Lyon -- a Mecca for French cuisine

 

 

 Lyon is a center for French cuisine in part with thanks to Super Chef Paul Bocuse who was a three-star Michelin chef for the past 50 years. He died on January 20, 2018, just shy of his 92nd birthday. The city mourned his death and honored him by posting his picture on the Hôtel de Ville (city hall). All of France recognized him with cover stories of him in major magazines.

Bocuse was known for the high quality of his restaurants and his innovative approaches to cuisine. A student of Eugénie Brazier, he was one of the most prominent chefs associated with the nouvelle cuisine, which is less opulent and calorific than the traditional cuisine classique, and stresses the importance of fresh ingredients of the highest quality. Paul Bocuse claimed that Henri Gault first used the term, "nouvelle cuisine" to describe food prepared by Bocuse and other top chefs for the maiden flight of the Concorde airliner in 1969.

Here's what it's like at a Paul Bocuse restaurant. Unfortunately, I didn't eat there; it costs 200 euros per person! However, it's interesting to see what haute culture is.

Les Halles Paul Bocuse is located on one of the major streets of Lyon. It is named in Bocuse's honor and is filled with gourmet food counters featuring cheeses, meats, fish, pastries, breads, and small restaurants. I didn't take any photos but click here to get a look at the venders on Les Halles' website.

On a building opposite Les Halles is a picture of Bocuse. At night, you can see a light show on his image. 

France worships its food, in particular, its local food. The government helps promote local food with subsidies to its farmers.

FUN FACT:
Did you know that there are as many cheeses made in France as there are days of the year?









Bocuse appeared on Anthony Bourdain's show, No Reservations. Click on this YouTube clip for a "taste" of what he claims is one of his greatest experiences with the show. The second video is Boudain's reflection on his interview with Bocuse.

 

 

A Return to Kalamazoo

World's Greatest Neighbors -- Kalamazoo

(left to right) Dean, Karen, Janet, Anita, Bonnie, Michigan

A stop in Kalamazoo would not be complete without a stop in my old neighborhood, Parkview Hills, home of the best neighbors on earth. We are all around the same age, and we like each other, visit each other, have parties and cook-outs together, and help each other out. Many of us have (or had) pets who were integrated into the fabric and culture of the neighborhood as well. 

Anita started out these activities and frequently organizes them--or at least inspires others to organize them. (She also helps me with my mail while I'm in France.) She is a gem! 

Dean is my confidant on business matters, politics, and Tiger baseball. I helped take care of her cat, Dante, and her groceries a couple years ago when she was layed up. She owns the Michigan News in downtown Kalamazoo and was able to conduct business in remote. We became great friends as a result of spending time together almost every day for two months.

Michael and Karen have emerged as leaders in the neighborhood association and now on the Parkview Hills board. They care deeply about the environment and do what they can to beautify the neighborhood. Recently, they have been bringing goats to the neighborhood to "cut" the grass.

Janet is a Francophile, a traveler, and an amateur genealogist. We share our interest in French language and culture and travel. She has been all over the world as a traveler, student, and volunteer. I once wrote a Gazette article about her travels. She had a particular fondness for my cat, Tucker, who was a handsome dude who liked to tantalize Jacquot, her small, white, poodle.

Bonnie was new to the neighborhood before I left. She is a joiner and a cat lover. She has become a key person who keeps the neighborhood going.  

Jan graciously offered to host a homecoming pizza party at her condo. You might say it was a kind of "oo-la-la" evening.

My favorite dog friend, Darby, joined the party, too. When I whistle a certain tune, he looks for my cat, Tucker. (Tucker responded to various whistle signals.) Darby also sings his own songs. His favorite is "Home on the Range." Here we are (below) singing before I left for France. I sure miss the little guy!

Down from the Farm with the Kleins

Busy farmers like Ron and Soo Klein of Windshadow Cheese Farm in Bangor have a difficult time leaving the farm to go into the city, yet my friends took some time for me. We had a delicious lunch at Food Dance Café and talked for three hours about the farm, our memories, and France. I have known the Kleins since 2009 when I first took up gardening and goat herding at their hobby farm called Dancing Turtle. It was a profound experience that allowed me to get in touch with Nature in a more personal and hands-on way. Ron spent a lot of time teaching me how to drive a tractor; clean a barn; and tend to the goats with milking, grooming, pasture walking pregnant does, "catching" newborns, and training young goats. In 2011 they moved from their hobby farm outside of Kalamazoo to Bangor where they built a goat dairy and cheese farm that now is home to 130 goats.

