French Food and Cooking

Bistrot Massilia: Butter Up!

Yorba Linda's hidden gem is good any day of the week you want French, but better on weekends

On The Line: Hiro Noguchi Of Sushi Noguchi, Part One

Hiro Noguchi may have required a translator to answer our questionnaire, but we shared a rapport over his omakase menu one afternoon. While skittish about dining on fresh coronet (pictured), it quickly became apparent that Noguchi would be our sushi hero, saving us from Americanized rolls and introd ... More >>

This Week In Food: Hilarious Restaurant Chalkboards, EFF if Effing Closed, and Names That Sounds Like Vagina

Hey, it's May! Let's take a look at what this week in food brought us... Edwin reviewed Urban Seoul in Irvine and feasted upon their post-modern bibimap. Then he shared the closing of Endless Food and Fun in Huntington...and I will keep all ironic comments about it to myself. Then he posted a phot ... More >>

Geeta Bansal Interviews Pierre Albaladejo About Alain Senderens, Legendary Michelin-Star-Shunning French Chef!

Every Monday, Clay Oven Irvine executive chef/owner Geeta Bansal shares an interview that she's done with some of the heavyweights of European cooking. Today, she regales us with a chat with Alain Senderens. Enjoy!

Pascal Olhats Closes Pascal at Hutton Centre

Pascal Olhats' seminal restaurant Traditions is all but a distant memory, and now the satellite location of Pascal at Hutton Centre has closed as well. I noticed it was dark and gutted this past weekend and shot an email to the man himself. Chef Olhats not only answered me within mere minutes v ... More >>

On The Line: David Kesler of Bistro Bleu, Part One

When the establishment you've worked at for so long changes their focus, do you stay? In David Kesler's case, the answer was clear. He took the opportunity to cultivate a CaliFrenchian space of his own. Between a calming color scheme and his charming wife monitoring the dining room, Bistro Bleu pres ... More >>

On the Line: Pascal Olhats, Part One

"I think it's time that Orange County made its mark in the country by being a restaurant scene. It's going to take some time. . . It's simmering, but we need to make it boil."It's unfair to associate Pascal Olhats with only one establishment, since he's spent the last 20-something years parlaying hi ... More >>

Bistro Bleu Comes Out of the Bleu

David Kesler offers inexpensive French cuisine out of an Anaheim strip mall

The Cellar's Ex-Executive Chef Opens Bistro Bleu in Anaheim

​David Kesler, The Cellar in Fullerton's executive chef for almost a decade, has now opened his own French restaurant in Anaheim in the space he took over from Sal's Bit of Italy. Bistro Bleu, debuted a few weeks ago and seems to be making good on being a French restaurant Kesler says wi ... More >>

Ex-Chef From The Cellar To Open Restaurant in Anaheim

​David Kesler spent almost a decade inside The Cellar in Fullerton as its executive chef. Now he's on his own and on the verge of opening Bistro Bleu, a French restaurant he says will be "without the high prices, sub-par food, and pompous attitudes."The space he took over is from the recently shu ... More >>

PBS Launches More Streamlined Food Site With Full Episodes of Julia Child

http://www.pbs.org/food/​ PBS has long been the bastion of hype-free cooking shows, the home of Julia Child, as well as such varied personalities as Jacques Pepin, Martin Yan and Mary Ann Esposito in the old days; plus, the brilliant Korean-food documentary series Kimchi Chronicles With Marja Vong ... More >>

On The Line: Josef Lageder Of The First Cabin Restaurant, Part One

Photo by Meranda Carter​This week, we are treated with an ocean view at The Balboa Bay Club & Resort for our interview with Executive Chef Josef Lageder. A man of diverse culinary talent, he's not only worked alongside Julia Child, but Sam Choy, too (That explains his love of using a rice cook ... More >>

On the Line: Dave Dennis of Matador Cantina, Part One

Photo by Amy Kaplan​A man who loves his turf as much as surf, Dave Dennis banged out our questionnaire in one day (Thanks, Dave!). Is he hungry to discuss his views or just starving all the time? Only one way to find out what the chef at Matador Cantina is thinking . . . and rocking out to.What ar ... More >>

Song Long Looks Through the Water Glass

Don't mind the harried service at this Little Saigon classic and focus on its fabulous French Vietnamese meals

Hugh Jackman Cooks Korean Food in PBS Series

Who knew that Wolverine could cook Korean food? The clip you see is a teaser for the PBS series, Kimchi Chronicles, which is a food documentary produced by the same man who gave us Spain...On The Road Again with Mario Batali and Gwyneth Paltrow.

