Epicure Imports: A Secret French Wonderland

A couple weeks ago, while at work, I came across an article about the salted caramels of Brittany, France.  Though the flavor combination is ubiquitous in the states now, the sweets originated in Brittany, as did Julien, one of our animators.

I heyed him to send him the link ('hey' is our IM program at work), and a lively conversation ensued.  He waxed nostalgic about the those caramels, and had a very specific longing for the butter he grew up with.  Soon an image of Breton butter popped up on my screen, a big tapered brick wrapped in cheery blue packaging like a favorite present, with a yellow banner in the center proudly declaring its contents.  By this point, I was feeling nostalgic myself for something I'd never experienced!

And then came the secret.  Apparently all homesick French expats and those in know are privy to a very special place called Epicure Imports.  It's a giant warehouse of specialty import foods in North Hollywood that works in wholesale, but only seven times a year is open to the public for a blowout sale of cheese, chocolates, and pretty much anything else wonderful and luxe and French that you can imagine.

As it turned out, their last sale was a couple weeks after our conversation, and so I went.  It was amazing.  In every row, exciting things:  bottles of pomegranate soda, fine olive oils infused with chili, or bottles of pale pink vinegar with a few stems of lavender floating inside.  Ornately packaged chocolate bars in flavors like yuzu and ginger, jams and preserves (I got a jar of "Figue Violette" jam for my mother Violet), alongside jars of pureed chestnut (I picked up a jar of that too, flavored with espresso.  Can not wait to taste it).  Even cheap sugar cookies are made exclusively from recognizable ingredients and offer a salted butter caramel variation.  And tables of samples everywhere.  Heaven.



I saved the walk-in refrigerated room for last.  My goodness.

Crates and crates of cheese, charcuterie, an entire rack of sausages, pâtés and mousses of all varieties. (I picked up a package of truffled chicken liver mousse.  Ridic.)  And, of course, bright blue packages of salted butter imported from Brittany.

so much sausage

So, you should go to one of these sales.  Really.  But, know that it's an exercise in indulgence.  You will buy a lot of things.  You will spend more than you intended to. (Although their prices are far better than retail, these are still high-end ingredients.)

But you will make your kitchen a welcoming, abundant, wonderful place.  Your kitchen will thank you.  It'll say, "merci!"  And you'll say, "de rien!"  And then, you'll eat cheese.

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Epicure Imports is located 6900 Beck Avenue in Van Nuys.
Sign up for their mailing list to be notified of future public sales.

As Soon as Humanly Possible

As quickly as you can, get this insanely delicious morsel of amazingness into your mouth. You will not regret it.

Take a slice of baguette, spread with Brillat-Savarin cheese, drizzle with white truffle honey. Oh, holy.

Last night was our first planning meeting for this year's incarnation of the No Cookie Left Behind bake sale. We had a potluck dinner at the lovely Ann Le's house, and Heather Taylor, also lovely, provided this outstanding combination. We had quite a spread, but it was this combo that had us all swooning. Between the creamy, and the sticky sweet, and the heady musk of black truffles, well, just, oh, holy.

Heather got the truffle honey from Surfas, and the cheese from Monsieur Marcel. The Brillat-Savarin was wonderful, but any soft creamy cheese like Brie or a triple-cream would do great. Just stop what you're doing right now and get it to your mouth. No, seriously. Run.

Anisette: What to Feed the Person Who Eats Everything

Let's start with Annie and Eric. Annie and Eric, who smuggled fourteen cheese -- fourteen cheeses -- in their suitcase back from Paris.

Annie, whose tearful dreams of avocados and tacos lead her from New York to the Motherstate (her term) like the scent of a pie cooling on a cartoon windowsill, and who'd hop in her car at any time of night and drive to Glendora if it's strawberry shortcake season at Donut Man. Eric, who has brought home an entire half-pig (warning you, click at your own risk, graphic pig photography, pretty gross), and from the pig has created porchetta, sausage, bacon, and (again, gnarly photos ahead) headcheese. Annie and Eric, who took me to 'inoteca for dinner when I visited them in NY, then proceeded to order salads, paninis, bottles of red, one after another, then of course the decadent truffle egg toast, something like twelve cheeses, and a bottle of prosecco, all after a day spent at the Feast of San Gennaro, which, for those uniniated into the guido-ish world of Mulberry Street, is a street fair through Manhattan's Little Italy devoted entirely to stuffing your fat face until it's twice as fat. Annie and Eric are not messing around.

So, they're in town for Christmas, Annie's called on me for brunch (along with our dear friend Samantha, herself known for some late night Donut Man outings), I know we had to do it up.

Anisette. It's French, it's fancy, it did not disappoint.

