Return to Paris: A Memoir [Hardcover]

When she was a teen, Rossant, whose mother was French and father was Egyptian, moved from Cairo back to Paris (where she was born) with her widowed mother to live with her grandmother in the upscale 17th arrondissement. This book charts Rossant's years in Paris and ends shortly after her marriage to an American. Although Rossant (Memories of a Lost Egypt) came of age in Paris during one of its headiest times-the 1950s-she doesn't offer much in the way of descriptions of the era. Instead, her memoir is personal, describing her struggles with her distant mother and her stern, difficult grandmother. It was hard for Rossant to get used to life in Paris: the city was gray and lifeless compared with lively Cairo; Rossant had to hide the fact that she'd been educated at a convent in Egypt (her Jewish grandmother in Paris would've been angry); her mother seemed to be interested solely in shopping and meeting men; and she had to get used to eating an omelette aux fines herbes for a snack instead of her usual semit, the Egyptian version of a soft pretzel. By exploring the wonders of French cuisine, Rossant found her way. She shares recipes throughout the book, interspersing them among anecdotes (e.g., when she butted heads with her grandmother, the cook's pain perdu [French toast] comforted her). This is mostly a pleasing memoir, but contradictions and repetitions in the text abound. These oversights will frustrate close readers, but those interested in food will still enjoy Rossant's careful explanations of meals and markets.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

In the first volume of her memoirs, Memories of a Lost Egypt (1999), food writer Rossant recounted her earliest upbringing in Cairo, Egypt. In this latest book, Rossant picks up the narrative with her 1947 removal to Paris. There she lives with her exceptional grandmother, having been deserted by her mother, who returned to the author's beloved Egypt without her daughter. During the war years, Rossant's grandmother had worked to disguise the family's Jewish origins, and this induced ambivalence in the youngster's self-image. Rossant initially found French food decidedly inferior to that of her beloved Egypt. The family cook, Georgette, soon convinced her otherwise, and Rossant fell in love with Camembert, swiftly followed by the discovery of Breton crepes. Enriched by the provisions of her father's will, Rossant began to travel and to explore French cuisine. This second part of Rossant's memoirs continues the tradition of interspersing text with recipes for dishes both simple and complex, from pain perdu to a whole goose and its artfully stuffed neck. Mark Knoblauch
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Betty Fussell author of "The Story of Corn" AND "My Kitchen Wars" Like an earlier Colette, Rossant writes with such engaging warmth and humanity that the reader is instantly drawn into the rites of passage of a schoolgirl in Paris, whose mixed heritage is difficult but whose love of food ripens into the fruitful loves of a woman grown.

""My first meal in France, in a hushed and formerly elegant dining car, was a revelation. The menu was absurdly simple; there was a choice of an" omelette aux fines herbes "or a" sandwich jambon beurre. "I chose the" omelette "and was delighted by the flavors of chives, tarragon and chervil mingling in the creamy lightness of the eggs, all so new to me. If the food in France was so good even in a train, I thought I might have a happy life here after all.""

In 1947, as Paris recovers from the war, young Colette returns to the city of her birth after eight years spent among warmhearted Egyptian relatives in Cairo. Initially Paris seems gray and forbidding to the young Colette, especially after her mother abandons her to the disinterested care of her stern grandmother. Yet Paris will prove the place where Colette awakens to her senses. Her transformation from "l'Egyptienne" to "la Parisienne" begins when she is taken under the wing of the family cook, Georgette, who introduces Colette to the city's markets and inspires a love and talent for French cooking. The streets of Paris soon become Colette's own as she navigates to and from her "lycee" -- occasionally skipping class altogether, thus beginning a decades-long habit of making room for adventure in an otherwise disciplined life. Colette is sixteen when her mother returns with a new husband, and although initially suspicious of the round man with the twinkling eyes, she soon realizes she has a soul mate in Almire Ducreux, her new stepfather. Mira introduces Colette to her first truffle and her gastronomical self. He will also be the only one to support her when she falls in love and runs away with a young American, scandalizingher proper French family.

