Chez Loulou

Cheese and Wine Tasting in Paris

2025-01-12T18:34:00.002+01:00

For the last 18 years I've explored French food, culture, wine and cheese through this blog. Now heading in an exciting and natural new direction, as of spring 2023, I will be offering an in-person experience devoted to tasting and appreciating French cheese.

My goal is to share my deep passion for the subject and to demystify the delicious, often aromatic, sometimes intimidating world of fromage!

The tasting includes:

A comfortably seated, 2½-3 hour cheese and wine workshop in a wine shop
10-12 French cheeses paired with 3 wines (and/or possible other drinks)
A fun, sensory and educational experience

You will go away with:

A deeper understanding of cheese
Confidence in purchasing, serving and slicing
Cheese and wine pairing insight and know-how
A new love for cheese, including their varied flavors, aromas and textures

The small group format, maximum 8 people, which includes all the cheese, bread, accompaniments and drinks, is €130 per person (please see note).

They will be offered most Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at noon. Sunday is sometimes also available.

To book a tasting, or for any questions you may have, please contact me at louloufrance@gmail.com

This experience can be customized for private groups, just ask!

Note: Please send an email to discuss a private tasting if you would like to include children under 14 years old

5 Things

2021-04-30T11:23:00.001+02:00

1) Goat cheese season!

2) Frilly tulips

3) Une baguette française

4) Organic

5) Île Saint-Louis

My French Cheese Workshops Are Now Online!

2020-12-11T18:10:00.027+01:00

If you've read this blog for any time now, you know how much I love cheese! And after weeks of working out a new (for me) way to share this great passion with you, I've finally done it.

Three virtual workshops, which I've entitled, French Cheese Fundamentals, are online and available on Eventbrite. They've been up for a few days, but I've haven't had the chance to share them here yet.

Part One is the Basics, a Cheese 101 that covers history, terminology, the French cheese families, seasonality - it's a lot of practical, nerdy information.

Part Two is all about creating Cheese Boards. You'll learn about tasting, serving, slicing, shopping and building beautiful boards.

Part Three is about Pairing cheese with wine, other beverages and food. Even though there are no hard and fast rules, there is plenty of information to learn about creating delicious flavor marriages.

I'm keeping the numbers limited to just 15 screens for a more personal experience, however I will continue to add the workshops to the calendar on a rotating basis, so if you miss one, it will be offered again in a few weeks time.

The Basics has already sold out for December (yay!), but there is another one being offered in mid-January, and there is still space available on Cheese Boards this month. Pairing Cheese is being offered for the first time in early January.

I hope to see you there and if you have any questions, please contact me at: louloufrance@gmail.com

Coming Soon - My Virtual French Cheese Workshops

2020-11-29T13:46:00.004+01:00

As I mentioned in September, I teamed up with Context Conversations and presented an online French cheese tasting seminar that was offered a few more times over the last few months. And more dates have been added in December and January.

I was also invited by La Cuisine Paris to do a live French fromage workshop in November, with another one coming up in mid-December.

All of this got me thinking that it would be fun to create some more comprehensive online workshops of my own, so that's exactly what I did!

For the moment I've got three finished that I'm going to launch shortly (all of the calendar app stuff and payment app stuff is a bit of a learning curve), so watch this space and I hope to share all of my French cheese knowledge and passion with you very soon.

5 Things

2020-11-19T14:46:00.001+01:00

1) Autumn stroll along the quay

2) Getting the cheese board all set up for a virtual workshop hosted by la Cuisine Paris. If you missed it, there's another one happening in December!

3) One of my favorite things

4) Enjoying some much needed fresh air during the second lockdown in Paris

5) Nutella crêpe? Yes, please!

5 Things

2020-10-22T10:04:00.000+02:00

1) My kind of cake!

2) Do I spy Emily in Paris?

3) Giant bouquets of autumn hydrangeas

4) A modern cheese board

5) Café life

Some Exciting Cheese News!

2020-09-17T19:00:00.000+02:00

I resisted. Boy did I resist!

The idea of going virtual with cheese "tastings," both during and after the lockdown in France, was completely overwhelming to me and I just didn't know how to make that transition. Several friends offered advice, but I was stubbornly closed to the idea.

Then something changed.

Part of it was the positive reaction from the guest post I wrote listing my Top Ten French Cheeses for David Lebovitz's fabulous blog. Additionally, Context Travel, who I was about to start doing tours with back in March, asked if I would join them as their online cheese connoisseur.

