La Palme d'Or

Ahhhhh....... La Palme d'Or!  A true highlight of every trip to France.  My first visit there was with a group of ladies, including my good friend Della Faucette.  In fact, we have Della to thank for our grand love affair with Le Palme d'Or.  Della and I were roommates staying at the Hotel Splendid on my very first visit to Cannes.  Earlier in the day one of the ladies on the trip read in travel book that an extra-special thing to do while in Cannes was to do what the star do when they are there... eat in the kitchen in some of the world's finest restaurants.  The book went on to describe how Clint Eastwood ALWAYS reserved the Chef's Table at le Palme d'Or whenever he was in Cannes for the film festival. 

So our group decided to try and do that.  We spoke no French, didn't know how to use the phones (no one had international cell phones in the 1990's), and most of us thought it was really odd to want to eat in the kitchen.  The whole thing was a real long shot!

Della was the one who "kept us going" as we tried to get a reservation.  Most of us had given up and in fact I'd gotten in the shower to wash my hair when we got a call from the front desk of our hotel (Hotel Splendid), that the chef's table was available for us THAT evening.  We had about 30 minutes to get the word to our group (about 6 of us) and get to the restaurant.

To say the experience was life-changing is not an understatement.  The daughter of one of our group was a chef herself, and tried to convey to us what a really big deal it was for us to eat there.  It was amazing, and I've never looked at fine dining in the same way since then.  Watching a group of chefs preparing a meal is like watching a symphony, and watching chefs of the quality at La Palme d'Or is one of my most treasured memories.  And since then I've gotten to do it many more times!

Skip and I were back in France about six months after my visit with the women.  His first visit at La Palme d'Or was as memorable as mine.  Since then we've been there many times, celebrating both our 30th and 45th wedding anniversaries there.  The chef has changed, but interestingly both the original and current chefs are named Christian.  The sous chefs have changed through the years, but many of the other staff are the same.  Dominique, the sommelier, has been a favorite of ours for the last several years.  I have to admit it's a thrill to be greeted by someone like Dominique upon our arrival!  Yes, no wonder Clint Eastwood likes it there.  We highly recommend dining in the kitchen at the Chef's Table... you won't regret it.

I have about a million pictures of our evening here, and it's really tough to choose which pictures to post.

Thanks Dominique for selecting such wonderful wines to accompany our dinner... we wish you well and look forward to our next visit!

Cannes

Cannes is one of our favorite places in France, much larger and metropolitan than the villages farther south.  To us it's sort of like a mini-Paris, with all the visual reminders of the "fashion" of Paris, but with the casualness of the south and the seaside environment.

As luck would have it, the sun came out almost at the exact time of our arrival.  So we decided to take full advantage of the good weather and began walking the Promenade.  In fact, we walked all the way from the Hotel Martinez to the Hotel Splendid, the hotel where we usually stay when in Cannes.  As the pictures illustrate, Cannes is a beautiful city no matter the weather.  Every time I'm there I fall in love with it all over again!

Can you get any more "French" that an accordion player on a street corner?