European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - September 30, 1977, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 20 the stars and stripes Friday september 30, 1977 d q us a la chef Michel Guerard by Flora Lewis new York times he 19th-Century idea of a vacation cure has been revived with 20th-Century efficient rigor i several european countries As Well As in the United states mostly devoted to reducing people s fat and toning up their Muscles in the hard Way a diet of Lemon juice maybe a bit of grated Carrot and plenty of pummelling for a lot of Money. But Eugenie Les Bains France has become a Graceful exception devoted to the 19th-Century approach of making it a pleasure to diet and trim with a Good con science Bonus of plenty of temptation to resist virtuously. It s All because Michel Guerard a master chef met and married a pretty woman who ran a hotel and then went on to decide that a Man in his new position ought not to bulge. They have settled Down now to run Les preset Les sources d1 Eugenie a hotel and restaurant that won its third guide Miche Lin Star this year next door to the modernized spa where the Empress Eugenie bathed away her Imperial Vapours a Cen Tury ago. We Don t want to be fashionable Guerard said. I Don t like people who come in Blase bothering the others looking bored with everything and themselves too. For them i spoil the Kitchen. I ignore them. If they be come because it s fashionable and now it i they la have to come Back anyway to stay in fashion. A but the ones who come with Gour Randise in their eyes i see it right away. For them we d chop ourselves in four to please them do anything they want bring them the mood. If they Only knew some do seem to know or at any rate to guess enough to make this Little Village in the Foothills of the pyrenees near Pau an annual habit. The stars of course Are for Guerard s grand menu gourmand and a lot of people Stop by for a Day or two on a restaurant Pil Grimage around France. But an equal at traction is the menu Mincer the strictly limited meal composed of variety of the dishes in Guerard s Best Selling Cookbook la cuisine Mincer which was published in the United states last Winter. It is a style of cooking without fat sugar flour or starch worked out after a great Deal of Experiment. But the secret of its effect is also in the fact that Guerard serves Only tiny portions which satisfy the appetite because there is so much flavor and the food is presented in a Way to pamper the Eye As Well As the palate. We eat it at least once a Day said Christine Guerard the chef s svelte wife a Pale Raven haired woman who looks As new York times Didier Blancha chef Guerard with wife anything to please Gourman Dise guests. Though she could have been the Model for both Modigliani and Charles Addams. Michel worked it out because in 1973, he had to diet. He was quite Chubby. But he said Ordinary diet food was disgusting too sad and it made him bad Humoured Grum bling All the time which just in t like  loves to eat. So do  he loves to Cook too and to feed people. As a child he said he lived often with his grandmother in the Village of Peteuil out Side of Paris an airy Leafy place where Claude Monet used to go and paint some times using Guerard s grandmother a Model. I be always associated cooking and love he said because my grandmother was a very Good Cook and she loved me very much. You can t Cook for people you Don t love and the More you love them the better you  but he did t Start out with that idea. I wanted to be a priest or rather a Bishop or an archbishop. I liked the setting As much As the mystical Side. But after All the Church seemed too austere so i also wanted to be an actor that s my tempera ment. I m drawn to drama humor theatrical presentation. My parents said the theater was t serious that i ought to learn a proper Trade. So i chose cooking. It really combines what i liked about both. They approved because they knew i would do  he did Well enough to turn a modest Little restaurant called be pot a Feu in the suburb of Asni Eres into one of Paris s nine three Star restaurants. That s How he met Christine too. Her father owns a string of spas in various parts of France. We were three girls in the family she said so i had to be the boy taking Over the management of what had become a rundown dilapidated hotel at Eugenie a decade ago. Her Youthful ambition was to be a Deco Rator and she managed to indulge it on the Side restoring the place bit by bit into an unusually charming cheerful country Manor establishment set in a fairy tale Park. People who arrive for the first time at night often Tell me it looks like sleeping Beauty s Castle she said. Still she was responsible for the management and five years ago she appealed to her Friend Pierre Irois Gros another famous chef to find her some Good help for the Kitchen because she was having Trou ble getting the Quality of the food up to the level she wanted to set for the establish ment. He told her to