Bread

I’ve realized that there are some things that I will cook by myself and others that require another person. Its not that they cannot be done alone or that I don’t know what I am doing but more that I associate that dish with other people and cannot conceive of making it on my own. There are always grand plans of making green chili or risotto churning in the back of the mind, but somehow it just never happens. I need that push of being home, fighting for control of the spatula with my mom and having my dad’s impressive appetite waiting for the creation.


So this weekend I have been home, babysitting Cocoa and Luna, our two dogs, and I of course came home with the big idea that I could get some baking done. Bread to be more specific. Like everyone else, I love bread. Really, is there anyone who when asked says, “oh no, I really just don’t care for bread.”? Nope, pretty sure that person doesn’t exist. There are many people who don’t like certain kinds of breads; white bread vs. wheat, baguette vs. country loaf, soft vs. crusty; but that’s certainly not the same thing as disliking bread entirely. Pretty sure there is some kind of bread in every culture in this world from the French baguette all the way to a Mexican tortilla, which probably explains the universal love for this simple staple of the human diet.


So a weekend at home by myself, with a large kitchen unencumbered by a roommate’s culinary creations and an oven that can be trusted seemed like a perfect opportunity. Yet somehow the hours slipped by and the allure of fresh, home-baked bread remained an imaginary ideal. Bread has settled itself in my mind as something that is done with other people. The hours spent waiting for the dough to rise seemed empty and lonely without someone to laugh and joke with.


During my sejour in Bordeaux, my host dad and I would bake up a loaf occasionally. The bread coming out as a dense country loaf bursting with seeds and always on the edge of being too yeasty since he always wanted it to be lighter and bigger, not realizing that he’d need a different recipe and probably more time to let it rise. Upon my return, my dad and I finally made good on our plans to bake together. When my parents were first married my dad would bake bread often, but with the passing of years and the busyness of work the baking turned into a lovely memory. However, after persistent begging and a need for bonding time after four months of separation, we made it happen.


We went on a mad baking storm Christmas day, with frantic trips to find a grocery store that was open and not sold out of yeast, cutting down recipes to make up for the fact that none could be found and then deciding to make extra bread when more yeast appeared from swirling black hole of the pantry. The entire afternoon and evening were spent mixing, kneading, finding an excellent use for the poor, ignored warming oven (as a warm, dry place to let the dough rise) and much impatient waiting as the breads rose, then were punched down, only to rise again, be punched, formed and risen again before even making it into the oven.


It was truly delightful, a pleasure for all the senses, and a wonderful time for just spending an afternoon with my dad. We both enjoyed being dusted with flour and mixing the dough with our fingers. And of course, the best was when the loaves finally came out of the oven, smelling like heaven and bursting steam with the first cut of the bread knife. Spread with butter which instantly melted into the white flesh of the slice there was a moment nearing perfect ecstasy eating those fresh, warm bites of our creation. Thus, no bread was baked despite the best of intentions, but I can always hope for more bonding time to come.

Thanksgiving in France

Thanksgiving, a day for being home with family, eating ridiculous amounts of food and being thankful for what we have. I am very thankful for my experience here in France. I’ve successfully eaten my way through my sejour, gleaning a much broader French vocabulary and comfort with the language and the people. I’ve made my way through some truly amazing French culture, movies, books, classes and a bit of travel. And its not quite over yet!
Last night, the other California students and I were invited to a Thanksgiving dinner put on by our program along with the Association Bordeaux-USA and the consulate. It was held in a collège or junior high school, which caused some fear on my part with visions of cafeteria food and strange ladies in hairnets dolling out the day’s mystery meat on plastic trays. Unfortunately we were in the cafeteria and there cooks were wearing hairnets and white lab coats, but there were tablecloths, real silverware and we were served the meal at the table.
However, the idea of a traditional thanksgiving has not quite been perfected yet, despite our program’s long experience with Americans.
The meal began with mingling and aperitifs. We got to see our fellow students, most of who had disappeared into Bordeaux seemingly without a trace, and see how people have changed. There were many looking very French with new clothes and (for the girls) and newfound ability to wear heels. A few people were looking thinner, a few a bit plumper from the amazing French food. One guy is growing a moustache and had curled it up at the ends for the occasion.
We sat down for our meal, the Americans clustering together in groups, and the French in their groups. An undrinkable red wine was on the table, and in true college student fashion, my table-mates attacked the bottle without restraint. It is at this point that the “traditional” dinner was to begin.

