Olive town

The space is impossibly cute

At a small 2,000 square feet, Eau Tour makes the most of its space with a very of-the-moment decor that you will particularly adore if you are a woman of the Millennial persuasion (guilty). Art deco accents like stained glass and gold bar stools meld with bright pinks and greens. The walls and floors are original D’Hanis brick and terrazzo that were preserved from when the building was a bank in the 1960s. Garnish Design did the interiors of Eau Tour and Lees Den, which has an equally trendy-cute aesthetic.

Seafood is the star

Led by chef Kent Domas, Eau Tour’s kitchen puts a big emphasis on seafood, from raw-bar selections like East Coast and Gulf oysters, to ocean touches on vegetable dishes, and fish entrees prepared in a wood-burning oven. The marinated crab claws are playfully presented, their tiny pinchers sticking upright in a small ice-hugged bowl, the fleshy bits swimming in a yuzu marinade ready to be nibbled off.

There’s a section of the menu called “caviar and roe for the people”—somewhat of an oxymoron as the high cost of fish eggs (here, $20 to $140) make them very much not for the people. But this is perhaps a reference to the fact that the caviar and roe are served with potato chips (sorry, Kennebec gaufrettes).

Fish shines in many other ways on Eau Tour’s menu, including in classics like seafood bouillabaisse, tuna tartare, mussels with snail butter, and grilled snapper. It also plays a role in an exciting leek dish—words not often stringed together—that’s a fresh take on “poireaux vinaigrette.” The leeks vinaigrette appetizer is enhanced with texture from hazelnuts and breadcrumbs, and brininess from marinated anchovies.

There’s a $23 omelet (it’s good)

It’s a bold move to put an omelet on the menu of a fancy restaurant—that’s gotta be a pretty special omelet. If curiosity gets the best of you too, you’ll find an expertly folded omelet enveloping very generous portions of crab, plus a gooey filling made even more creamy with the addition of Béarnaise sauce. It comes with a big, well-dressed heapful of what is perhaps the most luxurious lettuce: butter lettuce. Is the omelet dish worth $23? As always, that depends what $23 is worth to you.

There’s a way to get full for less

We’ve all been there: How do I actually leave this restaurant full without spending too much money? At Eau Tour, the formula lies with the most decadent dishes on the menu. The cheapest entree is a double cheeseburger ($18) that grinds both short rib and duck into the patty, topped with onions and Gruyère cheese, on a brioche bun.

The Parisian gnocchi ($25) is also up to the task, coated with caramelized onions, crème fraîche, olives and anchovies. And if you’re not too hungry, try the mushroom and raclette dumplings ($16), which are small but pretty filling, their crispy exteriors sitting on a bed of crème fraîche and chile oil.

The drinks will get you tipsy

The dining room features an actual boat full of mostly French wine bottles that really sets the tone. And the cocktails here are boozy—maybe that’s why Eau Tour is so fun? The Aneth Avec pierces through you like a dirty martini on an empty stomach, allying aquavit and gin with Lillet Blanc, cucumber bitters and a ton of dill. The most popular cocktail is bound to be the one that comes in a giant fish-shaped glass. The Mean Left Hook is made for the Instagram age, but also tastes good and goes down easy, mixing rhum agricole, green Chartreuse, coconut, pineapple and lime.

Eau Tour

Find it: 5117 Kelvin Dr Suite 200, Houston, TX 77005; (713) 492-2490

Several tipsters identified Green as a possible suspect after the reward for information in the case was increased to $15,000 this month. Officers arrested Green in Casper on Tuesday.

Green, 22, made an initial appearance by video Thursday before U.S. Magistrate Judge Kelly Rankin in Cheyenne. She remained jailed in Wheatland, a town of 3,500 people about 70 miles (110 kilometers) north of Cheyenne, with no bond set.

Dressed in olive green prison garb and wearing glasses, Green said only “yes” and “no” in response to basic questions from Rankin during the 20-minute hearing.

She is charged with arson, a felony punishable by up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Reached by phone, her attorney, Ryan Semerad, declined to comment.

The clinic was scheduled to open last summer as the only facility of its kind in the state, offering women’s health care, family planning and gender-affirming health care in addition to abortion services. But the fire delayed those plans.

It was then slated to open next month, but those plans were thrown into doubt after Gov. Mark Gordon allowed a broad new abortion ban to take effect on Sunday without his signature. On Wednesday, Teton County District Court Judge Melissa Owens halted enforcement of the ban after a hearing in which abortion-rights supporters said it harms pregnant women and their doctors, and violates the state constitution.

Owens suspended the ban for at least two weeks. Meanwhile, the state’s first-in-the-nation ban on abortion pills remains set to take effect in July but also faces a court challenge.

