Marseille

[Waitman]

Marseille is the Queens of France "“ a grungy, graffiti-splattered outer-borough sort of place largely populated by multi-ethnic, clock-punching types who still drink pastisse (when they're not Muslim) and leave the fine dining to the swells and tourists.

Although my colleague Olivier, who grew up in the gangster-turned-hipster Panier neighborhood (his father's shop was just out of camera range when a baguette-bearing bad-guy is murdered in the opening  scene of the French Connection) scoffs at Marseille's reputation for crime and violence, there are still websites full of dire warnings that perhaps should be consulted, if only to make yourself feel braver for going there.

I lived downtown during DC's "Murder Capital of America" reign and, in MFK Fisher's account of her time in Marseille, in "Two Towns in Provence," I sense the same sort of machismo (if more refined) that we all felt in those days.  She writes about her time with her daughters and then, two decades later, her sister in what was called "the wickedest port city in the world," with no apparent concerns.  In fact, she loves dropping "wicked" into her essays and referring to the visitors and relatives who were appalled enough to flee town or simply self-incarcerate in their rooms.  I imagine her abandoning these timid acquaintances to their fears and Scotch for the sheer spiteful delight of mingling with the drunks and whores and riff-raff (and maybe a pre-famous Julia Child) along The Canbabiere (Marseille's main drag) or the Vieux Port  in a Chanel suit as proper and impeccable her prose.

Indeed, as I read Mary Frances I found myself wishing that Marseille had not cleaned up quite so much.  The Old Port is newly spiffed and the whores and sailors apparently exiled to the edge of town where the new port deals in cruise and container ships.

Happily, the town does retain a certain louche air about it. You're tempted not to shave and to take up smoking once again.  Perhaps to over-indulge in pastisse and make a few bad decisions. Certainly to check into the Mama Shelter hotel to change out of your jet-lagged skivvies and into something faded and worn, warm yourself with a drink and head into the night to make those bad decisions, your imagination fired by the sordid suggestions that surround you in Mama's hotel.

Mama is a randy old broad, it seems: You're standing there at the front desk waiting for your accomplice to park the car and present her passport and you look at the creams and unguents in the glass shelf next to normal branded merch and discover they have names like "Touch My Body" and "Spank Me Baby." In your small, stark (and Philip Stark-designed "“ exposed concrete, odd angles, clean lines ) rooms you find that the "do not disturb" sign is a photograph of  silk panties ostensibly hanging from a doorknob.  I don't even want to know what the Halloween masks (Superman, Popeye) hanging in the rooms are for.  And don't let the kids alone with the remote and the on-demand video menu.

No matter.  The rooms are relatively cheap "“ from 70 Euros or so "“ and very stylish.  The neighborhood is funky, the breakfast is great (although it needs to be said that French scrambled eggs look like yellow puke), the staff is friendly and the New York Times likes it.

Perhaps it was the postmodern prurience of the hotel and the ageless funk of the neighborhood that somewhat skewed my expectations as I set forth for what would be my first real bouillabaisse.

Those things, as well as bouillabaise's origins as a fishwive's pot-luck and its status the reigning dish of a rough port city and memories of the inelegantly-spiced and usually-overcooked  random seafood soup served in Washington and even the purple prose of political gastronome Johnny Apple and our own superlative-prone Joe H., I expected a dish perhaps more rustic than refined, more enthusiastic than nuanced.

Of course, I should have realized that Michelin doesn't hand out stars to roadhouses or clam shacks and that l'Epuisette's one-star status signaled that a touch of elegance was in store.  As soon as we parked our car on a sidewalk walking distance from the place (I love France "“ you park on the sidewalk and walk in the street) and wandered in, it was clear that this bright, clean-lined and heavily-staffed space existed almost in a separate world from the rest of town.

After a quick, tasty puddle of clear fish soup with rouget and rouget liver ravioli, we got onto the main event.  Each of us received a hubcap-sized bowl of broth and a side plate holding toast rounds, two small bowls of rouille "“ one a straight-up garlic mayonnaise and one more shaded to saffron -- and a small bowl of shredded, perhaps Emmenthaler, cheese.

I had no idea what to do.  Stir the rouilles into the broth and drop the toasts in? Float rouille-topped toast on the broth like little garlicky fishing boats and wait for the broth to soak through?  Eat the rouilles like a dip? (probably not)

And what was up with the cheese?

So we did whatever and slurped soup that was surprisingly restrained given fish, garlic and olive oil, all in quantity.  Then they came out to show us the five fish they'd cooked, none of which was rascasse, which I thought was kind of required and kind of tasty. But, hey, if Johnny Apple says this place is the real deal and if they don't do rascasse I guess you don't need rascasse done.

I was facing the window, so I don't know if they did the thing of boning the fish more or less tableside or just brought it back into the kitchen. But, the next time we saw the fish, they had been fileted and divided and set gently atop another Frisbee of broth, this time with the rouille already stirred in by the chef, which seemed an altogether more sensible way of serving it.  The fish was quite delicious "“ memorably delicious, in fact, delicately cooked and well-married to the broth.