First course: a salad. Seems normal, right? Not necessarily when there are crevettes (shrimp) with their heads and exoskeletons still attached sitting on the plate along with the carrots, cucumber and one leaf of lettuce.


Second course: the main dish with turkey, stuffing, potatoes, Brussels sprouts and cranberry sauce. This at least seemed slightly normal; sure the turkey was rather dry, as were the 3 tiny potatoes and no gravy in sight to cover it up, and the stuffing just wasn’t “like mama used to make” but at least they had the components right. It’s not like there aren’t many families in the States who badly cook their bird or who pull out an old family recipe for stuffing that makes you wonder if there is any history of mental illness in the family. That’s part of the charm of the holiday season.

Third course: a small bowl with a wedge of cheese artistically placed on a leaf of lettuce. Last time I checked, there was no cheese course at thanksgiving, but hey, “when in Rome” (or France, rather) ….

the french would be lost without the cheese course

Fourth and final course: a proudly presented pumpkin pie. We each receive our plate, confused. What is it? Looking around the room all the Americans have a strange look on their face, ranging from a hopeful puzzlement to near horror. It’s not the right color or texture, and what are those bits in the filling? Nuts? One of our program directors asks us plein d’espoir (full of hope), “Is this right? We try every year to make a traditional American pumpkin pie but it’s never quite right, did we get it right this year?” Unfortunately, no. And unfortunately many plates went back to the kitchen barely touched. (to be fair, it wasn't terrible, it just wasn't what we were expecting)

this is not pumpkin pie

Despite the deviations from what we might consider a normal Thanksgiving dinner, it was good to touch base with other people in the program, compare notes on our “French Experience.” It was an excellent validation that I’ve been doing things right and that it seems as if my sejour has been a greater success than many of my compatriots. For that, and for French pastries, I am truly thankful.

Eco-friendly France

Typically I struggle with the idea of eating rabbit, I can’t quite get over the fact that I love my friend’s pet rabbit, Penelope, and that I would someday like to have my very own bunny, cute and fluffy with long ears and a cotton-ball tail. But I have kept true to my decision to eat whatever is offered to me, no matter how frightening or saddening I might find it.
Over the weekend we were staying in Dordogne at a lodging place run by the church. The good sisters follow the rule of “waste not, want not.” Thus, they make their evening herbal tea from plants and herbs that they either find in the garden or that they collect when walking out in the countryside. So the first morning we were there, I was admiring the fog that had settled into the valley when my host father called me into the kitchen saying they needed help and to hurry. So I scurried into the kitchen in order to be confronted by the sight of a dead rabbit bleeding on the prep table in the kitchen. One of the sisters was prepping it so that we could eat it for dinner. Apparently she was left a note early that morning that the next meal was waiting out on the road. The poor rabbit had made an unfortunate choice when trying to cross the road and thus became meat for the pot. I got a front row seat at the spectacle of rabbit skinning, watching as the nun sliced around and up the legs to free the skin to be pulled off in one piece, revealing a broken front leg. As she did so I tried not to think and just listened as she explained what she was doing and added in an interesting anecdote.
Why do butchers leave the feet and head on a rabbit when they sell them at the market? It is in order to prove that they are indeed selling a rabbit and not a cat because apparently the two animals look the same without the head and feet.”
Apparently if you don’t know what you are eating, the taste is the same too. Who knew that cats taste somewhat gamey, as the rabbit did?
As difficult as it was to get over the idea that I was to eat road kill, I very much respect the fact that nothing is being wasted. In some ways you see this often in French cooking. Hard, old bread is used for making soups such as the famous French Onion Soup that you find in all the chic restaurants. The broth left over from a pot au feu is later used for a traditional soup to which vermicelli noodles are added. When we cut up vegetables for dinner, the left over ends are given to the family pet gerbil along with any boxes and cartons that are empty and will fit in his cage. My host mother considers it a great waste to throw out dried out bread or to feed it to the ducks at the park; if she doesn’t use the bread in soup she gives it to her father for his chickens. I wonder if the idea of the “lucky rabbit’s foot” came about because someone did not want to waste any part of the animal?

