LOCALadk Magazine

22 Summer 2020 LOCALadk Magazine LOCALadk The 14th of July is to France what the 4th of July is to the USA—a holiday that celebrates the nation. Both are days to wave the flag—the red, white, and blue of the Stars and Stripes and the bleu, blanc, et rouge of Le Tricolore. Bastille Day commemorates, however, a more vio- lent revolutionar y event than Independence Day does. It refers to the 1789 storming of the Bastille (a prison and militar y fortress) by the people of Paris, to seize ammunition and free political prisoners of the king. Though its violent origins still resonate in the militar y parade that rumbles down the Champs-Élysées as well as in the fireworks that explode over cities and towns throughout France, no one today re-enacts the storm- ing of the Bastille. That symbol of the French monar- chy's absolutism was demolished by November 1789. These days the people of France are more likely to storm their local cafés, those symbols of French social life. There, of course, they are unlikely to "crack open a cold one" or "fire up the grill" for hamburgers and hot dogs, but rather to savor the food and wine that have made French cuisine famous throughout the world. Within the Adirondack Park's ligne bleu ever y July 14th, the best place to celebrate Bastille Day with the vins blanc ou rouge of France, as well as its celebrated cuisine, is at the Left Bank Café (LBC) in Saranac Lake. Overlooking the Saranac River just after it passes un- der Broadway, the LBC does indeed stand on the left bank in this artsy village, invoking the more famous rive gauche of the Seine, with its neighborhoods favored by artists, students, and cultural bohemians in Paris. Now in the 10th year of its second incarnation, the LBC first came into being thanks to Jack Weissberg, an American air ser viceman who participated in more than 60 bombing missions over France during World War II. After the war, Jack under went treatment for tuber- culosis in Saranac Lake, where, like many before him, the natural beauty of the Adirondacks made a lasting impression. Although he then moved to France, estab- lished an army surplus business, married and raised a family in the village of Entrains-sur-Nohain south of Paris, Jack returned to the Adirondacks in 1970 with his second wife Jane and his son Kenneth. Here the couple opened the Saranac Lake Baker y and Left Bank Café. While Jane, originally from Scotland, was an accomplished baker and businesswoman, Jack, with his love of all things French and his outgoing per- sonality, became known locally as "Monsieur Jacques." Since Kenneth was born in France and raised both there and in Saranac Lake, he experienced a uniquely bi-na- tional, bi-cultural upbringing, which he honored first in 1989 (the 200th anniversar y of the storming of the Bastille) by creating a Sister City Association between Saranac Lake and Entrains-sur-Nohain, then in 2010, by reopening the Left Bank Café. The LBC owes its Bastille Day festivities, though, largely to Anne Sterling, the restaurant's manager who became part owner in 2012. While teaching in the Culi- nar y Department of nearby Paul Smith's College, Anne first joined Kenneth Weissberg and his wife Noella to consult on the menu and recruit students to work at the newly opened LBC, whose operations she soon be- gan to oversee. Previously, Anne did her training over eight years in France —from student at La Varenne cooking school to restaurant and baker y apprentice, to chef for a tour- ist barge on the canals of the Loire and Burgundy re- gions. By the time the LBC opened in 2010 she had been awarded a Master of Gastronomy degree by Le Cordon Bleu, the renowned Parisian cooking school founded in 1895, whose culinar y programs still set the standard for French cuisine and hospitality worldwide. Since 2010, Anne has overseen the LBC's expansion four times, from its origins as a morning café ser ving croissants and crepes to the full restaurant it is now, ser ving lunch and dinner daily. Anne is sure to be toasted by the LBC's boisterous Bastille Day crowd, before they join Christopher Weiss- berg, Kenneth's son and Jack's grandson, in singing "La Marseillaise," the French national anthem. Sheet music and lyrics are provided, but several of the staff don't need them, having come from France to work on J-1 Visas. Even Christopher's three-year-old daughter has the song memorized, joining in as she winds her way around the bar stools. A small French flag adorns each table in the din- ing room, providing bleu, blanc, et rouge accents to the post-and-beam interior, with its wood floors and tongue-in-groove ceiling. Vintage Air France posters decorate the caramel-colored walls, and bookshelves Bastille Day on the Left Bank of the Saranac By Philip Kokotailo

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