Chunnel Vision

HAPPY BIRTHDAY to the Duc des Lombards jazz club, celebrating its 25th anniversary this month. Not too big, for sure, but not too small either, the club has carved out a canny niche as an intimate and stylish venue for cool jazz and only jazz, seven days a week. Tickets start at an eminently reasonable 19 euros. Make like the regulars, and get there early to bag a good seat.

Related post: Sweet and Lowdown

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Félicitations au Duc des Lombards qui vient de fêter son 25ème anniversaire. Pas trop grand, certes, mais pas trop petit non plus, le club a bénéficié d’un grand relooking l’an dernier, tout en conservant son ambiance intime. Consacré au jazz, rien que du jazz, sa proposition est toujours raisonnable (premier prix 19 euros). Les habitués savent qu’il faut arriver bien à l’heure pour avoir les bonnes places.

Voir aussi Sweet and Lowdown (jazz manouche à Paris)

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There isn’t much you can’t do from the comfort of Inamo’s touch screen tables. You can flick through an illustrated virtual menu, confirm your choice, summon the waiter. While you’re waiting, you can always switch to webcam mode and watch the chef at work on your order, or challenge your companion to a game of battleships. Need to book a taxi? Find out where you can catch some live music close by? Check the tube map? All possible at a fingerstroke.

Personally, I most appreciated the almost endless variations of virtual tablecloth, finally settling on a spread of lilac chrysanthemums as a worthy backdrop for my edamame and baby ribs. (Very succulent, by the way - but then, you’d expect nothing less in a restaurant just a street or two away from Chinatown.)

I don’t have much time for technology for its own sake. Can’t stand gadgets whose nine yards of “functions” only serve one function – to get you to buy the package in the first place. But here’s the difference: Inamo was dreamt up by two first-time restaurateurs who were frustrated with their inability to catch the waiter’s eye when dining out. It just so happens the result is a fun and funky eating experience that is already proving a hit with tourists and business travellers alike. So, guys, when will we get one in Paris?

• Inamo, 134-136 Wardour Street, London W1. 

 
Enfin un restaurant pour la génération Blackberry.

Bienvenue chez Inamo, le dernier restaurant poly-orientale, où la haute technologie assaisonne les rouleaux maki. De votre table, il n’y a pas grande chose que vous ne puissiez faire grâce à son écran incorporé. Feuilleter un menu illustré, passer sa commande, appeler le serveur – rien de plus facile. Vous pouvez même observer avec la webcam le chef en train de préparer vos plats. Vous voulez appeler un taxi? Trouver une boîte dans le coin? Tout est possible.

Pour moi, ce que j’ai apprécié le plus était le choix presque illimité de nappe virtuelle. J’ai enfin choisi une mise en scène de chrysanthèmes violets pour mettre en valeur mes edamame et mes côtes de porcelet. (Ces derniers étaient succulents; c’est le moins auquel on puisse attendre d’un restaurant si près de Chinatown.)

À vrai dire, la technologie en soi m’irrite un peu. Je ne supporte pas des gadgets qui sont hérissés de “fonctions”, dont le seul but est de m’inciter à acheter un machin. Mais voici la différence: Inamo doit sa conception à deux types qui en avaient marre de ne pas pouvoir attirer l’attention du serveur au restaurant. En réglant ce problème, ils ont crée une proposition branchée et ludique. Déjà un coup de coeur chez des touristes et des voyageurs d’affaires; Inamo, on vous attend à Paris.

Buddha Bar London

Paris, Vegas, São Paolo, Beirut, New York… So what’s taken the Buddha Bar so long to get here?

The global success of the Buddha Bar brand is something to meditate on. I’ve always had soft spot for the original Bar in rue Boissy d’Anglas – that is, on the few occasions when I could afford the splurge. Lighting so low-key you’d need thermal imaging goggles if it weren’t for the Emmanuelle Béart lookalikes shepherding you to your seat. Ceiling festooned with chandeliers, discreet vibes from the DJ, big, silvery buddha presiding over it all… the uninspired asian-fusion food was never the draw. It was all about ambience (that, and the chance to play Isn’t-that-Karl-Lagerfeld? once your pupils had dilated in the gloom.) When it opened in 1996, the Buddha Bar really was one of the coolest spots in Paris. Four years later, it went liquid nitrogen with its own bestselling chill-out label.

The formula works in Paris. It will go down a storm in Kiev, and in Almaty, I’ll bet they’re counting the days. But in the Capital of Cool, already feeling miserly as it teeters into recession? That looks like a tougher gig altogether.

• Buddha- Bar Paris, 8/12, rue Boissy d’Anglas, 8e. 01 53 05 90 00
• Buddha- Bar London, 8, Victoria Embankment, WC2. 020 3371 7777

La Boudeuse

By Amanda MacKenzie

The sight of a vintage sailing schooner moored opposite the city’s newest quartier has brought Parisians flocking to get in touch with their Inner Explorer.

El-Alamein

La Boudeuse isn’t the only star turn along this stretch of the Seine. Walk across the Simone de Beauvoir footbridge, and the El-Alamein is unmissable. Bright purple, she’s festooned with plants and groans like a Caspian wreck - but don’t let that put you off. By day, she’s a cafe; by night (August excepted), she’s a floating music venue. I haven’t sampled the latter but, for a cold beer on a hot day, this floating garden is as pleasant as it comes. Hats off to owner, Marine, for showering love on all those geraniums.

• La Boudeuse, Quai de Bercy, 12e. www.la-boudeuse.org

• El-Alamein, Quai François Mauriac, 13e. http://elalamein.free.fr/ and www.myspace.com/bateauelalamein