Medieval jardin potager (kitchen garden) in Dordogne

It is strange to remember that that my hippie-ecological side was slightly afraid to come to France thinking that they had no consciousness for the environment. But it is not so at all. We are very good here about putting things in the recycling bin or in the box outside the door for glass. I get scolded if I rinse something before putting it in the dishwasher or before putting it in the recycling bin because that is a waste of water. Actually, it is encouraged to not wash anything by hand since the dishwasher is very efficient both in the sense of water usage and in the sense that it cleans extremely well. They are very big on saving energy and I was given the “suggestion” to turn off my surge protector whenever I was not charging something because even a surge protector wastes energy with the current passing in and out of it. This advice was given along with the saying “il faut sauver les ours polairs.” In other words, we need to save the polar bears, and now every time I turn off my surge protector I think of polar bears.
Sure, the French do not embrace the idea of vegetarianism and they are still overenthusiastically feeding geese in order to get foie gras, but they are not unconscious of their impact on the world. They are more likely to eat local products, be it meat, poultry or cheese. A large portion of the French actually go to “le marché” (the equivalent to our farmer’s market) buying fruits, vegetables, meats and fish direct. If a fruit or vegetable is not in season, they probably will not buy it. Sure that means that my vegetable consumption is dropping as rapidly as the temperature, but at least fewer veggies are being shipped from all over the world which is rarely an efficient use of natural resources, namely oil. And then there is the key to the French staying thin despite being fearless in the face of butter: they walk! Or they take public transportation like the tram here in Bordeaux.
France: no longer just the gastronomic capital of the world, but now also eco-friendly!

foie gras anyone?

Europeans do it better

Europeans really know how to live. We are not just talking about the French here, but Europeans in general. On a quick weekend trip to Holland I was given a sneak-peak at what Europeans consider normal, but which seems fantastic by American standards.
Let’s start with the most basic, the airplane. Sure the seats have gotten closer together, the planes packed as full as possible, just as you might find on an American airline but there is a certain amount of service that is given that is nearly unheard of these days. The flight attendants are perfectly dressed, coiffed and even beautifully choreographed with their “in the case of an emergency” demonstration to the point where it practically becomes a dance. The announcements are given in two and sometimes three languages to accommodate all the different nationalities. Despite the fact that the flight between Bordeaux and Amsterdam is only an hour and a half, the passengers are not thrown a tiny packet of pretzels or peanuts as the flight attendants run down the length of the plane looking flustered and pressed for time. Instead, you are served neatly wrapped sandwiches, nothing fancy, but much more substantial and much more appetizing than stale pretzels. This is done calmly, and followed by the cart with the drinks, which they manage to have pass twice during the short flight, since they have the timing down to perfection and thus have no need to rush. Personally, I found this incredibly civilized and was extremely delighted on my flight home to even be given a delicious biscuit-cookie upon the second passing of the cart to go with the tea and coffee that was offered. Too often on a short flight in our good old U.S of A. you have to beg for anything to eat.
Once on the ground the civility of European culture is continued. I had the good fortune to experience an event which in the US warrants only a brief letter in the mail but which is celebrated in Europe with all the pomp and circumstance that it deserves: an achievement of a full professorship at a university. In general, Europeans give professors and teachers in general much more respect than we give ours. I don’t know if they are paid any better than our professors but at least they are given the respect that they deserve for years and years of work and learning. Unfortunately this means there is a certain amount of social distance between the pupil and the prof., as is immediately explained to us American students, the professor is NOT your friend. Yet this is not the point I am trying to make. My Dad’s friend had the fortune to achieve his full professorship and thus we went to attend the inauguration ceremony and the conference which was to follow celebrating the event.
At least in Holland, the inauguration ceremony for a professor involves dressing up nicely, in other words, there was not a pair of jeans in the room (take note fellow Californians: flip flops are not appropriate for all occasions, as much as we would like them to be so). The women wore dresses and heels and the men were in their suits and ties. The representatives of the university were in full scholarly regalia, velvet robes with colored bands and fringe around the sleeves, strange velvet caps with four corners and those who were still students (I assume) had black suits and those triangular necklace things in fabric with a medallion around their shoulders (I apologize I have no idea what the term is and don’t even know what to search for on the internet.). They all looked extremely official as they paraded down the hall, somewhat like what you might see in a wedding ceremony. Us Americans grouped in the corner were whispering to each other about how amazing this is, how special, and why don’t we do this? The man of the hour gave a lovely speech, in perfect English no less (the Dutch are universally bilingual and speak English as well if not better than we do) then he and his fellow scholars took another ceremonial walk down the aisle, exuding importance.
The ceremony was followed by a reception in the professor’s hall where they pass their thesis exam under the watchful painted eye of the Queen. We however spent our time chatting, looking at the paintings of professors gone by, congratulating the new prof and plowing through the large assortment of wines, beers, juices and hors d’oeuvres. Those of us considered special enough (or like me, accompanying someone special enough) were treated to an elegant dinner afterward. The dinner involved an amuse-bouche (a tiny serving of split pea soup and corned beef and cabbage, in honor of the regional cuisine I suppose), a delicate entrée of scallops and tempura shrimp, un plat de poisson (a white-fleshed fish crusted with poppy seeds and accompanied by artistic swirls of sauce), un plat de viande (a meat dish, in our case duck), dessert (a lovely mango tarte tatin) and to finish, various sugary bon-bons accompanying a petit café. The dishes were beautifully presented a served. My favorite touch was the sauce for the duck being served out of the copper pot in which it was cooked, which I felt gave an air of authenticity to the chic restaurant. By the time the café with its bon-bons arrived I felt ready to pop, but I did my duty as self-appointed culinary correspondent and tried them all, finding them to all be too sweet after the previous indulgences. The meal was accompanied by three different wines: a white which remained from the amuse-bouche until the duck arrived, then a red and then a dessert wine in a lovely amber color. Contrary to my usual preference for reds, I found the white to be the stand out. The dessert wine was far too syrupy for my taste, but I seem to find that I do not enjoy dessert wines. Yet in true European restraint and logic, the portions were not so large that I couldn’t properly walk to the taxi after the meal had ended and I did not feel the next day as if I could never eat again.
Now I cannot claim that I go to many conferences, but from what I have been told, this degree of quality is quite common in Europe but is quite rare in the United States. Perhaps this is a result of the strong hospitality industry in Europe which has many, many schools and involves quite a lot of training. Perhaps this is the result of thousands of years of tradition which we lack in the US and thus we choose a more business-like, efficient and less ceremonial path. Yet a little bit of the Old World charm and ceremony could really class up the country. Personally I would love to have more opportunities to break out my new LBD (little black dress) and les talons (heels). Sure I love my California casual life, the ability to wear flip flops every day, but sometimes it is nice to feel special, to have an event that makes someone else feel unique and celebrated. It is not necessarily that the Europeans do things better than we do, but they know how and when to add that extra something, remembering the little touches that so often get pushed to the side in favor of economy or efficiency. Personally I believe this is why they live longer than we do.

