Talking 25 years of soup with Valérie Blum

Much has changed around Fitler Square over the last quarter century, from the blossoming of Schuylkill River Park to a high-end housing boom and the arrival of trendy new dining options and $4 pour-over coffee. But one thing that has remained a constant: Café Lutécia, the cozy 25-seat cafe at 23d and Lombard that serves French home cooking for breakfast and lunch - warm quiche, fresh salads, soulful soups, and baguettes stuffed with pâté - not to mention the neighborhood's best gossip. With the cafe's 25th anniversary underway, French-born Valérie Blum, 58, who owns Lutécia with her Main Line-born husband, Jonathan, took a moment to reflect on her time at this corner, on her devoted neighborhood customers, and on the power of good soup.

I've long been a Lutécia fan. The cooking is basic but so satisfying. It reminds me of eating at a friend's house in France. Your soups, though . . . why are they so special?

I've loved soup from the beginning. I am from Biarritz, the Basque country, and because my parents ran restaurants on campsites, we would get up early during the summer around 4 a.m. By 9 or 10, we didn't want coffee and a croissant. We wanted something filling like a bowl of soup. We also had an elementary-school cantina with these massive women who made soup every day, and they were the best cooks ever. When we had a cabbage soup called la pôtée Béarnaise, there was a piece of pork with skin on it that all the 6-year-old kids would fight to get a piece of.

Wait a second, I just ate that soup at your cafe a few months ago.

Yes, that's true. And I simmer it overnight. Like my chicken soup - I buy whole chickens and cook them for hours.

You're most famous, though, for that creamy tomato bisque. I think it's the best in town.

I start with butter and lots of shallots because the soup is a little sweet. But I think people like it because it has a little kick. I put in a little bit of piment d'espelette.

Most people don't know this, but you went to medical school in France. What happened?

My dream was to work for Médecins Sans Frontières [Doctors Without Borders], and I was starting my residency in a children's hospital. But I wasn't strong enough. I couldn't deal with illness in children. So I dropped it, took my backpack, and went to Israel. And that's where I met Jon. We were on the same kibbutz.

What strikes you most about changes in the neighborhood since you and Jon started the cafe?

Well, the people have gotten younger and more demanding. They expect the food to be fancy and the cafe to be high-tech with WiFi and credit cards. But we're a mom-and- pop store, and I'm very old-fashioned. I feel like it's the fact that I am not-WiFi that brings many people back. But I'm also not sure I'm pleasing everyone anymore.

Do you ever think about evolving the cafe?

I need to change. But I don't have a [big enough] kitchen. My dream was to cook dishes of the terroir, like blanquette de veau or boeuf bourguignon. I don't want the plates to be beautiful with a piece of whatever for decoration. I want them to smell good and taste good. I think we're losing that. My daughter Jordane [a server at the Fat Ham] and I want to do it someday. But I'm getting old, you know?

Your customers, though, seem incredibly loyal.

Some people have come here every day for 25 years. Everyone knows the business of everyone, and my life is extremely public. When Jon became very sick with non-Hodgkin lymphoma in 2000, people brought us checks, people brought us food. [He has been in remission for 12 years.] Some customers helped me open at 6 a.m. each day. And then they were so nice again when I got sick with cystic fibrosis. I should have died in my 30s, but now I am one of the oldest patients at Penn's CF clinic. They put me on gene therapy, and I feel great. I feel like I have another chance in life.  

To be in business for 25 years, though, is a good run.

Yeah, life is good. But it's hard work. We've met so many people here, though, I feel like my life has been worth living. The cafe is our baby, our home. And even though it's not, like, famous, I think we created something.

I feel like it changed a neighborhood.