Green’s arrest followed an investigation that had been stalled for months.

In early March, an anonymous donor added $10,000 to the $5,000 reward in the arson case. Investigators received a dozen tips, including four naming Green as a possible suspect.

An image in one of Green’s social media accounts showed her wearing shoes that matched those worn by the arson suspect. And Green drove a beige, 2007 Toyota Corolla that matched a car in security footage shot at the crime scene, according to Wright’s statement.

Confronted by investigators Tuesday, Green acknowledged setting the fire amid “nightmares which she attributed to her anxiety about the abortion clinic,” Wright said in the court filing.

Green was living in Laramie at the time at the time of the fire. She told investigators that she bought gas cans and aluminum pans at a Walmart the day before the fire, drove to Casper, and put the cans and pans in a bag she carried to the clinic, matching security video and a witness’s account, Wright wrote.

She said she used a rock to break glass in a door and, once inside, poured gasoline into the pans in several rooms and on the floor. She set fire to the gasoline in a room and planned to light more, but the fire spread quickly and she decided to leave, Wright’s statement said.

Green said she slipped on gasoline and fell before she fled out the door she had entered, then drove 150 miles (241 kilometers) back to Laramie without stopping, Wright wrote.

Reached by phone Thursday, Green’s father, Stephen Green, declined to comment and referred questions to her attorney.

___

Hanson reported from Helena, Montana. Associated Press researcher Rhonda Shafner in New York contributed to this report.

He could have thrown in the towel; he might have looked for an extra hand or two.

Instead, he called Michel Suas .

Known within the industry as the guru of artisan bread, Suas has made a career out of responding to similar quandaries. The native Frenchman has worked with all the big names in the bread world. From local outfits like Acme, Grace Baking and Semifreddi’s to La Brea Bakery in Los Angeles and Balthazar in New York, Suas has done everything from developing formulas for the perfect loaf to streamlining baking processes to designing bakeries worldwide.

In a little more than a decade, he’s founded the San Francisco Baking Institute and equipment importing company TMB Baking, opened Thorough Bread (a retail bakery) and authored an impressive textbook on baking and pastry.

Suas is living proof that when it comes to dough, he’s the go-to guy.

“He’s the best in the business,” says Robertson matter-of-factly. “You can ask him anything and he knows exactly what to do.”

For Robertson’s sleeping dilemma, that meant helping him figure out a way to slow down the bread rising so it could happen overnight. That way, he could catch some Z’s while the dough worked its magic.

“I knew what needed to happen,” says Robertson, “but I was 22 and I’d never done it before. Michel worked with me to figure it out.”

Suas’ expertise draws from a 40-plus year career that began in Brittany, France, when he was just 14.

At that time, kids would either stay on the same track in school, he explains, or, “If you were goofing off, they’d say, ‘OK, we’ve had enough of you,’ and they’d make you get a job.”

Given his gentle, reserved nature today, it seems almost unfathomable that Suas would have fallen into the latter category, but he did, so he began an apprentice program in the kitchen.

The apprentice

“I started on my 14th birthday,” he recalls with a grin, “and they made me peel potatoes and clean mussels all day, with my tender little hands.”

It was a rough start, but he lasted in the program for the three required years, before moving his focus to pastry. Suas spent one year in training, received his diploma and moved around to build up his resume. With each new experience, his passion became clearer. It wasn’t simply that he was drawn to the bread and sweets – that much was true. But a great deal of his influence also had to do with lifestyle choices and personalities.

Suas began working with a pastry chef named Hingouët – they only knew last names at the time, he says – who was educated both in and outside of the kitchen. “When the other chefs were all about chasing girls and fast cars , he talked about love, music and the arts. He had family values.”

After that, he says, “I never stopped pastry.”

Sitting across the table from the wiry, now 54-year-old man at the South San Francisco offices of the baking institute, it’s hard to imagine that he would have chosen any other path. He gently brushes a lock of floppy gray hair from his forehead, and talks about his wife, Evelyne, who has been with him every step as his business has grown and is a co-owner of the San Francisco Baking Institute and TMB Baking. Their 12-year-old daughter, Julie Marie , conceived the name Thorough Bread for his retail bakery and designed the logo. Keeping his family close and involved is clearly a priority.

But focusing on life outside the bakery wasn’t the only positive influence that Hingouët had on Suas. Under his tutelage, the 21-year-old Suas landed a job as head pastry chef at Barrier restaurant in Tours, France. The fact that it had earned three Michelin stars was just the cherry on top – the real draw was that at the time, it was the only three-star restaurant baking its own bread on site. But after three years of adding to his bread-baking repertoire, he was ready to move on.