Trop Gourmande

For the past couple weeks, I’ve been plowing my way through the classic Physiologie du Goût written by Brillat-Savarin sometime around the beginning of the 1800s. It has, of course, been taking me awhile since it’s in French, but since I’m a bit of an odd duck, I find it fun to read all his little anecdotes, stories, and analyses about food. Anyway, I thought that I would share a couple passages which caught my eye. I hope that my attempts at translation do not destroy too much of the meaning and enjoyment of Brillat-Savarin’s writing.

Méditation XI: De la Gourmandise. p. 141
“55_ I’ve investigated the dictionaries for the word “Gourmandise,” and I’ve yet to be satisfied with what I’ve found. The problem is a perpetual confusion between the word “gourmandise” properly said, with the word “gluttony” and the word “voracity” […]
“Definitions: Let us then define it ourselves.
“The ‘gourmandise’ is a passionate preference, reasonable and regular, for things that flatter the taste [buds].
“The ‘gourmandise’ is the enemy of excess; anyone who overeats or becomes drunk risks being punished or put under controls.
“The ‘gourmandise’ encompasses also the “friandise” which is nothing more than the same preference applied to dishes that are light, delicate, small in proportion, for jams, pastries, etc. This is a modification introduced in favor of women and men who resemble it. […]
“The moral of the story: it is an implicit resignation of the order given by the Creator, who gave us the need to eat in order to live, that we are thus invited (enticed?) by appetite, we are kept interested by the flavors and we are rewarded by the pleasure.”

p. 170
“73_ The difference between the pleasure of eating and the pleasure of the table (the pleasure of dining?) […]
“The pleasure of eating is the actual sensation and a direct need that is satisfied.
“The pleasure of the table is the thought-over sensation that is born of diverse circumstances of actions, places, things and people that accompany a meal.
“The pleasure of eating is something we share is common with animals; it does not address anything but hunger and what is required to satisfy that hunger.
“The pleasure of the table is particular to the human being; it assumes the preceding cares for the preparation of a meal, for the location and the assembling of the guests.
“The pleasure of eating demands/requires, not only hunger, but at very least an appetite; the pleasure of the table is more often independent of appetite or hunger.”

