Sunday, April 10, 2005

 

Cafe Marly


There are weekends when you cook, and there are weekends where you end up eating out a lot. This weekend, which isn’t even over, has seen lot of the latter. Since I have officially decided not to take pictures of food in restaurants anymore you will just have to let my words convey the dining spot that is Café Marly, Beverly Hills.

Now before I start talking too much, I just want to clear up something about good ol B’Hills. Yes kids, there is a lot of money there, and yes, there are some fancy stores, but for the most part, and you see this more at night, when the tourists and the worker bees have gone away, that it is a city with a decidedly aged population, which doesn’t exactly make it a place the girls and I head to on a regular basis for dinner. (Lunch on the other hand, is a dream) But because a friend was performing with his jazz band at this little spot we got glam and decided to find out what's what in the world of Beverly Hills Bistro Dining.

We got to the little store front and took in the décor, best described as Provence chic (you know, that yellow and red fleur de lys fabric was everywhere) we were immediatly seated and loving the music when it dawned on us that (GASP!) have only a beer and wine license. We suspect that has something to do with the neighborhood, but aren’t quite sure. Looking around, we saw that the place was packed with patrons of the older and hushed variety.

The menu is a cliché of bistro classics, so in order to have the full affect, we went ahead and ordered a veritable smorgasbord of French delights. First up, French Onion Soup and Escargot de Bourgogne. The soup was quite good, with just the right amount of gooey cheese and mounds of softened onions in a clear broth that had just a hint of wine or sherry. The escargot, well, I’m no aficionado, so imho they were great. Lots of buttery-garlicy sauce over 12 plump little snails.


For entrees we had the Salad Nicoise, Moules Frites, and the Vegetarian (Savory) Crepe. Let me just put it this way, while everything was tasty, nothing was very stunning looking. French Fries with dill (Dill?) which were served along side the huge bowl of delicious, hot and flavorful mussles were divine. The crepe was served the traditional French manner, with the fillings underneath, in this case, some large ripe chunks of avocado, nicely softened sun-dried tomatoes and lots of cheese (which may have been Swiss.) under a gorgeously turned out crepe that was obviously the work of a master. The Nicoise was made with all organic ingredients, which was nice, but seemed a little limp altogether.

For dessert we split a perfectly turned out, not overly sweet Crepe Suzette, which was enough to merit a return trip, but maybe during the day.

Overall food rating – Lovely
Décor – Southern French/Crafty
Noise level – Low
Odds of returning – Good
Parking – Free in city lots


Café Marly is located at 9669 Little Santa Monica Blvd. Beverly Hills, CA 90210

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In a study in the March issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, researchers compared the effects of adding 100 grams (3.5 ounces) of dark chocolate or 90 grams (3.2 ounces) of white chocolate to the normal diets of 15 healthy Italians.

The participants ate a daily dose of dark chocolate for 15 days, followed by a seven-day no-chocolate phase, and then ate the white chocolate for another 15 days.


Researchers found that blood sugar metabolism was significantly improved after the dark chocolate phase, as evidenced by reduced insulin resistance and higher insulin sensitivity. But no such healthy effects were found after the white chocolate phase.The study also showed that the participants' systolic blood pressure (the top number in a blood pressure reading) was significantly lower after 15 days of eating dark chocolate -- an average of 108 mm Hg compared with 114 mm Hg. Again, no effects were found after eating white chocolate.


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Comments:
Rachael, where do you find those wonderful tidbits at the end of your posts? Love them! Off to grab a bite of dark chocolate...
 
Thanks Caryn! I just post things I find that seem interesting. (I usually attribute too, at least, I HOPE I do!) Thanks again, and thanks for reading! -Rachael
 
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