Saint Romain "SR" 2017, unsulfured and unfiltered, very pure and so classy.
This pandemic crisis incidently created long queues in the street as businesses and offices open to the public only let a limited number of people inside at the same time. Here at the Post Office it may have to do with its banking services which are popular for its low costs. Here I think the queue was 150 meter long at least, amazing.
With this new virus there has been several experimental therapies tries with more or less success across the world using molecules already available like ones designed for Ebola, Aids or Malaria, and the story for the latter, namely Chloroquine was literally a political Commedia Dell'Arte in France, proving whatever the tragical circumstances that politics would prevail over common good. From what I understand there is this Professor Didier Raoult in Marseille who seemed to have some success in his area containing the death count using a combination of cheap medecine at the onset before symptoms worsen (as a result, 5 times less deaths in Marseille than in Paris in spite of similar overpopulation and contamination risks). But instead of being praised for the low death toll under his watch, he was kind of bullied by the government and its medical establishment allies, Raoult happening to have been very independant-minded for years on many issues, too much at least for the health ministry in Paris and its allies. The government even went so far as to dictate the doctors all over the country and edict the order to use this drug only for the intubated patients, that is, when it's too late and the drug is useless.... I'm not an expert in the field but this smells like clan politics and overdrive retribution against a maverick dissident, except that the patients seem here to be the last concern for our authorities. To make things even muddier, more info surface and Agnès Buzyn's (the health minister) husband happens to be a big shot of the pharmaceutical industry who had Raoult in his crosshairs for years and who was present in Wuhan for the official opening of the P4 laboratory (which we all learnt during this crisis was built/designed by the French
). Commedia Dell'Arte & vendetta in the middle of a pandemic...
On this video shot in Marseille you can see Raoult being celebrated as a hero by taxi drivers and passerbys who discover him driving to work...
With the restaurants and wine bars being closed the wine sales and shipments have almost stopped (if you leave aside the supermarket wines which keep selling) but there are signs of life again, like when I heard Gilles and Jean-Christophe of Marchands de Vin were soon getting a shipment in Paris for their direct sale business. Here they're helping unload their pallet of Rhône wine (Ardèche actually) from domaine Saint Hu, also known as Trescol é Bouit, a 3-year-old domaine founded by two guys who trained with Dard & Ribo (particularly with Ribo for the vineyard farming). Not tasted their wines yet but I should soon.
Marchands de Vin is dealing with natural wine only, it sells direct (no shop window) to restaurants, bars and individual buyers in the Paris area, their prices are very competitive, see their portfolio with tax-included prices (free delivery for 12 bottles or more). Gilles Manzoni has been into natural wine for years and also worked years at Caves Augé.
Another magnum I opened recently (I'm trying to downsize my wine fridge), this is a super light Côt, Côt Lectif, vin de France 2018 by Jeremy Quastana, when I first tasted this cuvée a year ago at the Portes Ouvertes at Christian Venier (first picture on the linked story), it was love at first sight, this 11 %, unfiltered, no-so2 Côt had this Aunis touch with drinkability, fruit and juice feel. It still had this aura especially the 2nd day I had some pours. Don't miss Jeremy's Côt, it is also very affordable.
For the first weekend after the lockdown was lifted, we visited B.' sister in the Loiret, more or less in the 100 km radius allowed by the authorities. She has a house with orchard and so many fruits in the season that she makes compotes and jam when she can. She stores them in this old armoire in an outbuilding, just the sight of these things make Parisians wonder why they haven't yet moved out...
Comments