My grilled salmon salad was both beautiful and delicious.

Jesus & Elsa in Battle Creek



Jesus and Elsa from Mexico were both my English as a Second Language (ESL) students. Twice a week I would meet with them individually to help them improve their English. Jesus and I focused on his work while Elsa and I talked about everything under the sun. We developed a friendship that was to last over the years and over the miles. Elsa knows French, which she learned in school and as an associate for the Mexican embassy in France.  

We had authentic Mexican food--made by Elsa--that included paella (right), "sopes" (little corn flour tortillas with beans, cheese, and hot sauce), and "tinga" (beef with onions, tomato sauce, pork sausage, and chipotle pepper). For dessert (left) we had delicate tastes of peach jello, ice cream, and cheese cake.

They recently bought a beautiful house in Battle Creek and proudly showed it to me. Elsa also gave me a book titled Sor Juana by Octavio Paz. I saw a Netflix movie about Juana Inés de la Cruz and asked Elsa if she had ever studied her. "Yes, of course," she said excitedly. Sor Juana was a nun and the first great Latin American poet who wrote about the intellectual life of the viceroyalty of New Spain in the 17th century.



Beth and Dave

I've known Beth and Dave since 1990. Beth was in marketing and communications and Dave was with AT&T. Now they are both retired and living the good life. I was always struck by their avocations that included sailing, music (Dave plays in a band), cats, travel, and cooking. They are environmentalists and foodies who live in a beautiful Carver home in the woods. Beth edited my first book (Heroes of a Different Stripe: How One Town Responded to the War in Iraq). She is a writer as well as a book publisher and magazine editor and writer. They are now celebrating their retirement with a trip to Australia. They may even come to France to visit me someday. I hope so!



Holland -- Monny

Monny and me

A trip to Michigan wouldn't be complete without a trip to see my in-laws. Rich and my sister-in-law, Tracy, took me to see Tracy's mom in Holland. We spent the day with Monny by lunching at Peredie's, watching a short demonstration on ice cream making (which included samples), and visiting together.

Monny is 94 and as healthy as can be. That comes from years and years of yoga and good, clean food. She can still do a four-minute plank. For several years she led a small group of women in yoga exercises once a week. Before we left her, Tracy hauled out a jigsaw puzzle and separated the pieces of the border. Monny is a whiz at puzzles, too. 

Rich

Tracy

Elmo used to guard the lakehouse deck from the birds.

Making ice cream

Andy, Mary Katherine and Grace

My nine years as a professor at Kalamazoo College (2002-11) were the pinnacle of my career. Having students like Andy and Mary Katherine was a supreme pleasure: they are smart, motivated, oriented toward service, and humble people that work to get a job done well. That we still have a relationship with each other is the essence of what I think a small college can uniquely offer its students. Andy and MK invited me to an enchilada dinner at their house. Grace, their three-year-old daughter, provided the entertainment. She is a bundle of joy for them and their opus magnum, as you can see from the following cute photos. 

     

 

Kalamazoo

There have been a few changes in Kalamazoo like the construction of a new condo building at a former parking lot on Michigan and Rose. The city has been trying to provide more downtown condo living and this is the first building that is newly constructed instead of renovated. Congratulations to the developers!!

Red electric buses have also appeared on the streets of the city. Kalamazoo Metro Transit is in the process of replacing the blue and white buses of the 1980s.

A Return to Nazareth--an Enduring Presence

Dear ol' Nazareth remains an "enduring presence" in our hearts. It is a symbol of the mission, ministry, prayer, history, and spirituality of the Sisters of St. Joseph that began with the founding sisters of Le Puy-en-Velay in 1650, extended to the pioneer sisters who settled in Kalamazoo, MI in 1889, and continues with today's sisters, associates, benefactors, workers, friends, and visitors.  

Many souls have passed through Nazareth, and they, too, are an "enduring presence" full of stories, experiences, life-long lessons in living, loving, and friendship.

Let me explain what I mean about "enduring presence." One day as I sat near the 14th century Twisted Bridge that crosses the Borne River in Le Puy, the words, "enduring presence," popped into my head. I pondered these words for months without understanding them--until I visited Nazareth this winter.

