Patricia Wells’ ‘Food Lover’s Guide to Paris’ is now an app: Search bistros, cheese shops, more

Essential for anybody heading to Paris this summer: Patricia Wells’ new app, “Food Lover’s Guide to Paris.” If the name rings a bell, it’s because the book of the same title, which first came out in 1984 and then was revised a couple of times over, was everybody’s Paris bible in a world before search engines, blogs and 24/7 tweeting.

As then-restaurant-critic for the International Herald Tribune, Wells, a longtime Paris resident, was indefatigable in searching out the best in bistros, restaurants, cafes, bakeries, cheese shops, butchers and anything else of interest in Paris.

Her book was organized by neighborhood, which is just one of the ways you can search on the app. But now you also have interactive maps, links to the establishments’ websites, a glossary of French terms and more.

The “Food Lover’s Guide to Paris” app is now available in the iTunes store for $4.99 and from FoodLoversParis.com. Wells tells me she updates the content almost daily -- good news with a fast-changing city like Paris.

You’ll have an inside track to new bistros and neighborhood restaurants, as well as their addresses and phone numbers, the better to make reservations well ahead.

She’s also working on the revised book and e-book, which should be out April 2014. Like the original (last updated in 1999), this one will include recipes. ”The new book has all new text, photos, and mostly all new recipes (had to repeat a few favorite classics)!” Wells said.

And for those of you, like me, not headed to Paris any time soon, we can dream, can’t we?

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