“I was curious and I had nothing to lose,” he says, “so I took my backpack and came to the United States. I didn’t speak a word of English.” Landing first in New York on his way to Chicago, it didn’t take Suas long to find a job – word spread that there was a guy from France in town, and he was a good baker and pastry chef.

After a stint in the Windy City and a trip back to France to take care of his ailing mother, Suas and his then-girlfriend, Evelyne, returned to the United States for good.

Cross-country odyssey

The two piled into a VW van and drove all over North America, from Key West and Texas up to Canada, sightseeing and eating on a budget.

“We got lucky,” he says. “We ran out of money in San Francisco.”

Suas landed here in 1987, when the Bay Area was smack in the middle of an artisan bread revolution.

One afternoon, he popped into the office of Earl Lind , who, at the time, was the go-to equipment guy for bakers. Sitting across the desk from Lind was Steve Sullivan , who had opened a little bakery in Berkeley called Acme, and was looking to expand.

That began a 20-year acquaintance that would ultimately benefit them both.

“I had gone to a couple of these trade shows in Europe,” says Sullivan, “and had seen a certain kind of mixer – all of the old bakeries there had it.” Sullivan says that even though he didn’t know much about it, he had already decided that his bakery should have this mixer. But he didn’t know how to get it.

“I couldn’t believe it when Michel walked in. He knew exactly what I was talking about.”

Sullivan became Suas’ first client, and the word spread from there.

Suas primarily helped Sullivan with equipment and planning, but Sullivan’s word-of-mouth recommendations were priceless.

Nancy Silverton at Los Angeles’ La Brea Bakery was Suas’ second client, and others followed.

In the late ’80s and early ’90s, says Suas, “everything was being shaken up, and I was in the middle of that chaos. I was here at a time when people were looking for support and direction, and all I did was give my honest advice.”

That advice went to bakers at Metropolis, Grace Baking, Boudin, Ecce Panis in New York, and Essential Baking Co. and Grand Central Bakery in Seattle, plus chefs like Thomas Keller – before opening Bouchon Bakery – to name a few.

“Almost anybody who has set up a bakery in the last 15 years in the United States has probably dealt with Michel,” says Sullivan.

But for Suas, it was an education as well.

Intro to sourdough

“I was so amazed with what was going on here,” he says of the artisan movement. “It was a thrill to be surrounded by so many people with that much talent.” In fact, Suas explains, he never wanted to be that guy who came from France and said, “Here’s how to make a baguette.”

“When I came, sourdough was a discovery,” he says. “At first I thought, ‘Wow, that’s a strange flavor,’ but when you learn how it’s done, you start to appreciate it.”

In addition, the way bread was processed and handled was different. Liquid starters were not something that had been used in Europe. And bread with cheese or olives? That was completely new.

“I don’t take credit for what was being developed,” says Suas. “I just helped stabilize those formulas.” The truth is, he says, as long as you have the basics, you can adapt and work with anything.

His helpful, honest advice and passion for the bread movement led enough people to his door, but what he really wanted was to start a baking school. In 1996, that’s exactly what he did, opening the San Francisco Baking Institute.

“I was traveling a lot at the time, and one thing I realized was that a lot of young people were being left out. Small bakeries couldn’t afford a consultant, and I couldn’t be everywhere at once.”

At the school, students come either for five-day seminars, or the 18-week professional training program (see sidebar, this page), and include everyone from serious bakers who have never had proper training to those who want to open their own bakery. Some even come as a gift to themselves on a vacation from another line of work – baking enthusiasts who consider it a hobby.

Suas is quick to assure that artisan bread can and should be baked in the home oven, and to that end, he has instructors give tips on how to do so (see “The nuts & bolts of bread-baking,” Page F8).

To those heading into the professional arena, both Suas and the baking institute remain a resource long after students leave the school.

Though he doesn’t have a hands-on role with the students, Suas keeps plenty busy. These days, he starts every morning with a trip to Thorough Bread, his retail spot on Church Street in San Francisco. He personally brings in the baked goods from the school, admitting that it forces him to keep an eye on things.

Bakers’ resource

In addition, he has spent the last four years assembling a new textbook (“Advance Bread and Pastry: A Professional Approach,” Delmar Cengage Learning, 2008) that gives functional and technical advice on all aspects of baking and pastry. The book weighs more than a 5-pound bag of flour, but is surprisingly approachable. He hopes that it will become the standard instructional book.

It’s fitting. At the end of the day, Suas is, first and foremost, a teacher. If he can help someone streamline the process to go from 50 to 5,000 baguettes a day, if he can equip a bakery to run efficiently or – perhaps most importantly – help a fledgling baker figure out how to get some sleep, he knows he’s succeeded.

Step-by-step bread-making instructions, tips and recipes,

AND TASTER’S CHOICE BEST BAGUETTE, Pages F8 & F9