With "Return to Paris," Colette Rossant proves herself the true heir of M. F. K. Fisher. In clear, understated prose she writes of a life lived and enjoyed passionately. Memories and family stories segue gracefully into descriptions of great meals and recipes. This is food writing at its finest.s

Colette Rossant is the author of eight cook-books and the memoirs Apricots on the Nile and Return to Paris. A James Beard Award-nominated journalist, she divides her time between New York and France.

Chapter One

The windows in my study are wide open; I am looking down at the garden. The cherry tree is in full bloom and from above it looks like a very light white cloud. I remember when we planted it thirty years ago. Juliette, my daughter, wanted a small cherry tree for her birthday. We planted what we believed was a miniature cherry tree. To our surprise it grew nearly sixty feet high and produced great, dark Bing cherries. Juliette loves the tree and thinks that when and if we sell the house, she will cut down the tree and use its wood to make furniture.

The mailman has just delivered a letter, which I hold in my hands. I am not sure I want to open it. I know in my heart of hearts the news will not be good. I am a witch, as I always tell my children; I am sure that this letter bears no good news.

I go back to my desk, letter still unopened. I can hear my grandchildren laughing on the floor above, and as I sit down at my desk, I take out my mother's old photo album and gaze at a photograph of her. She is so beautiful in her long dress. Her train is artfully arranged around her feet. She carries an enormous bouquet of cascading flowers. There are also pictures of my handsome father and of my grandmother, elegant in a large hat and a long dress, holding on to my grandfather and staring boldly out with icy eyes.

I remember my French grandfather's round belly, a pince-nez perched on his nose and a mustache of which he was very proud. I remember walking with him in the park, holding his hand; his picking me up on our walk in the summer to grab hazelnuts from the tree in the back of their summer house. There is a lovely picture of my husband and me when we first met. I look so happy and French; he looks so American!

My grandfather is dead. He died the last month of the war. My mother is also dead. I want to cry.

I open the letter and read the doctor's note. The biopsy is positive. I have breast cancer....Could I call him right away to make an appointment for surgery? I stand there, silent, and then turn back to the photo album to take one more look. I find a picture of me on the deck of the boat taking me from Egypt to Paris. I look forlorn and sad. I close the album and remember.

I am standing on the bridge of a Greek ship, which will take us to Marseilles, looking down at the pier. The noise is deafening, and people are running and passing baggage, crying out in Arabic: "Be careful...turn right...No, I mean left...You idiot! Why can't you be more careful!" as they are loading possessions and themselves onto the deck. Families are gathered in a corner saying goodbye to those leaving. Most of the passengers look young. I imagine that, like me, they are going to Europe to study. The war has been over now for nearly two years and the Mediterranean, which had been mined by the Germans, is now declared safe. I am going back to Paris with my mother to attend a lycée and to see my brother, who has spent the war years in France. We are going to live with my maternal grandmother, who has raised my brother. I am excited to go back to France where I was born, although quite sad to leave my Egyptian grandparents and Egypt, where I have spent eight wonderful years.

My mother was French and my father Egyptian. For the first six years of my life we lived in Paris and summered in Biarritz with my maternal grandparents. But in 1937 my father became quite ill with lung cancer. After a successful operation we were summoned to Cairo by my Egyptian grandfather. He believed that my father would recover if the family surrounded him. We arrived in Cairo, greeted by a noisy, affectionate, extended Sephardic Jewish family. We settled down in my grandparents' apartment on the ground floor of their four-story house, surrounded by a large garden with a resplendent mango tree planted, my grandfather liked to say, when I was born. The life of the household revolved around my grandfather, a stern but loving man, and my grandmother, a diminutive woman who ruled the household and her brood with an iron fist. My voluptuous, attractive mother, happy to be relieved from her duty of taking care of a sick husband, made herself the toast of Cairo society. As for me, I spent my time roaming the house, usually ending up in the kitchen where Ahmet, the cook, prepared meals that reflected the complex cultural makeup of the family. I spent a lot of time in the kitchen, tasting Ahmet's food and listening to the kitchen gossip. Warm spices, pungent herbs, exotic fruits, and the alchemy of hands became part of my daily life. Within a year, though, my life was shattered for the first time. My father died. A few months later, my mother decided that her best life was elsewhere, and left me with my grandparents for the next four years. I was devastated and heartbroken. Ahmet and his kitchen became my only solace as he enveloped me with love and food.