But again: confusion on my part, as it was simply five filets set atop a thick soup, rather than the gleeful mélange served up by stateside purveyors.   I was expecting something a little messier.

The sommelier did me the honor of speaking to me only in French, which made me feel as sophisticated as my inability to figure out what to do with the cheese made me feel uncouth.  But, as a consequence, I didn't get as much about the wine as I might have. It was a Côes de Duras (kind of a Bordeaux suburb) Sauvignon Blanc/Semillon blend and took on the Bouillabaisse quite well.  The bottle, a 2009, was just starting to show its age, a little darker in the glass and a hint of nuttiness on the palate.  (I'm wondering "“ since this has happened to me before "“ if serious wine people actually do like a white that's just getting toasty, or if the sommeliers just see me coming and know that with a little sales pitch or indecipherable French they can unload some old stuff from their cellar.)  Whatever.  I liked it and the somm seemed quite enthused.

In the end, I was not blown away by bouillabaisse in the way that I expected to be.  But that was, I think, the result of expectations and jet lag.  And the more I think about it, the more I develop a retrospective appreciation.  I hope to try it again, possibly at Fon Fon (which also makes the opening scene of The French Connection), with proper expectations and perhaps some rascasse.  I'd also like to return to L'Epuisette for its other fish, which I suspect would be quite good.

Mary Francis did not like bouillabaisse but she did like to eat and "TwoTowns" has a whole chapter on restaurants that almost makes you weep to think that they are long gone and makes you strongly suspect that no restaurant today can capture the vitality and flavors of those long-dead dining rooms.

But L'Arome does a pretty good job of feeling very vital and Marseillaise, from the graffiti on the wall to the reasonably-priced menu (26.50 for three courses) to the harried, friendly staff.

We got a table on a crowded Friday night in part because the waitress/hostess/(and I got the impression) part owner decided I look a lot like Jean Reno (which is so much more flattering than being told you look like Jeff Goldblum). There was almost an international incident when she thought that I hadn't seen "Léon," which was resolved once we figured out that the movie was released as "The Professional" over here and I had seen it.

I love watching people who care about their work doing their work, and I sort of felt fortunate to be invited to pull up a small table in a small room, and make my way through a pretty decent hand-made meal prepared and served by people who see their job as a calling.  We learned that "tourteau" does not mean turtle, but crab, and ate it with confited lemon; tossed back some cromesques of veal, a filet mignon of pork and some duck.  The wine was cheap and tasty.  We quite enjoyed ourselves.

L'Arome also has the advantage of being smack dab in the middle of the hip and crowded nightlife district around Cours Julien  and so we wandered past the art opening and bad blues and grabbed a Cinquante-et-un  at an outdoor bar and chatted up an unwed mother whose friend (how good a friend he was, we weren't quite clear on) stood just beyond the rope pushing the stroller back and forth so she could duck inside the perimeter for a few drinks.  And then we wandered back, half-drunk on post-midnight streets, to Mama Shelter.  We were not murdered.

We held off leaving for Vaucluse until after lunch so that we could hit up La Boí®te í  Sardine, a lunch "“only (served until 5PM) place which also felt like a place that MFK would have written up.  Bright, boisterous, inexpensive and known for impeccably fresh fish and its sardine can décor, the Boí®te is one of those places whose personalities are irresistible to travel writers.

But fame has neither gone to its head nor scared off the locals, who had filled every table by the time we arrived. The scruffy guy in the wife beater and watch cap who told us that we could certainly eat at the bar turned out to be the owner and he fetched around the a chalkboard from which we selected Atlantic and Mediterranean oysters, a plate of deep-friend rougets (I love those little guys, aka red mullet) and a standout cuttlefish in squid ink.  The bartender/dessert prepper/designated gopher was quite pleased to be serving a couple of Americans and when we noticed sea urchins being brought in, he snagged us one, for free.  Kind a perfect counter-balance to L'Epuissette "“ great food once again, but in a decidedly no-star setting.

A week later, we blew back into town without dinner plans, found a place on line but found out it was closed in real time and drifted jetsam-like around the Vieux Port until the writer in me was drawn to La Virgule (The Comma). Half a block off the quay and a world away from the fried fish and tourist bouillabaisse (it is required to sneer at all bouillabaisse that costs less than 30€ a portion), it seemed the sort of spot that affluent locals drop into and that you enjoy, but you're not sure you'd go out of your way to go back again.  I had a quite good fish soup, which was a lot like bouillabaisse but without fish, and a delightful magret de canard, aka duck breast.  Madam enjoyed her risotto quite a bit.

Earlier, as we'd checked into our hotel, we discovered that Mama was not the only saucy babe hovering over our hotel selections.  I'm not speaking of Ms. Fisher,  though I actually was reading "Two Towns" in my room at the  Grand Hotel Beauvau when I turned a page and discovered that she was was devoting the entire next chapter to her adventures at "The Good Old Beauvau" (including a Christmas story starring her two little girls and a cast of locals that would have melted Scrooge's heart if the ghosts hadn't already gotten to him).

