Living

ENJOY CITY OF LIGHT VIBES AT ENDURING NEIGHBORHOOD BISTRO

April in Paris, chestnuts in blossom Holiday tables under the trees April in Paris, this is a feeling That no one can ever reprise

-Yip Harburg

If you can’t make it to Paris in April, the next best thing might just be to visit Parigi, the Oak

KERSTEN RETTIG Lawn Avenue restaurant named after the City of Light. Parigi, the Italian word for Paris, has been a Dallas dining institution since 1984, making it one of the more enduring upscale restaurants in Dallas, alongside Café Pacific (1980) and Dakota’s Steakhouse (1984). The original owner sold the restaurant in 1995 to owners who ended up selling Parigi to Janice Provost and her husband of 27 years, Roger.

Janice started working at Parigi in 1998 as a prep cook. She left a successful career in telecom after more than a decade to pursue a culinary career. She sold long-distance and point-to-point communication services and then left her job and enrolled in the culinary program at El Centro, now Dallas College.

Parigi is, at its heart, a neighborhood bistro.

“It belongs to the neighborhood,” Janice told me. In fact, so much so that Parigi was awarded a James Beard Foundation Relief Fund Grant that select community restaurants received to help prevent closure.

Visitors to Parigi on Oak Lawn Avenue can’t miss Janice Provost’s love for hot pink – including XOXO artwork by artist in residence Shane Pennington – and shouldn’t miss the bistro’s top selling

deviled eggs. (PHOTOS: MANNY RODRIGUEZ AND KERSTEN RETTIG)

Though it wasn’t meant to be, some say it’s karma for the many different charitable causes that Janice and Parigi support.

From Cotes du Coeur to Zoo-to-Do, Janice’s signature hot pink chef’s jacket and fiery red hair stand out in the crowds at Dallas’ top food events.

So, what about the food? Chef Daniel Munoz and the long-serving culinary team create immaculately prepared French Bistro fare such as Boeuf Bourguignon, Chicken au Poivre, and Pomme Frites. Flavors for the risotto, pasta, burger, soup, pizza, fish, deviled eggs, and dessert change daily, which suits a couple of regulars who, with their pooch, Peaches, dine there four to five times a week.

Top sellers include the deviled eggs (she serves almost 1,600 of them a month) and the Chocolate Glob, a 1984 original menu item that was, like many of the world’s best inventions, a mistake. It was created when a pan of brownies was prematurely removed from the oven, and the hot silken chocolate mess won the heart and mind of the displeased chef who added it to the menu.

Janice’s signature pink graces the restaurant throughout, most notably in the illuminated XOXO artwork by Parigi’s artist in residence Shane Pennington, who, along with employee artists, has work lining the milky white walls of the restaurant. The sleek banquettes and enrobed tables provide the perfect slate for the clientele and the artful plates that reach the tables.

Janice’s long-term dream is to own a pied-a-terre in Paris, her spiritual home. In the meantime, she and her team will continue to be a place where diners can imagine themselves dining in St. Germaine, enjoying country paté beneath string lights and enjoying a swath of the City of Light in our backyard.

Follow Kersten Rettig, a Park Cities-based writer with 30-plus years of experience in food and beverage marketing and public relations, on Instagram @KerstenEats.

‘This is Dallas’ Explores Histories, Contributions of the Disenfranchised

The late Marcellus Clayton “M.C.” Cooper is Dallas.

On Feb. 12, 1862, Cooper was born to an enslaved person, Sallie Lively, and a white man, also named M.C. Cooper.

He spent his childhood on the Caruth Farm, a massive estate once stretching over 30,000 acres north from downtown and covering where SMU, Highland Park, University Park, and NorthPark Center are now.

After attending school in East Dallas black settlements near White Rock Lake, Cooper got a job at Sanger Brothers Department Store. He worked for 11 years saving money to study dentistry at Meharry Medical College in Nashville, Tennessee.

Cooper returned to Dallas in 1896 and opened a dentist office on Commerce Street.

The formerly enslaved person’s story is one of eight featured in “This is Dallas,” an exhibit running through May 30 in Dallas Heritage Village at Old City Park, 1515 S. Harwood St. Visit dallasheritagevillage.org.

The exhibit explores the impact of disenfranchised individuals and groups on “big picture” history. Others highlighted include Anita N. Martinez, Rodd Gray [Patti Le Plae Safe], Maggie Wu, Alexander Sanger, Antonio Maceo Smith, Grace Danforth, and Quahana Parker. – Staff report

Rodd Gray, one of those highlighted in “This is Dallas,” checked out the exhibit during a recent visit to Old City Park. The displayed artifacts explore the history and contributions of people of color, women, and LGBTQ+ individuals.

(PHOTOS: COURTESY DALLAS HERITAGE VILLAGE) The late Marcellus Clayton Cooper, 18621929, a formerly enslaved person who became a dentist, is the namesake for the M.C. Cooper Dental Society, founded in 1954. Cooper Street in South Dallas also commemorates him. (IMAGE: COURTESY