drop in for a dinner he was planning with a group of friends and he d see what he could do. And he invited his Friend Michel Guerard telling him about the spinster manager who was coming. This girl is not a tarte which is the French equivalent for no Cream Puffin the Way he described me to Michel so he expected somebody 50-ish with a big gun and spectacles. She was not quite 30 then and Evi Dently was pleasing to the ebullient soft mannered gu6rard, so that was that. Not Long after he had to abandon the pot a Feu because the area was being torn Down to build a superhighway feeder Road. They started negotiations to buy Lau rent a formally elegant restaurant just off the champs Ely sees and then maxims but neither one went through and finally they decided just to pack up Paris and establish themselves at Eugenie. It worked. I love being out of doors and you waste so much time in the City in traffic getting around Guerard said happily. Now he can use the time buying vegetables straight out of the Patch from local Farmers writing cookbooks he has just completed the manuscript for what he Calls the antidote to la cusine Mincer which is Michel Guerard Cuisinier Gour Mand a collection of his grandest dishes to be published in the United states next Yea Rand planning gastronomic cum professional travels that May include a United states to series with their Friend Julia child next year. The Eugenie establishment is open Only from april to the end of october so there is also plenty of travelling time. The staff at Eugenie half local and half More or less Guerard retainers fills in the off season working at establishments in Paris an new York. There Are 16 chefs in Guerard s Kitchen bustling around one another one for every two or three customers in the dining room. Cuisine Mincer takes a lot More time and Effort to prepare Christine Guerard explained because All the grease had to be removed from the meat and there is an enormous lot of chopping and draining necessary to make the Low caloric sauces. Haute cuisine works on an almost medieval apprenticeship system with Young people spending a couple of years with one master moving on to another before finally launching their own restaurants. There Are Only Young men at Eugenie now one of them a new yorker 24-year-old Michael Romano who studied at Fordham for a couple of years without much idea of what he wanted to do and then discovered Cook ing. It is awfully strenuous too much for most women though we did have two american girls last year mrs. Guerard said. One of them has now opened a Cook ing school and a catering service in Cleve land. We re kind of a Guild in the world of cuisine you know we All know each other. We can go practically any place in the world and in two minutes we re sur rounded with people who Are friends  at resend by Erm Bombeck years ago i swore off going to Mexico because i had a biological intolerance for gift shops. The condition is called Montezuma ii s revenge. Few people realize this but there were two Montezuma. Montezuma i is credited with lending his name to an urgency americans refer to As the Green Apple two step. Montezuma ii i generally known As the Patron Saint of gift shops. Both Are unkind to foreigners with Montezuma ii s revenge i would t be in the country five minutes before i got severe stomach cramps my right hand would stiffen into the shape of credit card my step would quicken and i d Rush out into the streets shouting cuanto cuanto despite All my precautions on my recent vacation to Europe i fell victim to the malady. Sometimes Early in the morning i would leave my room and wander up and Down sniffing the wind and saying i smell gift shops. Don t worry i la just buy a few cards and be Back in time for lunch my husband was less than sympathetic. Will you get hold of yourself remember you re on a ship and the last port when you tried to swim ashore you  i was a woman obsessed. I bought a head Scarf that when worn in the rain gave me a Navy Blue face. I bought a toilet tissue Holder carved out of Wood and held by a Man with one tooth. I bought key rings flags patches and a left handed letter opener made out of Reindeer ant lers. After awhile i could t sit on a sight seeing bus any longer than an hour or so before leaning Over to the bus Driver and saying Aren t we going to make a gift shop Stop soon is it absolutely necessary he d plead. Are you willing to take a Chance it in to i bought boxes of matches to shirts paper weights pennants ships in bottles Small Glass ducks corkscrews and rocks with the lord sprayer on them. I bought a Moose for my Charm Bracelet a cocktail apron three cheese slicers with fur handles a Spanish doll for my bed a Small Chicken coming out of a soap Stone egg ashtrays a set of coasters a Linen Calendar with months i could t translate and a wild boar Cook Book. One might i met a woman with Montezuma i s re Venge roaming the deck. I ate the lettuce she said miserably. What s your excuse i spent  c Field enterprises inc