Brunch at Anisette just felt great. You walk in and immediately feel the the sliver of a restaurant's sparkly ambiance. Gorgeous Frenchy details, worn red leather banquettes, a wall lined with absinthe bottles and magnums of Veuve all the way up to the lofted kitchen. Waiters rush by with trays filled with every shape of glassware -- stems, bowls, and tiny carafes. The staff were notably smiley, as were the clientele, a fact that I must say was a little disconcerting at first, considering how much we were all paying for a casual weekend brunch. But, what the hell, it's vacation. And we have New Yorkers in our midst. We went large.


I don't remember much of what we talked about, (well, other than that we had to curb the swearing, what with the adorable child next to us playing with her croque monsieur), but my goodness, we ate. With the first round of bloody Marys, mimosas, and coffee, we ordered a small basket of flaky pastries. The croissant is the only one worth mentioning, but the basket came with jams and a perfectly piped squiggle of vanilla bean butter! Heaven! Eric, being Eric ordered himself 3 oysters, and they too were well-trimmed: served on a bed of crushed ice with a tiny bowl of mignonette. The bloody Marys were notable too, for more than just their potency -- one was all sorts of savory, with mustard, horseradish, more mignonette, and giant blue-cheese-stuffed olives, and the other, called the Farmer's Market, was a cool refreshment, with muddled cucumbers and fresh dill.


But then came food, along with another round of drinks, natch. The broth accompanying Eric's mussels was velvety with a bit of cream and lots of fresh tarragon, and Samantha's eggs benedict looked fine, but the duck confit hash was the thing. Bits of dark shredded duck had the texture of the richest jerky you've ever tried: the smallest bites were slightly chewy, bigger chunks were like butter. A 'melting' duck egg sat over top, its creamy yolk seeping through the hash as soon as I broke it open. Swoony.

Oh wait, just remembered what we talked about. We were absolutely redundant trying to get Annie and Eric to move to Los Angeles. We really need to do this more often. The Motherstate needs Annie and Eric, though I'm not sure if we can afford them.

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Anisette is at 225 Santa Monica Blvd., between 2nd and 3rd st. Call for a reservation: (310) 395-3200. In addition to brunch, they're open for lunch and dinner, and have a full bar.

Joyeux 14 Juillet

Bastille Day Festival, West Hollywood Park

the girls of body city

What you're not seeing:  sandwiches of freshly grilled merguez on fresh baguette with mustard; tiny glasses of Ricard pastis, turned from crystal clear to cloudy and pale yellow upon being cut with water; peach gazpacho from Little Next Door; a game of guess-who's-French played with a friendly Belgian dude with funky glasses; the musical stylings of the Fishtank Ensemble, a group possibly designed expressly to feed my geeky obsession with all things gypsy and remotely klezmer and a little bit French; the charming Alex of Hot Knives, whose demonstrated expertise in the fields of beer and cheese make me want to crash his parties.  

C&C: Little Next Door

I've never been to Paris. But of course, I'm taken in by its mystique thanks to countless filmmakers, novelists, artists, and even food bloggers. I've never had the cliched Parisian experience of languishing for hours at a sidewalk cafe, sipping wine, smoking cigarettes, writing in your moleskine, and finding yourself. Or rubbing elbows with quotidian fashionistas as a charming grocer hands you the perfect peach at a sidewalk market. I mean, this is the land that inspired Annie and Eric to smuggle no fewer than fourteen cheeses (imagine that gloriously stinky suitcase!) back home. Of course I'm smitten.

Paris is a little far away for a day trip, but I can play pretend. The other day as I was sitting on the patio at Little Next Door, enjoying the perfect breakfast, Parisian cliches came to life before my eyes! There was a woman sitting behind me, wearing hot pink stilletos and smoking her cigarette through a slim black holder. There was an unreasonably handsome man in a beret humming loudly to himself.

The cozy shop is appointed perfectly to be the quintessential Parisian cafe, plucked from the streets of Montmartre (or so I imagine). One wall is lined with jars and jars of homemade preserves and pickles: fig jam, preserved lemons, pickled pearl onions, and tiny jars of harissa with cheerful orange rubber washers. The opposite wall houses the extensive wine collection, and in between are pastries, chocolates, charcuterie and cheeses, fresh-baked breads, and more. Everything beautiful, everything evocative.

Even my croissant was a bit of a gamine. The flirty thing came on a vintage plate adorned with roses and hummingbirds, and somehow its twists and curves were a bit more curly, a bit prettier than usual, and it had the lush taste and texture to go with it. It really was a gorgeous thing. And its golden crust was the perfect scoop for the rich foam atop my bowl of cappuccino.

As my neighborhood slowly turns into pretend Europe, it gets easier to get lost in the illusion. Or maybe I just am getting more willing to make believe.

[Incidentally, this character is spending New Years in Paris and Amsterdam. Hopefully he'll share some stories so I can swoon over the city even more.]

Little Next Door is at 8142 W. Third Street, one block west of Crescent Heights.