My time at Nazareth has always been special from the first time I stood outside the front gate in 1973 to my entering the congregation in 1975, to working at the College 1976-79, to being a visitor from France. Nazareth is home for me. It is one of my connections to the Earth, to the sisters, and to God. Nazareth is an "enduring presence."  

Seeing the sisters this winter, most of them quite elderly, is a witness to Nazareth's "enduring presence," too. They have lived a religious life of faith and commitment for decades--and neither age or disability stop them. They continue on as witnesses to Christ just as they always have. They say their daily prayers. They go to Mass. They engage in community meals, activities, meetings, and friendship. They serve in whatever ways they can like taking sisters' trays, caring for plants, planning liturgies, putting on parties, sewing, driving others, keeping up with the news, joining or supporting various social justice activities--all of it in prayerful, service-oriented ways that helps the community as a whole. In short, they "move always toward profound love of God and love of neighbor." They are an inspiration to anyone who comes to know them.

Such a witness to "enduring presence" is a stark contrast to our nihilistic and consumerist society that breeds things like violence, hatred, substance abuse, sexual abuse--all commonplace occurences that we see in the daily news. "Enduring presence" is like the light of a small candle that gently whispers love and kindness to all. 

When I was 24 years old and getting ready to enter the Sisters of St. Joseph, a priest told me that he thought religious life was dying. What a thing to say! Nevertheless, if we look at the numbers and ages of today's sisters, we might agree with him. However, such a view skews other possibilities of what religious life is and can become. It ignores the fact that to have new life, you must wade through the death of the old order. The alchemists would call this death the "nigredo." Its blackness is followed by the "albedo" or resurrection, which is signified by the color, white. The next stage of development is the red or "rubedo" where things become stable, fixed, and wise. Then the process starts all over again.

Time and again, sisters coming to Le Puy would visit the Kitchen where the six founding sisters lived and marvel that the congregation has survived so long--despite the trials of the French Revolution and the Church's penchant for trying to monasticize the Congregation away from its charism of living and working among the people. In just 300 years after its founding, the sisters grew in number to 30,000 sisters with 56 motherhouses all over the world. Today, the Sisters of St. Joseph number 10,000 and with them are thousands of associates and people working in their institutions. The sisters may not always be visible but the "enduring presence" of the SSJ mission is. This service to the dear neighbor endures because it is good; it is right; it is just; it is a gift of the Spirit.

These days I am struck by how much the sisters devote themselves to working with the poor. In the past the sisters were largely teachers, nurses, and social workers in Catholic institutions. They worked with the poor, but the focus seemed to be more on maintaining the institutions. That was good for the first half of the twentieth century, but those institutions have been in a gradual decline or they have been highly corporatized. Institutions as a means of organizing our society are losing favor, especially among young people who feel swallowed up by stringent rules and the endless hours and expense of  certifications, degrees, and other tools that are required to prove one's competence. The next generation seems to be looking for more direct ways of helping others.

We are living in new times, exciting times. And, the Spirit is driving us toward new works and new worlds--yet another aspect of our "enduring presence"--and God's.



Some Enduring Faces of Nazareth
I saw many sisters during my week at Nazareth, some of whom I've known for over 40 years. Nazareth felt like home as strongly as it ever did. Here are a few of my friends.

 

Cathy Brazda, CSJ president, and Patty Warbritton, both new on the leadership team, with Janet and Sue.

                                    Georgiana                                                       Carol

 

Loretta shares her new stuffed pooch with Irene, former SSJ president (1971-79). Irene told me about the W.K. Kellogg National Fellowship Program and encouraged me to apply for a grant. I got the grant (1984-87) and began my travels all over the world. Irene helped me to change my life and realize my dreams of being a traveler and a writer.

I played softball with Jan in the Kalamazoo summer league and trumpet with Sue and other musicians at special Masses held at Holy Family Chapel. 

Fr. Don celebrates Mass at Nazareth. He was there when I entered in 1975. 

 Pat and I go back to the 1970s at St. Conrad's in Melvindale where she was a youth minister. We went to her family's home in Nova Scotia one summer and had a marvelous time. This year she helped me out by taking me to and from the train station. She can tell a story like nobody can!

  Kit was my novice director in 1979-80. 















Marge is one of the Nazareth Center administrators. She is woman of patience and wise judgement, which comes in handy as the sisters prepare to move to the new building.

