Paris: Cafe de la Nouvelle Mairie

By the time we arrived in Paris I'd just spent three days eating like crazy in Tel Aviv and really couldn't face the prospect of sitting down to a big dinner straight away.  We stayed in a cute hotel in the Latin Quarter called Hotel Petit Paris with the most exceptional reception staff who were the perfect mix of attentive and relaxed and, very importantly, made some great food and drink recommendations. Laetitia, who was our favourite, mentioned this small cafe bar about two minutes walk from the hotel called Cafe de la Nouvelle Mairie.

So we decided to give it a go and walked along Rue des Fosses Saint Jacques until saw people sitting outside a cafe, all looking a bit chic and Parisian, and headed inside.  We ended up ordering some excellent red wine in a 'pot' which was pretty cheap by Paris standards, a big plate of cheese that was absolutely phenomenal and a hefty slab of rabbit terrine (that I spotted someone else tucking into and was sold) containing about 1000 calories - obviously all with a non-stop supply of amazing crusty baguette. 

So, this little feast ended up being by far our best food experience in Paris. The bar staff were fantastic, the owner was really great and patiently taught me the pronunciation of 'brobis', which was this amazing goat-ish cheese,  and gave us some recommendations for food markets in the area. And really importantly it didn't feel pretentious or frosty - just an interesting crowd out for a quick drink and bite to eat on a Friday night. In fact we wished that we'd had the chance to eat there again but the owner closes on Saturday and Sunday! Totally my number one recommendation for Paris - in fact if I lived in London it would be worth a Eurostar day trip.

Singapore: Long Zhong Zhai Roti

Its been a while since the last post mainly because we've been keeping a low profile to save some money for our overseas trip and haven't been out and about enough to have many eatshoplive moments to report. On our travels we had some great food experiences, and even though this blog is meant to be focused on Sydney, it seems like a shame not to include a few places from the trip to add to the mix.

On the way to London we stopped in Singapore for a few nights and even though we weren't really overwhelmed with the city the food courts were really impressive. We had some great laksas, curries, steamed buns and lots of the strong and sweet condensed milk coffees, but one of the best (and cheapest) food court finds was a roti stand in Little India called Long Zhong Zhai.  

We were there pretty early ,just as the place was coming to life, and had two beautiful, light and slightly crispy roti with a spicy little bowl of curry for about 90c. I've paid at least $7 for something not as good (and with a huge queue) in Sydney. 

It was actually the first place we walked past when we started looking for somewhere to eat breakfast and when we carried on walking to see what else was on offer the owner told us we'd be back - he obviously knew the roti rocked!