EPISODE DATE: December 18, 2022

Guest Notes for Episode 420: A Jewish Perspective on Paris

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Categories: First Time in Paris, Paris

Hotel

Sonder Atala Champs Elysees (8th)

Favorite Kosher Restaurants

Le Bazar (Levallois) – “Cuisine fusion novatrice élaborée par un chef dans une ambiance branchée et décalée au cœur de Levallois”

Rodchenko (Marais – 4th) – Tapas

Maestro (17th) – Italian

Nonna Rita (12th) – Italian

Marceau Cafe (6th) – Cafe/Brunch

Favorite kosher food places (not restaurants)

Damyel (Marais – 4th) – Chocolatier + Macarons

Murciano (Marais – 4th) – Jewish Bakery

Yayın – Vins Cashers (Marais – 3rd) – Kosher wine store

French Foods/Drinks

Brioche au sucre, Kir royal, Brouilly Dominique Piron (Beaujolais region, gamay grape), Drappier Champagne, brioche perdu, cote de boeuf, fondant/moelleux chocolat, camembert roti au miel

Separate Point: A lot of French Jewish food is influenced by Tunisian and Tunisian Jewish food, so there’s canned tuna everywhere and on everything, especially pizza and pasta, which was a little too strange for us

Favorite Activities

  1. Vedettes du Pont Neuf (Boat tour at night, 9:45, got to see Eiffel Tower sparkle)
  2. Candora Perfume Workshop
  3. Montmartre Tour
  4. Jewish tour of the Marais
  5. Louvre tour
  6. Photoshoot at Trocadero/Bir Hakeim
  7. Versailles Half-day tour

Museums

It’s hard to rank because really best appreciated holistically, also most people are going to go to the Louvre and Versailles and for good reason, so doesn’t feel so meaningful rank them:

  1. Orsay Museum
  2. Orangerie (specifically the water lilies)
  3. Pompidou
  4. Picasso Museum
  5. Jewish Museum: very cool to see the continuity of tradition that we still live dating back hundreds of years and very accessible as a museum, but a little less special for us because we’ve been too many similar museums, but highly recommended for those a little less literate.
  6. Rodin Museum: my wife really liked this one, gave her a newfound admiration for sculpture, which I also found seeing the Greek/Roman sculpture in the Louvre.
  7. Versailles Palace + Gardens
  8. Louvre

Places

Ranking the top 6, plus a list of other places we visited and the lists of the places we saw on our two walking tours)

  1. Arc de Triomphe/Place Charles de Gaulle
  2. Pletzl/Marais (feels quainter more historical, less planned, a nice contrast to the Hausmannian boulevards and buildings which are beautiful in their own right. Also really liked all the boutique shops)
  3. Jardin du Luxembourg/Fontaine Médicis
  4. Parselle Leopold-Sedar-Senghor (a beautiful pedestrian bridge to admire the city, we also did the very touristy thing of putting a lock on the bridge when we got there since it’s one of the bridges that has taken over from Pont des Arts, but by the time we revisited the bridge a few days later they had taken off all the locks and metal grates and replaced with plastic siding)
  5. Montmartre
  6. Boulevard St. Michel (Almost the Latin Quarter)/Fontaine Saint-Michel + Quai des Grands Augustins (the walk from the Luxembourg gardens to Notre dame was probably our favorite walk of the trip)
  7. Montparnasse/St. Germain – Boulevard Saint Germain
  8. Jardin des Tuileries/Bassin Octogonal
  9. Place de la Concorde
  10. Champs Elysees
  11. Ternes (17th)
  12. Rue de Rivoli
  13. Ila de la Cite/Notre Dame
  14. Hotel de Ville
  15. Pletzl
  16. Shana
  17. Fragonard Boutique Francs Bourgeouis
  18. National Archives Gardens
  19. Pont Neuf
  20. Trocadero
  21. Bir Hakeim Bridge
  22. Arpege (just to glance inside, couldn’t eat there)
  23. La Mouette Rieuse
  24. Paroisse Saint-Paul (passed by)
  25. Beth Loubavitch Champs-Elysees

Jewish Tour

  1. Place des Vosges/Synagogue des Tournelles
  2. Agoudas HaKehillos Synagogue
  3. Oratoire Mahzike Adath Synagogue
  4. Fondation Roger Flesichman
  5. Rue Pave
  6. Rue des Rosiers
  7. Ecole de Travail Ort
  8. Goldenbergs Memorial
  9. Shoah Memorial

Montmartre Tour

  1. Place Blanche
  2. Moulin Rouge
  3. Le Bateau Lavoir
  4. 54 Rue Lapic (Van Gogh House)
  5. Le Moulin de la Galette
  6. Le Passé Muraille
  7. Vigne de Clos Montmartre
  8. Rue de l’Abreuvoir/Le Maison Rose
  9. Square Marcel Bleustein Blanchet
  10. Square Suzanne Buisson/Statue of St. Denis
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Categories: First Time in Paris, Paris