Jeanne is one of the most solid, wise, and loving persons I know. A fellow extrovert, she has helped me through many a scrape with her counsel and prayer. 

 Mary Catherine and Joan

Josepha and I spoke her language, French, together for the first time. 

  













Joan introduced me to the women's movement of the 1970s and unlocked the spirit and language I needed to express what I had always felt as a woman.

 Mary and Rita

Margot opened her home to me during the first half of my stay in Kalamazoo. We first met when she was co-director of Formation in the mid-1970s. She represents for me a model of prayer, love, and gentleness, which I've experience from her through a simple lighted candle and a warm squeeze of the hand.

  Gertrude and I worked together at Nazareth College. She was my retreat director several times, director of my associate training group, and a member of my Mission Circle. She is one of many sisters who introduced me to the fact that women could be smart, highly educated, articulate, professional, and responsible for big things--all the things I wanted to be. I had never met women like the Sisters of St. Joseph.

Pat epitomizes the quick wit, brilliant smile, and deep blue eyes of the Irish. She is a model of service to others and always ready to help others. She was a regional when I entered, and helped me navigate all the details of entrance.

Lois was the parish minister at St. Conrad's in Melvindale when we met in 1973. She taught me the faith that enabled my conversion into Catholicism. She later inspired me to enter the Congregation in 1975. Lois helped to change my life, and she has remained one of my best friends. We talk on the phone a lot, even when I'm in France.



 




          Jean and Marge

               

                                        

 

   Ann Therese and Mary Claver read my blogs and encourage me to continue to write more. 

 

                                 Pat and Adele


Beth 

Sue and Pam were previously parish ministers at St. Thomas More Student Parish in Kalamazoo where I was a parishioner. In addition to providing wonderful liturgies, they both helped me pass through a couple "bumps in the road," which ultimately prepared the way for the life and work I'm now doing in Le Puy. They both like cats, too. We are all around the same age, and they make me feel as though I am one of them.

 


Winter Wonderland
During my time at Nazareth, the campus clothed itself with a coat of fluffy white stuff as gloriously as ever. Here are some treasured scenes of Nazareth in winter.

westside view of the front porch

view of the front porch from the third floor

view of the east wing from the bus stop

view of the front drive from the west side of the building

"backyard courtyard" with Fontbonne on the left and the chapel (white building) on the right

view of the land that Nazareth College once occupied

Naz at night, a view from the porch down the front drive

Naz at night, another view from the porch looking westward 

Here is one of the many mounds of snow plowed that fell during the Polar Vortex of 2019 when temperatures reached -30 F. This mound was at least seven feet high.

Nazareth Kitchen Staff

 

It seems impossible for me to write a blog without talking about food. Meals at Nazareth are plentiful and tasty with some of the best cafeteria food anywhere. Pictured here is my Saturday turkey dinner with sides of mashed potatoes, mixed vegetables, cranberry sauce, salad, peaches with cottage cheese, and potato salad. Sometimes I can't stop myself from eating like a U.S. Marine.

The Nazareth kitchen staff is a well-tuned team. They prepare and serve meals in a most professional and loving way. They know the sisters by name and interact with them on a daily basis. The sisters, in turn, appreciate the kitchen staff not only for the work they do, but for the wonderful people that they are. I had the honor of working with the kitchen staff in 2016 and enjoyed it immensely. Upon my return to Nazareth this month, several staff members remembered me and greeted me warmly with big hugs and smiles. Caffee, Bridget, and Deb (manager) are not pictured, but they are integral to the smooth running of the kitchen. God bless them all!


 

Pauline has been with the Nazareth kitchen for decades. She is currently working on a memoir of her life growing up in Mississippi. As they say in Tupelo, she has "God all over her." 

Cheryl

Theresa

Ashley works in the kitchen as well as in the General Office. She was my trainer when I worked in the kitchen in 2016.

 

Latifah (center) serves some ice cream to Peg and Pat.

Jonathan is the overall manager of the kitchen and one of the best bosses I've ever worked under.

 

Winter is a heck of a time to go on vacation in Michigan, unless you are a skier, which I am not. However, for me this year it has been a rich time of rekindling old bonds and friendships, reflecting on my own "becoming," and seeing Nazareth as it is for one last time. This vacation has been a pure gift.