(entrance to "La Biche", a very chic baguette heaven)

I suppose these descriptions encompass what I am trying to experience during my stay in France. It is the exploration of all the pleasures of the table or of dining, not just the food which adorns the table but all that surrounds it. Trying to keep up with conversation with my host family, occasionally even telling my host father “Wait!, Stop!, let me speak!” since I haven’t quite developed the ability to talk at the same time as other people as is so common in France. I have come to love the French form of eating dinner which is focused on being “équilibré” or balanced, having the main dish, usually some sort of salad or vegetable (in which potatoes, rice and pastas are also included in the place of a legitimate vegetable), and either or both fromage (cheese) and dessert. In this family, desserts are typically the yaourt (yogurt) and maybe a bisquit, the closest thing the French come to cookies.
The meal is a progression, it is not simply one step, with everything piled on the plate, consumed as quickly as possible and then dumped in the dishwasher before moving on to other things. After dinner, I go one step further by taking my evening tea, just as I did in the States, and I ask if anyone else would like a “pisse-mémé,” literally a term for evening tea which means “something that makes a grandmother have to pea in the middle of the night.” Some times they accept and take a “tisane” or an infusion, an herbal tea or fruit tea. My host mother likes “fruits-rouge” and my host father likes something called “nuit calme” so that he can “sleep like a baby.” But the dinner meal itself is what we Americans might think of as a 1950s style family meal, with everyone around the table, the parents asking the kids what they did that day, listening to the descriptions of the dramas playing out between Anne-Sophie and Paul at school, remarking that the car needs to be washed, the garden neatened up or that they are going to be gone on such-and-such-day visiting family.
Often, one hears the French say that someone is “très/trop gourmande” implying that they eat too much of one thing or another. When my host father goes searching for the baguette and fromage, sampling each one in large portions, my host mother often remarks that he is “très gourmande.” This is what is described by our friend Brillat-Savarin in saying that being a gourmand is often confused with gluttony. It is, admittedly, a fine line to walk. When does one pass from eating for the pleasure of the savors and perhaps eating a lot because the flavors are so detailed and enjoyable, to simple gluttony, eating too much because, yes, it tastes good, but also because one doesn’t know when to stop. I try not to be too “gourmande” and simply enjoy what is given to me without excess, but it is often difficult, especially with sweets (perhaps that puts me more in the line of a “friandise”). But France has been a good teacher, I’ve lost much of my fear of eating that I held before. I would often deprive myself of things like butter saying “I don’t need it, olive oil works just as well, or toast is just as good with just honey or just jam, the butter is unnecessary.” But it was fear that maybe it was too unhealthy or fattening. Sure its not exactly healthy food but despite my repeated motto of “anything and everything within reason and moderation” I would cut myself off from many pleasures of eating. France is a good influence, a bit of cheese here, some baguette there, a dab of butter and a dessert if you want it is not the end of the world (or the end of your waistline).
Thus I raise my glass to Brillat-Savarin, the French and all those who know how to eat like gourmands and not gluttons, the enjoyment of food is the enjoyment of life and we are here to live it.

A Weekend in Paris

Last weekend was spent in Paris. I did not go for the Eiffel Tower or for the Louvre, in fact, though I saw both, I chose to skip those oh so typical attractions in favor of eating. Yes, I spent my weekend in Paris eating. Eating, and then walking up and down the Seine trying to burn off all that I ate so that I could eat again. Ok, so it wasn’t quite that food oriented but I must say that upon returning to Bordeaux I had a couple days where I generally lacked an appetite.
So what did I consume? Not all good food, unfortunately. I hit up a sandwicherie upon arrival since I felt like I could not go one more step without eating and so I settled for what I could find. But after spending much more time than any normal person would in the Opera Garnier then wandering over to the Église de la Madeleine and running into a crazy melee of people at the Tuileries anxious to catch a glimpse of their favorite designers and models exiting a fashion show, I felt that I needed to inaugurate my stay in Paris with a visit to one of the most famous salons de thé in Paris, Angelina. Angelina’s is always busy, always busting and always filled to the brim with both tourists and hard-core Parisians alike. Located on the Rue de Rivoli, across from the Tuileries it is bright and inviting with a constant background of teacups and chatting giving atmosphere to this Paris institution. Though I’m sure that their teas are of the highest quality and they surely serve a wonderful café I have tasted only one item, their Chocolat à l’Ancienne dit “L’Africain.” This glorious concoction has put them on the map. It has also nearly put me into a coma on nearly every visit to Paris.


