PARIS, FRANCE - By the time the skidding jumbo jet wheels raise smoke puffs from the runway at Charles de Gaulle Airport or the sleek Eurostar turbowhines into the Gare du Nord, I have fixed in my mind a lengthy list of Paris addresses.

Mistresses? In a sense, yes. These are the memorable restaurants that have proven so alluring in the past that I yearn to embrace once again their prix fixe. Yet it seems axiomatic that on every visit, fickle diner that I am, I discover a new love. And I swear to one and all that their gibellote exceeds everything that came before.

Ah, Restaurant Le Cuisiner! How do I love thee? Let me count the ways:

• 1. Crème brulée with an entire pear showing below the thinnest pane of carmel.
• 2. Fricassee ('gibelotte) of rabbit cooked with prunes, served over rutabaga fettucine and spiced with aromatic old-world chervil.
• 3. A salad topped with sautéed chicken livers that had pickled black-radish slices artfully surrounding the greens.
• 4. Sea scallops and rice mixed in pastry with winter truffles.
• 5. Fresh-water perch pan fried in an essence of red wine, served with a mousse that marries potatoes and hazelnut oil.
• 6. Consommé of langoustine (a small, delicate lobster) with winter truffles.
• 7. Considering French prices, a bargain basement '92 Pauillac exceeded in my memory only by a Margaux poured in extremely cautious portions at the American ambassador's reception for Pearl Bailey in 1982.

In the villages of the 16th arrondissement, much like the Ile St. Louis, there are out-of-the-way streets where residents persistently pursue their insular lives, ignorant of the airplane or anything surpassing the wireless. Some of them have never ventured off their island whether it be defined as in the case of Ile St. Louis by the Seine or by other frontiers such as the Bois de Boulogne.

Deep in the 16th district of Paris not far from the Porte de St. Cloud through which Parisians stream into the suburbs on weekends lies the miniscule Rue le Marois. Once it may have consisted of carriage gateways or old stone walls, behind which one could sense the presence of a boxy abode with an old-fashioned garden. Today Rue le Marois shelters, at No. 19, a tiny restaurant that has been steadily growing in reputation over the past four years under the guidance and culinary skill of Elisabeth and Thierry Conte.

The tables grow in clusters as tight as the lilacs of the former gardens of Rue le Marois. As the evening passes, every chair becomes occupied. What is it about French restaurants that allows normal conversation in such tight quarters? What is it about French restaurants that would allow the man seated directly behind me to smoke a pipe (throughout his meal!), for which he would be carried directly to jail in the United States, and none of us noticed? (Parisian friends say it is the high ceilings; we once lived in an apartment that, if turned on its side, would have offered twice as much room.)

The decor at Le Cuisinier bespeaks comfort, but there are no frills. Oh, comfortable chairs of course and the potted palm in the entrance, but this venue is dedicated to food on the table and not vintage cognac bottles on the shelves or copper pans on the wall. The fixed-price menu offers three courses for $27 (as of this writing). This includes a choice between the aforementioned rabbit or the perch. The chicken livers were among the salads. Crèpes flamed in Grand Marnier were on the dessert selection (although I jumped to the a la carte menu for a cr\ème brulee unmatched in my culinary experience; it is interesting here to note that American fire restrictions usually preclude the use of a blowtorch to properly carmelize the surface of this dessert).

Molière, Racine and La Fontaine all lived in this village and often gathered at the restaurants. Molière read the Misanthrope' to his friends in the back room of the Auberge du Mounton Blanc immediately after he had written it. Some say that this attests to the literary fame of the 16th district.

Maybe. I prefer to think it attests to the culinary fame. Au revoir, Le Cuisinier Francois. You will remain in my heart forever. Or at least until a more alluring andouillette comes along.

Le Cuisinier Francois
19 Rue le Marois
Metro: Porte de St. Cloud.

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