I want to talk about our favorite salad in Paris. Paulina and I were 6 hours into our first day in Paris, right after the rotisserie chicken, and we were going to go to Chez Paul, because Dorie Greenspan said so. When we showed up, which was at the very American hour of 7:45 PM, Chez Paul was dead inside and we were not getting the best of vibez, nor were we getting the worst vibez.

I should take a moment to explain the Good Vibez/Bad Vibez rating system. Things on our grand Euro trip either fell into our Good Vibez column or into our Bad Vibez column. Lest you think this was not recorded, I can confirm that we did jot down notes every day. Little sister is an accountant. T-charts are de rigeur, even if nothing else on our vacation was. So Chez Paul was kinda falling through the cracks that night, because it didn’t fall in either column. It just wasn’t the right time for it.

We ran into L’Armagnac on our walk back, presumably on our way to go buy another roasted chicken. L’Armagnac is and was a place I used to go to when I lived in Paris. They had free wifi and the place I was living in did not, so I spent a lot of time getting demi carafes of wine and applying to internships in Paris, trying to cling on to the city for as long as I could, as long as I felt I could love it. Once, I got a cheeseburger there. Overall, very good vibez.

L’Armagnac still had a big burger selection the menu, but Paulina and I had foie gras and cheese on our minds. It was happy hour (the radar starts shrieking when we find a deal), so one glass into the rose we threw caution to the wind and ordered the cheese salad, which was primarily composed of cheese.

“Oh,” I said. “I didn’t realize there would be this much cheese.” My face expressed dismay, but my voice said otherwise.

“Yeah,” Paulina agreed. “This is a lot of cheese.”

We ate it, in the way that people do when they are presented with the opportunity to eat a lot of cheese, and we agreed that 2 out of the 3 cheeses were pretty spectacular. Given the quantity and price (12 Euro) we could only truly award L’Armagnac with the greatest prize of all time, which is to be featured on the Faux Pasta sister food blog.

In any case, if you’re going to Paris, do not waste your time with the Relais Gascon - we went back, but we agreed we’d never discuss it again, and it landed on the top of the Bad Vibez list. If you’re going to get a salad, go to L’Armagnac during happy hour (or outside of happy hour) and get yourself some foie gras too.

104 Rue Charonne, 75011 Paris, France +33 1 43 71 49 43  () ‎

- Nellie