This hot chocolate is not your Swiss Miss with the mini marshmallows or even Garadelli hot chocolate mix; this is hot chocolate in the pure sense of the term, “hot” and “chocolate.” I’m pretty sure they simply melt down some chocolate, maybe add a bit of milk, and then pour the thick, creamy substance into a small, pretty pitcher and deliver it to the unsuspecting and/or anxiously waiting client. They serve it with a little cup filled with unsweetened whipped cream and a demi-pichet of water which is absolutely necessary. I made the mistake of decided to start things off with a bang and decided to order one of their gorgeous pastries along with the chocolat chaud, I chose the Paris-New York at the suggestion of my waitress. Next time I go to Paris, please, please, please, someone slap me upside the head if I try to order a pastry along with the intoxicatingly rich chocolat afriain, I nearly ended up in diabetic shock trying to make my way through them both. Eventually I abandoned the pastry, took a long break to make my way through three quarters of my pitcher of water, clearing my head before I felt that it might be possible to slowly finish the second half of my chocolat. That had to be accomplished in between sips of water and long pauses for people watching as best as I could from the back room that they placed me (perhaps they thought it looked unseemly for a girl to be there alone and thus had to keep me away from the sight of the other chocolate craving diners). But there was no way that I was going to abandon my glorious chocolate before it was finished, and finish it I did.


There was one thing that I learned on this weekend in Paris; it is that I should trust my instincts. I knew that I should go to Angelina’s, it was the proper start to my stay and made me incredibly happy, if slightly delirious. But, if a place looks too overcrowded with foreigners, has little flags and English translations on the menu, or makes you feel like you are settling, you should trust your gut and move on. What you get will probably be edible, but it probably won’t be a culinary epiphany either.

(my kind of tourist attraction)

On the other hand, there are one or two good tourist traps. I enjoyed a lovely crèpe Nutella on the Champs-Elysées; it was warm and freshly made right before my eyes so I didn’t mind looking like an outsider sitting on a bench next to other tourists and a man mixing various condiments: ketchup, salt, pepper, etc., in a water bottle, which made me feel rather guilty for having my chocolaty treat. I probably should have gone and bought him one too.
But one evening I found a glorious little restaurant, or rather chose randomly from the many restaurants that Clotilde lists on her site Chocolate and Zucchini, and had what was by far the best fish I’ve ever eaten in my life. Unfortunately I don’t know what kind of fish it was, but it was a white fish made with a pesto sauce and served with perfectly cooked haricots verts and petits pois (green beans and peas). I was incredibly happy, and there wasn’t any chocolate involved!
But the event that caused me to even visit Paris in the first place was the chance to take a cooking course. After much internet searching, ie going through the list of cooking courses in Paris on David Lebowitz’ delicious blog, I found something that fit me perfectly. “La Cucina di Terresa” is a cooking course, plus market visit, plus lovely conversation. Terresa, an American living in Paris for quite some time, met me at the Raspail organic open-air market where we went over the menu before making a beeline for the cheese stand. If anyone needs to be reminded that the French are not mean, rude or American-hating, all they need to do is visit this market. Everyone was incredibly nice, the produce looked absolutely glorious and the smells were delicious, to say the least. We were spoiled by the cheese maker who had us try many of his creations, each as delicious as the last. It is a good thing I don’t live in Paris since otherwise I would have bought out the market. We sorted through the produce, taking note of what was still in season, what is coming into season, who sells the best honey (I bought some miel de foret, the only thing I bought in Paris that could be taken home with me) and collected all the ingredients for our dejeuner. Then we took the Velib (the city bikes) back to Terresa’s apartment, which was glorious since I got to see Paris from a whole new perspective and also got to work up an appetite for cooking and eating.


