Perrier

Here in Philadelphia we have our own "Breakfast at Tiffany's. " But you don't have to be two drifters off to see the world to enjoy lunch at Boyds. At this outpost of Brasserie Perrier you'll find designer shopping, Audrey Hepburn chic, and food good enough to chase away whatever the color of your bad mood. The best part is that you can write your own script. Or so advises Jesse Sarnoff, the GM who came from D.C. about four months ago and doesn't mind if customers dash in and out or stay the afternoon.

Georges Perrier, the Philadelphia chef who led the vanguard of the city's restaurant renaissance three decades ago, was sued yesterday by two women who said they were regularly groped and propositioned by Perrier and other male employees at his Brasserie Perrier restaurant. The sexual-discrimination and -harassment lawsuits, filed in federal court in Philadelphia by Suzanne Moses, a former manager, and Sharon Patrick, a former hostess, describe a "hostile work environment" of unwanted touching, sexual propositions and lewd comments between late 1996 and June 2000 at the restaurant at 1619 Walnut St. The lawsuits also complain of similar conduct toward the women by other top Brasserie Perrier employees: general manager Joseph Amrani, head chef Christopher Scarduzio, and director of operations Andre Guillet.

A protracted water-rights fight that has pitted a small Chester County community against Perrier, the nation's leading purveyor of bottled water, appears to be headed for a settlement. Tonight, supervisors in South Coventry Township are scheduled to discuss a three-party agreement that could end their five-year battle with Perrier Group of America, which bought a 60-acre tract in the township in 1987 from Great Bear Spring Water Co. A local watershed-advocacy group, the Green Valleys Association, is also a party to the settlement.

Hydrologists for an environmental group in northern Chester County have contested the Perrier Group's claims that groundwater will not be depleted by withdrawing 95,000 gallons a day and trucking it away to be bottled and sold. "It's my considered opinion that that's hogwash," said Thomas H. Cahill, a consultant for the Green Valleys Association, at a Tuesday night meeting of government officials to discuss the situation. Cahill and two others have concluded that there is not enough groundwater to accommodate both the future growth of the area and the withdrawal requested by the Perrier Group, which owns the Great Bear Water Co. Even now, they said, periods of drought and low rainfall would mean private wells would be affected and the unnamed stream near the South Coventry property owned by Perrier could run dry. "It's not that the water's not there," deadpanned Green Valleys executive director Ralph Heister.

"When the well is dry, we know the worth of water. " The quote from Benjamin Franklin's Poor Richard's Almanac was prominently displayed Monday in Owen J. Roberts Middle School, where about 125 people attended an emotionally charged meeting. To some, it was the opening skirmish in a David-and-Goliath fight between northern Chester County residents and corporate America - specifically, the Perrier Group. The company has drilled a 192-foot bore hole to prepare for a possible expansion of its water-pumping plant.

If Indian summer is keeping you elbow-deep in tomatoes, consider turning those unrequited love apples into delicious, herb-flavored and conveniently storable tomato confit. At Le Mas Perrier on Lancaster Avenue in Wayne, Chef Laurent Pillard makes the confit - a close cousin to the sundried tomato - out of his surplus 'maters. (His recipe is for as large a quantity as you like; just be sure not to saturate the tomato wedges with oil.) Pillard pairs the tangy dried tomatoes with proscuitto and pesto on "ciabatta" bread laced with kalamata olives and olive oil. CIABATTA SANDWICH Ciabatta olive roll 1/2 teaspoon extra-virgin olive oil 2-3 pieces tomato confit (see below)

In less than two weeks, on Monday, Sept. 8, the first cookbook ever from Philadelphia's No. 1 chef will go on sale, and the Daily News Food section's most popular writer will breathe a huge sigh of relief. Aliza Green, who writes our weekly "Ask the Chefs" column, has collaborated for the past year and a half on "Georges Perrier - Le Bec-Fin Recipes," helping to translate the great chef's creations into recipes that not-so-great chefs can make at home. As the book went off to the printer, we asked Green to put off a well-deserved vacation down the shore just long enough to give our readers a behind-the-scenes peek at the making of the book.

I didn't see any obvious literary types when I lunched this week at La Coupole, the new basement bistro in the Bourse named for a legendary Parisian cafe where Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein and Jean-Paul Sartre once hung out. Philadelphia's La Coupole was filled instead with office workers and Christmas shoppers too busy to linger over espresso and contemplate philosophy. La Coupole occupies part of the sprawling space that was once the supper club Harlow, then Oggi. The kitchen is vastly improved over those previous incarnations - no surprise, considering that Le Bec Fin's Georges Perrier is a partner in this enterprise.