So, I'll be going live on September 27 with a deep dive into all things cheese-y at From Camembert to Chèvre: An Exploration of French Cheese. Hope to see you there!

August in Paris

2020-08-14T14:41:00.000+02:00

August means stretches of long, hot days with bright skies, followed by days of heavy air and storms. We're finally at the end of a week-long heatwave and the last two evenings have given us spectacular sound and light shows over the city.

Tuesday afternoon a photographer captured some incredible photos of lightning striking the Eiffel Tower. I wish I had witnessed that!

Our neighborhood, le 15ème, is mainly residential and always very quiet this time of year, as most of our neighbors have left for the month and the little mom-and-pop places have closed for their annual vacation.

I've ventured into the center of Paris a couple of times, near Notre-Dame and parts of Saint Germain, and both neighborhoods were devoid of the crush of tourists that this month usually sees. It's nice for those of us who have stayed in town, yet it does feel strangely deserted this summer.

Friends have told me how nice the museums are without the crowds, so I plan to take advantage of this peaceful time and go back to the Louvre, the Rodin Museum and possibly the Picasso Museum.

Other than that, we're still mostly staying home.

Several of our friends tested positive for COVID-19, a couple of whom were hospitalized for over a month, which was very scary. Everyone has now recovered, thank heavens! I was quite sick in mid-March and found out in May that I also had the virus. Unfortunately that doesn't mean I can't get it again, so we continue to be extra careful.

If you're on holiday, I hope you're having a wonderful time. If you're somewhere that has gone back into quarantine, I am thinking of you and hoping that it ends soon.

Please wear your masks and stay safe, everyone!

5 Things

2020-05-15T15:37:00.000+02:00

1) Apéro

2) Spring green

3) Homemade applesauce happened during confinement (along with banana bread and a lot of homemade yogurt!). Apples courtesy of a neighborhood shop called Paysan Vrac.

4) No filter

5) Spinach, onion, ham and goat cheese tart

5 (Covid Confinement) Things

2020-04-26T11:31:00.000+02:00

1) We have a great fromagerie around the corner, so we're still able to enjoy French cheese. Phew!

2) The nuns at the Catholic maternity clinic across from our apartment have been coming out on their roof terrace to join the 8pm applause for the health care workers, and then staying on to sing a couple of songs for the neighborhood. Complete with tambourines

3) Zonked out

4) Sunday is now pizza day! This one from last week was sautéed red onions, red peppers and Spanish chorizo

5) There were flour, egg and sugar shortages at the beginning of the lockdown, so when I walked into our local G20 grocery store and spotted this, I felt like I'd won the lottery

Zucchini and Goat Cheese Tart - Day 34 of Confinement

2020-04-18T10:07:00.002+02:00

As life has thrown us all a curve ball and we're advised to stay inside as much as possible, I'm heeding that advice. With that, I'm being extra conscious about not wasting food (something I will definitely be better at in the future!) and being creative with what has been lurking in my kitchen cupboards. I also, like so many others, have a lot of time on my hands to cook.

It's rare that I follow a recipe to the letter. When I cook I feel pretty comfortable swapping a minor ingredient or two if I don't have what the recipe calls for and if I don't think it will change the flavor of the final dish.

Last night I needed to use up some fresh goat cheese and zucchini, and after looking in my cookbooks and searching online, I found this tart recipe that looked interesting, but I still felt the urge to tweak it. I thought about swapping the walnuts for toasted almonds and omitting the honey entirely, but in the end I made it almost exactly as it was written (I used dried thyme instead of fresh - didn't have any - and fresh puff pastry instead of frozen) and was super happy with how it turned out!

Keep cooking, stay healthy and stay at home!

Notre-Dame de Paris, As She Was

2020-04-15T13:18:00.002+02:00

It's been one year since Notre-Dame de Paris was almost destroyed by a devastating fire. Sadly, the re-construction has been temporarily put on hold due to the Covid-19 virus lock down in France.

I so look forward to the day when her famous roof and spire will once again grace the skyline of Paris! The city isn't the same without her.
#Parissesouvient

Life in the Times of Coronavirus - Day 18 (17? I've lost track)

2020-04-01T16:47:00.000+02:00

The New Normal.

