Colette Rossant


Colette Sol Rossant was a French-American cookbook author, journalist, translator, and restaurateur, who was a member of the Pallache family.

Background

Sorbonne rwk.jpg|thumb|right|Chapel of Sainte Ursule at the Sorbonne, where Rossant studied]
Born in Paris, Rossant was the daughter of Iska Palacci and Marceline Bemant. She traveled with her mother to Cairo to live with her father and her father's family during World War II. Her mother spent much of the war in Beirut, while her brother Eddy Palacci remained in Paris with their mother's parents.
After World War II, Rossant returned to Paris and lived with her grandmother and brother, joined occasionally by her mother. In Paris, she studied at the Lycée La Fontaine. She spent a year learning English at Roedean School near Brighton, UK. She earned a B.A. in Comparative Literature at the Sorbonne in 1954. She married American architect James Rossant in 1955.

Career

Image:Lower Manhattan from Jersey City November 2014 panorama 3.jpg|thumb|right|View of Lower Manhattan, where Rossant moved in 1955.
Moving to New York City with her husband in 1955, Rossant pursued several careers, often simultaneously like teaching, writing, translating, restaurant business, and raising a family.
Rossant spent many years teaching French. She was first a language instructor at the Browning School. She then taught French at Hofstra University. She became head of the French department at St. Anne's School. Her last position was as Liaison Officer at the New York branch of Crédit Lyonnais. Exploring New York, Rossant became very interested in bettering the food she found there. She published her first of seven cookbooks in 1975. Her third cookbook, A Mostly French Food Processor Cookbook sold more than 50,000 copies and made a name for her in the Food industry. She became "underground gourmet" for New York Magazine in the 1980s. She served as food and design editor for McCalls Magazine. She then became a columnist for the New York Daily News, where she wrote a popular Wednesday column called "Ask Colette." She contributed to Food Arts and Super Chef magazines.
Rossant helped launch two restaurants in New York. Buddha Green opened in Midtown Manhattan and featured original, vegetarian "Buddhist" cuisine. Dim Sum Go Go opened in Chinatown and featured original Imperial Cantonese cuisine, although Rossant had stopped consulting there. Her husband James Rossant helped design both, while son Tomas helped on the interior at Buddha Green. Rossant traveled abroad. Her lifelong interest in Asian cuisines took her to China and Japan, reflected in her cookbooks and restaurants.
Image:Copie de EVOLUTION DES TOUCHES 19 e siècle à 2005.jpg|thumb|right|Dorceau in Orne, France, near Rossant's home since 2002
Rossant's last books were memoirs: Apricots on the Nile, Return to Paris, and The World in My Kitchen.
In 2002, Rossant moved from New York back to France, but rather than return to Paris again, she went to live in the department of Orne, two hours west of Paris. In 2009, Rossant's husband of 55 years died. She continued to live in their home near Condeau, France, on whose town council she has served. She continued to contribute to Super Chef, Food Arts, and Pays du Perche magazines and was writing a twelfth book. In November 2010, Rossant received the Prix Eugenie Brazier for the French translation of her first memoir, Mémoires d'une Egypte perdue.
Rossant appeared during an interview in Rebekah Wingert-Jabi's 2015 documentary Another Way of Living: The Story of Reston, VA, along with an excerpt of an interview with Rossant's by then deceased husband, James.

Personal life

Rossant's parents met in Paris at a wedding. Her father, who was ill for much of his life, returned with his family to Egypt for warmer weather.
Rossant came from both Sephardic and Ashkenazi families:Sephardic line: According to her first memoir, the Sephardic Palacci side of her family left Spain after the Alhambra Decree, moved to Italy, and then moved to Istanbul. There, an ancestor became a major domo in the Ottoman army. During an Ottoman invasion of Egypt, this great-great-grandfather moved from Istanbul to Cairo. In Egypt, he owned lemon perfume factories in Upper Egypt. Her grandfather Vita Palacci owned a well-known department store in Cairo and who, "like all his ancestors before him, had traveled to Turkey to find his wife... The eldest son in every generation had gone back to Istanbul to find a wife." Her father Isaac Palacci worked in exports and imports in support of his father's department store. Iska Palacci died in early 1940 in Cairo.Ashkenazi line: According to her brother's memoir, the Ashkenazi branch came from Eastern Europe. Her maternal grandfather, "James Bémant," was born "Shlomo Beiman" in what is now Belarus. Her maternal grandmother, "Rose Bémant," was born "Esther Rosenberg" in what is now Poland. James' father was a part-time colporteur and pêcheur with nine children. Rose's father was an épicier who became "rich" and had seven children. James and Rose Bémant had two children, Marceline and Charles. Marceline studied at finishing school in Brighton, UK.
Colette Rossant died from breast cancer on 12 October 2023, at the age of 91.

Awards and nominations

;Awards
  • 2010: Prix Eugenie Brazier for Memoire d'une Egypt perdue
;Nominations

Works

Writing in 2007, The Jewish Chronicle noted "Rossant lives and loves through the fragrance and flavour of food" and called her writing "simple and direct."
;MemoirsThe World in My Kitchen ; Madeleines in Manhattan Return to Paris ; Return to Paris ; Retour a Paris Apricots on the Nile ; originally Memories of a Lost Egypt ; Apricots on the Nile ; Mémoires d'une Egypte perdue ; Mein Kairo ; Abrikozen langs de Nijl ; Sárgabarackok a Níluson
;CookbooksVegetables: Growing, Cooking, Keeping, with Marianne Melendez New Kosher Cooking Colette's Japanese Cuisine, introduced by Calvin TrillinColette's Slim Cuisine A Mostly French Food Processor Cookbook with Jill Harris HermanColette Rossant's After Five Gourmet Cooking with Colette, edited by Lorraine Davis
;TranslationsBest of New York, by Gault Millau Bocuse a la Carte by Paul Bocuse New Classic Cuisine by Michel Roux and Albert Roux Paul Bocuse's French Cooking, by Paul Bocuse