Chocolate and Architecture

So what do chocolate and architecture have to do with each other? Both are museums we visited in Paris this trip. We decided to try new museums and to visit some we had not been to in several years. Paris has museums on every subject– from stamps to Picasso to crystal to science to Balzac to dolls to eroticism.

The Chocolate Museum –Le Musée Gourmand du Chocolat (Museum of the Chocolate Lovers) is new in Paris. It seems a little odd to go to a museum on chocolate in Paris run by a chocolate maker from Belgium, but when we saw a special exhibit on the health benefits of chocolate listed in Pariscope, we HAD to go! Any excuse for chocolate consumption!

The museum is not for someone who is new to Paris in my view – our visit was more of a lark. It is not cheap - 9€ - plus 3€ for a hot chocolate at the end. Oh well – to justify chocolate as healthy – why not?

The museum is in an out-of-the-way location in the 10^th arrondissement. The three floors contain a history of the cocoa bean, where it grows, how it is processed, its history in the New World, the importance of the bean in Aztec and pre-Columbian America, etc. The introduction of cocoa into Europe is also traced as well as displays of chocolate cups, pots, chocolatiers, porcelain figurines…all things chocolate.

There is also a demonstration area where the process of making chocolate candy is explained – including how filled chocolates are made – yes there were samples!

At the end of the visit, the hot chocolate was supposed to be available. When I saw what looked like an automatic hot chocolate machine I was not happy. As it turned out, this was just for heated milk. We were then given a choice of several flavors – dark chocolate, hazelnut, Aztec, Spanish, etc. We were given a stick with a square of chocolate on the end that we stirred in the warm milk to create our own hot chocolate. Not as good as Angelina’s or Ladurée but good. The Aztec flavor was my choice – it had a slight kick of cayenne and other spices.

Before I forget, yes – there were several displays on the myths about chocolate and the health benefits. No mom – chocolate does not worsen teenage acne – where were the experts when I was 14!

Chocolate has many of the same benefits of red wine.

“Research suggests that red wine and chocolate are good for the mind. It is thought that polyphenols - plant chemicals abundant in dark chocolate and wines - widen blood vessels, speeding the supply of blood to the brain,” according to a study at Northumbria University.

What's even more encouraging is that....

“Researchers at Oxford University reported better cognitive performance and test scores among older people who regularly consumed chocolate, wine, and tea all foods that are high in flavonoids.”

Let’s hear it for flavonoids and us old folks. Red wine and chocolate – I’m convinced!

Cité de l'Architecture et Patrimoine (Heritage) is located in the Palais Chaillot – built for the International Exposition of 1937. It is on a hill across the Seine from the Eiffel Tower.This museum was always the first place Elisabeth took her college students during her 10 years of bringing classes to summer school at the Sorbonne. Not the Louvre, not the Musée d’Orsay, not Notre Dame! Why?

The museum gives you the opportunity to see examples of many centuries of French architecture in one place – to identify the differences between Romanesque (Norman, Provence, Auvergne, Burgundy), Early Gothic, High Gothic, Flamboyant Gothic, Renaissance, etc. This gave the students a guide to what they would be seeing in Paris and France.Although it may seem strange to go to a museum with models of important architectural features instead of looking at the real thing in Paris, it is all in one place making it easier to see the differences. Oh - and the view of the Eiffel Tower isn't bad either!

In 1997, I had joined Elisabeth in Paris at the end of her July program. On one of the last nights, we took the students on an evening Seine cruise on a Bateau Mouche. As we approached the Eiffel Tower, we noticed black smoke coming from a building on the right bank – it was the Architecture Museum in the Palais Chaillot! The Museum suffered major damage. After 10 years of work, the museum reopened in 2007. This was our first time back since it reopened.

There are new additions on the second floor (third American) of modern architecture. A temporary exhibit of the construction of the Millau Motorway Bridge over the River Tarn was interesting – a film including time lapse photography was very well done. The design of the bridge was awarded through a competition and won by a British architect and French engineer – it is one of the tallest in the world. One of the reasons this fascinated me was that we used the motorway to the south of France in the 1990s and were stuck in the typical huge traffic jam caused by the gap in the motorway. We wound our way down to the town of Millau in the gorge of the River Tarn and then up the other side of the valley – it took forever. Years later we sped over the new bridge in minutes!

Millau is famous for another reason. In 1999 an anti-globalization activist demolished a McDonald’s just days before it was to open – as a protest against fast food, Americanization, and genetically altered food. The McDonald’s was eventually rebuilt and years later President Chirac pardoned the activist. Ah France – they love their strikes, marches, and protests!

VIVE LA FRANCE!