In 1942 Cairo had become the center of the North African war effort. It was a bustling city occupied by the English, swarming with foreigners and immigrants who escaped the horrors of the war in Europe. My mother, attracted by the glamour and excitement of Cairo, suddenly reappeared in my life and yanked me away from the security of my grandparents' home with the idea of taking care of my education. Since my attachment to her had transformed itself into resentment, our relationship in the beginning was tense and difficult. Desperate to have a mother like the other children in the family, I tried to reopen my heart to her. Caught up in the swirl of Cairo's social life, my mother quickly tired of the mother role she was playing and stuck me in a convent school for three years, hoping to convert me to Catholicism while she traveled from resort to resort playing cards, dancing, and flirting. To please her and win her love and attention, I did convert, to the chagrin of my Jewish grandparents who felt betrayed by my mother. During those three years I was shuttled between two households, living a difficult double life between an indifferent mother and loving but powerless grandparents. The convent, a squat, five-story house surrounded by gardens just outside Cairo's city limits, had become my haven. The nuns, or mères (mothers) as they were called, were warm and tried to make me feel at home. I especially loved Mère Catherine de Rousiers, a young nun full of vitality and good humor who had taken me under her wing. She was the only person I could really talk to about the problems faced by a young teenager -- problems that my own mother, who was never there, could not help me solve.

In 1947 my mother, pressured by her own mother in Paris, decided to go back to Paris to be with my older brother, Eddy, whom she had not seen for eight years. She was permitted by my Egyptian grandparents to take me along only after she convinced them that I was in dire need of a proper French education. It was an argument that my grandfather could not ignore; his own children had been educated in Europe. In reality, she was obeying her own mother, who insisted that she finally assume her child-rearing responsibilities. In 1939, my brother had been unhappy in Cairo. He hated the heat, the noise, and especially seeing my father paralyzed and ill. My French grandfather suggested that my brother be sent to France for the summer months, and my mother agreed. The war broke out two months later, but my grandfather, thinking that the war would last just a few months, thought that my brother should stay there. My mother consented, although her decision would create the same nagging resentment in my brother, too. Now that the war was over, my mother had no excuse for not coming back to Paris.

As I stand on the bridge there is a light breeze, and I feel cold and lonely. I look with envy at a young man being hugged and kissed by many relatives down below on the pier. I have no friends here to wave me goodbye, no family below to wish me a safe trip. My grandparents have not come, crushed by the idea of my departure. I shiver at the memory of my grandmother's tearful embrace as she hugged me tightly. I wrap myself in my light wool coat that my grandmother had had made for me, fearing the cold of Paris after being accustomed to the warmth of Cairo. The coat feels heavy on my shoulders from the gold links my mother has sewn into the hem. The government does not allow us to move funds from Cairo to Paris. My grandfather had a long, heavy gold chain made. It is about two meters long, and at his suggestion it is sewn into the hem of my coat. "She is young," he tells my mother, "no one will know. Don't worry. When you reach Paris, here is the name of one of my friends, an Egyptian jeweler. He will sell it for you." There are also gold coins sewn into my shoulder pads. I am a walking golden child. Years later, when I was at the Sorbonne and totally broke, I wore that same coat. I decided one day to remove the shoulder pads, no longer fashionable, and found twelve gold coins hidden in them that my mother had forgotten to take out. I sold six of them immediately and kept six of them. I still have them. One day, I will give them to my grandchildren. As for the chain, my mother sold it when we got to Paris but kept a small piece as a bracelet in memory of our trip. I also have the bracelet. I never wear it as it makes my wrist black because it must be at least twenty-four carats. "You should sell it," my husband tells me once in a while. I seem to be unable to do so, nagged by a superstitious notion that if I do, I will cut all my ties with my childhood. The bracelet stays in my jewelry box. I take it out from time to time and remember.

A loud siren pierces the air and the shouts and cries below intensify. I hear a voice crying, "Semit, semit." I look down and see a young boy with a basket on his head filled with semits, the Egyptian version of a soft pretzel. I suddenly remember my first bite of the hot semit topped with roasted sesame seeds when we first came to Egypt. I run down the plank to buy some while the sailor shouts in Greek to come right up as the boat is a... --This text refers to the Paperback edition.