Rather, I speak of George Sand, who shacked up at the Beauvau with both Alfred de Musset (who is, apparently, famous in France) and the famous-everywhere Chopin, though not at the same time.  According to Fisher, local gossips alleged that she was also having Chopin's pulmonologist over for nooners, but this is unconfirmed and the doctor's portrait is not displayed in the lobby next to the other three.

Also according to Fisher, Sand quite disliked the place, due to the noise and stench from the port. Although the hotel sits directly on Quai des Belges and you can, by asking politely and paying extra, get a room that looks directly over the Old Port (well worth it), the raw sewage problem has been resolved and the windows are soundproofed, although I prefer them open (except when trying to sleep -- I'm not sure what bar was open until 6 AM, but there sure were some loud happy drunks along the quay when we woke up to catch our plane).

The concierge who bedeviled MFK Fisher across three decades is long gone, but the place does retain a certain civilized charm, particularly the bar.  And they found and are shipping my iPod, which was apparently not swiped by a larcenous Marseillais after all.

Directly across from the Beauvau is the fish market.  Very small "“ maybe six boats --  and not much use if you don't have access to a stove.  But it is the only market I've ever been to where  the occasional fish (a rascasse, perhaps?) was still actually flopping about its display case, and I was half tempted to pick one up, bring it back to my room and hack it into crudo with the knives we'd brought along for use at the country house.

After eating dinner steps away from the Beauvau, at La Virgule, do not go to Pelle-Mèle expecting it to be a jazz bar.  Unless a Frenchman singing R&B to a recorded soundtrack is jazz (hint: it is not).  Unfortunately La Caravelle, also only steps from the hotel, only has live music two days a week, so if you are there on a Saturday, you might pass it up.

But, craving a nightcap, you might wander "“ yes, just a few steps -- over to L'Uniq Bar.

One of my favorite things about France is the dive-y little bar-tabaq's and outright dives that still cling to life.  Just pull up a plastic streetcorner seat, order a "pression" (draft beer) and watch the world go by.  After a slightly disappointing stroll through the Arab neighborhood between the Panier and the train station (just drab, surprisingly) we decided to regroup at the Bar-tabac La Francaise, at the intersection of  Rue Nationale and Rue Providence. Both the names of the streets and of the bar suggest something grander than the reality of this multiculturally blue collar crossroads.  But it was perfect in in a sort of classic way: the coffee-swilling Muslims inside gambling on the horses, the lovely original bar, the customer who looked exactly like Popeye and the guy who walked by with a goiter the size of a grapefruit slung against his neck by a bandana-sling.

But the L'Unic Bar, a block off the port, was the more classic spot (and made me feel that my dive-spotting instincts were still spot on).  We sat outside, ignored the all-American cocktail list stuck to the wall (who knew you could get a Long Island Iced Tea in Marseille?) in favor of beers during an initial afternoon foray and apéros on the return engagement, and watched the all-French passing show.  Waitresses who seemed to love everybody, colorful crowd, eccentric décor and, of course, the passing show "“ it's the sort of place that people like me, who think of The Raven as a treasured cultural institution, will love.

I don't think that MFK Fisher would have sipped an Americano at Unic. But I do think she would have walked out of her way to pass by on her way back to the Beauvau, just to smile at the smiling crowds crowded around its tables.  And it did seem the perfect kiss goodbye from an underrated town.

[Waitman]

Joe, no hints on bouillabaisse-manging? 

[DonRocks]

Joe, no hints on boillabaisse-maging? 

I'll let Joe answer this, but I just wanted to say that you wrote one of the best posts in website history.

(Joe, if you do answer, I may move your response (hopefully detailed) to Shopping and Cooking.)

[Joe H]

Joe, no hints on bouillabaisse-manging? 

Waitman, I thoroughly loved your post.  Please forgive me:  what is boullabaisse-"manging?"

[Waitman]

Waitman, I thoroughly loved your post.  Please forgive me:  what is boullabaisse-"manging?"  

Sorry.  Back when I worked (briefly) at a swank French restaurant (Le Pavillon) waiters would sometimes eat the unfinished (usually, untouched, especially foie gras) portion off diners' plates, a practice that became known as "manging" from the French verb to eat: "manger." It has become rather common slang in my inner circle and so I use it sometimes forgetting that only about 6 people know what I'm talking about.

So, bouillabaisse -eating. (i.e., how to distribute toast, rouille and cheese appropriately).

[Waitman]

I'll let Joe answer this, but I just wanted to say that you wrote one of the best posts in website history.

(Joe, if you do answer, I may move your response (hopefully detailed) to Shopping and Cooking.)

Aww, shucks. 

[johnb]

I'll let Joe answer this, but I just wanted to say that you wrote one of the best posts in website history.

+1.  Even Daymon Ruyanesque in spots.

[Joe H]

http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/485636 is our experience at Nice's L'ane Rouge from 2008.   Sorry if you've seen it before.

[Waitman]

http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/485636 is our experience at Nice's L'ane Rouge from 2008.   Sorry if you've seen it before.

Seen it? I linked to it!  It comes up prominently on Google if you search bouillabaisse, Marseille, btw.  But I must have glossed over the paragraph with the toast directions before I went, as I had forgotten them by the time the fish was set down.