March 19, 2002 - 10:33 a.m.
So after going to sleep early (thank god) we wake up Thursday all happy shiny and well rested. Like crazy women that do not know better we decide to take the metro to the Cluny. Cleverly we ask at the hotel desk to confirm the metro location, pack some pears in the backpacks and off we go.
You see what we did not know is that the closest metro � Gare de Lyon is one of the LARGEST stations in Paris. IT has several Metro lines, a couple of RER lines (a larger span than metro, goes out to the suburbs too) and the largest bus terminal in the city. So here we are arriving at one of the !!10!! entrances to the stations (that should have been a hint). Have you ever tried to get a walker and an unstable (on her feet, not mentally) woman thought turnstiles and through a strange metro station? It has its moments � Imagine me with the walker in the air (above the gates) putting a ticket in a machine, with my mother holding my elbow, trying to convince her to put her ticket in the machine, At the time is was very frustrating and made me regret that I don�t work out more often, now it seems like a bad comedy.
To make this short I will simply tell you that when you see a sign with an arrow that points down � it does NOT mean go down to a lower platform. It means continue the direction you are headed now. Somewhat like what I would be used to seeing an UP arrow for in America. This accounted for about an hour of life and more stairs than I care to admit putting my mother through. We finally gave up, and walked to a different station (that only had 2 lines serving it) and got on our way.
Finally, we arrive at the Cluny Museum. Now the first thing that hits you is that part of this building is remnants of the old roman baths, and then the rest of it is a former religious hotel from the 15th century. Interesting aside � it seems that the word �Hotel� means many, many things in French. Sometimes it is a hotel, as in where people stay for a while. Or perhaps a large home/estate in the city. Or perhaps a hospital, or sometimes something entirely different like a police station????
Anyhow, we finally make it into the museum. 12 rooms on the first floor, another 11 on the second. Mom is pretty beat by now, but that is okay. She has a cool walker that turns around into a chair. We enter a room, she spends 5-10 minutes and then sits and waits. This continues happily until room 12. The room with all of the cast pewter bits. OHMIGOD!! They have tons of them, and the moulds on display too. And they have taken plaster impressions of the back sides of many of the moulds too. I learned so much in this room and took so many pictures (with 2 cameras) that I think the guard that was wandering through thought I must be casing the place. Mom took a nap. A nap!! Sitting on a bench leaned against the wall. She needed it and it made me feel much less guilty.
Finally I am sated and I wake Mom to go upstairs and see the Lady and the Unicorn tapestries � the one thing that she bonded with when I was describing the museum to her. But helas, they are upstairs and she is tired. She will just meet me at the gift shop. I personally can not imagine being directly downstairs and not going to see them. They were bigger than I had thought. And none of them are the same size. So impressive � I din�t even click a single picture, the books do so much of a better job than I was going to hope for in that lighting.
The gifshop has a large and lovely book of just the cast pieces. It is in French, and has LOTS of good pictures. I went back to the hotel (as in a place you stay, not a police stations) tired but happy. The trip back was much easier now that I knew what and arrow meant. Rounded the day off with dinner (a lovely wonderful dinner) and sleep.
Poulet au citron
1- Cut a whole chicken into pieces.
2- Brown it in a hot frying pan with one tablespoon of vegetable oil.
3- Remove the chicken and wipe the frying pan with a clean tissue to remove the excess of oil
4- Put the meat back in the pan and season to taste (salt & pepper).
5- Add a heavy whipping cream (in France, I would use "creme fraiche"; you can buy creme fraiche at Giant. It is a little expensive, but I make it myself: to one pot of sour cream, I add three tablespoons of buttermilk, blend well and let it set overnight).
6- Add two tablespoons of dry dill, and one table spoon of dry tarragon (optional).
7- The trick is NOT to use lemon/lime juice (it would make the cream curd), but the grated lemon zest. The lemon zest bring the flavour without the acidity of the juice.
8- Let the dish simmer for 30 min, until the sauce thickens. Serve with white rice or steamed potatoes.
9- Do not forget to add some parsley and one or two slices of fresh lemon for the decoration.
Bon appetit.
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