Anti-Foie Gras Activists to Picket Brasserie Pascal Tonight

​The man above is Orange County's master of French food, Pascal Olhats (and the man who shot the photo is Jonathan Ho). Foie gras is a staple of French cuisine, and his Valentine's Day menu for Brasserie Pascal advertised a foie gras terrine and a Cornish game hen with a foie gras demi-glaze sauce ... More >>

Five Great Cooling Soups for Summer

Flickr user niecieden​Driving through the 104°F (40°C) Central Valley today was a stinging reminder that summer is in full swing. Here in Orange County, the worst of the heat is yet to come, but when it does hit in August and September, appetites will be blunted and we naranjeros will be looking ... More >>

Yvon Goetz of The Winery, Part One

Photo by Kimberley Valenzuela​I first ate Yvon Goetz's food when he was the executive chef at the now defunct Chat Noir in Costa Mesa. It was a wonderful meal. This was way before the whole Culinary Adventures empire went kaputz. Prior to that, Chef Goetz was the executive chef at the Ritz-C ... More >>

OC Restaurant Week Recommendations

​OC Restaurant Week starts next week (Feb. 28-March 6) and there are a bevy of restaurants and menu choices to go through. If you asked me where I would go and what I would try, here's what I'd say (in alphabetical order):

[BEST OF OC] El Francés (the Frenchman): Pascal Olhats

Anaheim White House Pays Delicious Homage to Julia Child

Brasserie Pascal isn't the only restaurant with a Julie & Julia culinary tie-in. The Anaheim White House is another contender, running a month-long promo featuring dishes from MtAoFC (if you have to ask what that is, you haven't read the book or seen the film). Available until the end of the mon ... More >>

Julie & Julia & Pascal

Courtesy Sony Pictures​ Another Pascal-related post?  Can you say movie tie-in?  All this week (ending Saturday) in conjuction with the opening of "Julie & Julia," that French chef of OC's French chefs, Pascal Olhats, is offering a few of Julia Child's favorite F ... More >>

In Praise of the Julia Half of 'Julie & Julia'

Brasserie Pascal Is the Restaurant Pascal Olhats Has Been Waiting to Do

You Won't Be Able to Stay Neutral About the Stellar French/Swiss Fare at Basilic

Garden Grove's Korean District In New Cooking Show on KOCE

Before The Food Network came along , there was Martin Yan, Jacques Pepin, Tommy Tang, Jeff Smith (a.k.a. The Frugal Gourmet) and of course, Julia Child.  As a kid, I watched their shows every Saturday morning on PBS's KCET 28 when other kids watched cartoons.  I'd stare with rapt amuseme ... More >>

Crime Made Sheriff Mike Carona Hungry

"Crab cakes sounds good. How about that French brie too?" --Then-Sheriff Mike Carona pausing temporarily in August 2007 from plotting how to foil a federal grand jury corruption probe during a meeting at a Newport Beach restaurant with Don Haidl, his onetime assistant sheriff who is secretly wearin ... More >>

Paris Baguette - New Korean-French Bakery Now Open in Irvine

Food fact: Some of the best French bakeries in Orange County are run by Asians. There's Japonaise Bakery in Tustin, whose custard-and-strawberry-stuffed croissants would make Escoffier weep. For baguettes with crusts as shatteringly crisp as potato chips, go to Little Saigon, where Vietnamese ba ... More >>

Grub Guide

grub guide

Grub Guide

Tasty morsels from the county's best damn dining guide

Grub Guide

Tasty morsels from the county's best damn dining guide

grub guide

Grub Guide

Tasty morsels from the county's best damn dining guide

Grub Guide

Tasty morsels from the county's best damn dining guide

Grub Guide

Tasty morsels from the county's best damn dining guide

Grub Guide

Tasty morsels from the county's best damn dining guide

Grub Guide

Tasty morsels from the county's best damn dining guide

Grub Guide

Tasty morsels from OC's best damn dining guide

Grub Guide

Tasty morsels from the county's best damn dining guide

Grub Guide

Tasty morsels from the county's best damn dining guide

Grub Guide

The county's best damn dining guide

This Week in Frenching

Parlez-Vous Dien Bien Phu?

A tour of Orange Countys French-Vietnamese restaurants

Kiss My Cassoulet!

Flabby Francophile defends Gauls, dines at Bistro le Crillon

High-Class Meatloaf

The Lodge serves really good cafeteria food

Coffee Crusade

The great Little Saigon coffee inquiry

The Doctor is in Pescadou

French dining with Art Davis

Holy Cats!

Favoris fabulous catfish doesnt taste like chicken

Bistro Chic

Fish so good, we got emotional