Life has completely changed since France closed non-essential businesses and asked its citizens to go into confinement in mid-March. It was supposed to last for two weeks, but now has been extended until April 15. I think this came as no surprise to anyone and now we all wonder if it will be extended again. So we wait.

Fortunately, the boulangeries and fromageries are considered essential! I'm trying to avoid going out as much as possible, so every time I think about leaving the house to run and get a baguette or pop into the local fruit and vegetable shop, it's a mental tug of war of wanting to support local businesses vs. respecting the fact that we should stay inside as much as possible to avoid spreading this virus. The latter is winning. But when I do venture out, about every 5-6 days, I try to shop at the small, local places.

Obviously, tourism has been hit HARD, so I'm not working for the time being. This means I could be doing many things to fill my days, but I've found it difficult to focus. There's a great amount of uncertainty, not just for our future, but for many of our loved ones as well.
So I'm cooking. A lot. Much of my time is spent coming up with inventive ways to use up things that have been lingering in our kitchen cupboards and drawers. I'm thinking of it as a kind of therapy.

Looking out our windows at the (almost) empty streets is truly bizarre and sometimes it feels like we're the only ones living in our neighborhood. Then every night at 8pm, we know we're not alone. It's the hour when we join our neighbors by either hanging out of our windows or stepping out on our balconies to applaud the French healthcare workers*. It is truly moving, and is one of the ways we feel connected to each other during this "interesting" time.

I hope that you and your loved ones are staying healthy and sane. We are all in this together and we will get through this!

* who should all be granted sainthood when this crisis is over, in my opinion.

La Journée Mondiale du Fromage

2020-03-27T11:41:00.000+01:00

It's World Cheese Day! My favorite day!

Life in the Times of Coronavirus - Day 6

2020-03-21T10:51:00.002+01:00

Wishing I could be as chilled as Enzo...

Beach Life

2020-02-17T21:01:00.003+01:00

In California visiting family for a week. Makes me realize how much I miss the ocean! (and good tacos!)

Fromagerie Marie-Anne Cantin

2020-02-09T08:44:00.000+01:00

One of my favorite cheese shops in Paris. And her selection of Comté is incredible!

Paris Passages

2020-02-02T09:09:00.000+01:00

The covered passages in Paris are worth exploring! Especially on a rainy day.

Camembert de Normandie Fermier

2020-01-22T09:11:00.001+01:00

One of only two remaining, farm produced Camembert de Normandie is made by La Fromagerie Durand. It is worth the extra €2!

Keeping Warm at the Café

2020-01-13T16:40:00.002+01:00

As a person who gets cold quite easily, I love it when cafés offer blankets when it's cold outside.

Le Brin d'Amour

2020-01-06T11:55:00.000+01:00

A Corsican ewe's milk cheese sprinkled with aromatic Mediterranean herbs and sold in a perfect state of affinage. Heaven!

Happy New Year!

2020-01-02T09:26:00.000+01:00

We kicked it off with a long walk through the quiet streets of Paris and ended it with the holy trinity - cheese, wine and bread. A good start to the new year!

Wishing you all a very happy 2020!

Can I Eat That Moldy Cheese?

2019-12-17T20:02:00.002+01:00

Cheese + Mold. Is it safe to eat? This is a question I get asked a lot!

This article on the Bon Appetit website came across my radar the other day (even though it was written in 2018!) and after I read the following paragraph, I knew I had to share it.

"The first thing you’ve got to understand is that, by and large, microorganisms like mold are what makes cheese, well, cheese. “In a lot of ways, cheese is mold,” explains Morillo. With the notable exception of fresh cheeses that are meant to be consumed shortly after they are made (mozzarella, ricotta, queso fresco, etc.), most cheeses owe their distinct deliciousness and texture to the microbiological alchemy that occurs when mold, bacteria, and other microorganisms feast on the proteins and sugars present in milk, transforming them into a wide range of flavorful compounds. (Science is cool!)"

Yes, science is cool! And mold, when it comes to cheese, can definitely be our friend.

Haussmannian

2019-12-15T18:25:00.001+01:00

A Haussmannian building that houses a café named after Baron Haussmann located along the Boulevard Haussmann.

Today's Cheese

2019-12-13T12:38:00.003+01:00

The minute I started to unwrap this one, I was in heaven! SO lusciously smelly, oozing and sticky. We haven't tasted it yet, but I expect wonderful things.

Oh, and for those of you who are curious, it's an ewe's milk, washed rind cheese from Corsica. I can't wait to try it!