The American community in Paris is an extremely well organized, generally supportive group that definitely, definitely knows its food and wine — although to read the French press you wouldn’t know it.
Le Figaro gave coverage recently to the new Ralph Lauren flagship store on boulevard Saint-Germain, noting that its restaurant specializes in “the American way of food, burgers included.”  This type of press only underscores some of my French friends’ belief that Americans eat nothing but variations of McDonald’s hamburgers, washed down with Coca-Cola.
To prove them wrong, I’ve decided to organize an outing to Daniel Rose’s Spring Boutique (Spring the restaurant has not yet reopened), where I recently attended the launch party for the new foodie Web site Paris By Mouth. Somewhere between my third and fourth glass of wine, I looked up at the store’s shelves and discovered, with much joy, that Spring stocks my favorite olives from l’Oulibo, a collective of olive growers located in Bize-Minervois.  A Paris boutique that has l’Oulibo olives plus delectable, affordable French wines? YES!