At Terresa’s apartment we donned aprons, washed up and worked on my knife skills (Mom, I’ll be sharpening all the knives once I get home). As nibbles to keep us going while we cooked, we made oven-warmed and crisped radishes, and rice-flour crackers with goat cheese and jam. I learned to make dough for a tarte tatin de pommes, make homemade vegetable stock and the proper way to make risotto. We had a glorious salad with warm olives, greens, tomatoes, lemon zest, mint-infused olive oil, nuts and goat cheese. The wine complimenting the meal, a natural wine from the Domaine de Rancy, vin du pays 100% Carignan 2006, was perfect and was a unique twist to the risotto, since there are only about two vegetables with which you can make a red-wine risotto. Only the radicchio that we used and perhaps the haricots (the beans) that look splatter painted with bits of pink can be used in a risotto made with red wine since very few things can stand up to the intensity of the wine. I think that many people might find the radicchio to be a challenging vegetable to eat, its bitterness perhaps a deterrent but it was nicely complimented by the wine and the glorious creaminess of the risotto cooked “all’onda” which is a more liquidly form of risotto than the drier way of making risotto that I was familiar with. As we chatted through the repas, the risotto even improved, the flavors melding beautifully together. We finished our meal with and apple tarte tatin infused with the flavor of bay leaves and dolloped with crème fraîche. I apologize that I’m not giving away the recipes, but I think that if you want them, you should take Terresa’s course, though she will probably have you cook something else depending on the seasonality of vegetables, but if you ask nicely she might pass along the recipes of my meal, too. Not only is this course instructive (and vegetarian!), but Terresa is great conversation (in both French and English, so don’t worry I practiced my French too!), a warm and inviting host and has a cute, functional and very French kitchen, which means it is tiny, so do not be surprised. We passed far more than my allotted time chatting about the wine, about the food, possible variations, French culture, and many other subjects making the time fly by and I felt completely at ease and satisfied both intellectually and gastronomically.


Fortified by Terresa and my joint efforts in the kitchen I felt ready to take the final tourist plunge: les bateaux-mouches. I checked my pride at the dock and finally, after many years, saw Paris from the water. It was chilly and my camera battery died on me, but I was still glad that I had decided to do something different. I left Paris the next day, the rain that had been threatening all weekend finally coming down and telling me it was time to go back to the still-sunny Bordeaux and perhaps more sensible eating habits.

For those who are curious:

Le vin de repas: http://www.domaine-rancy.com/ vin du pays 100% carignan 2006
Terresa’s website : http://www.lacucinaditerresa.com/index.html

Salade

I love salads. When I’m in the states, I tend to eat a lot of them, sometimes every day, which really, is not such a bad habit to have, even if it may seem a tad obsessive. Left to my own devices, I tend to put bits of every vegetable in the fridge right into the salad along with whatever leafy accompaniment I have on hand, usually baby spinach leaves. Then I debate over which salad dressing I’m in the mood for and what I actually have on hand. Some fresh ground pepper and I’m happy as a clam.
Now, the French do eat salads, and quite often a meal is begun with a salad course before moving on to the main dish. Yet their idea of what entails a salad is slightly different from my own heavy handed approach. For the most part, simplicity seems to rule. A salad could be just “salade” (i.e. lettuce which shares the name) or just beets, or just shredded carrots. Usually this has a bit of a quick vinaigrette mixed in, just some balsamic and olive oil. My French mom once went wild with a salad; she put in tomatoes and along with it some bits of cheese, plus the prerequisite vinaigrette.
I tend to get rather excited over the word salad even if its just one vegetable since sometimes that is the only vegetable I will see all day. I do not count potatoes as vegetables. Though I must admit, I was given a slightly skewed first impression of my host family’s eating habits when I first moved in. They wanted to make me feel special and really show me some very “French” meals, so lunches and dinners were heavily weighted towards meats and seafood. Now they have realized that they can put anything in front of me and I’ll eat it and it doesn’t have to be special or stereotypically French. Thus my introduction to cèpes and a couple other vegetable centered meals such as last night’s chou-fleur (cauliflower) and the previous night’s artichokes which gloriously littered our plates with tooth-scraped leaves.
Salads in restaurants have a tendency to be a bit more complicated, though not by much. There is the classic goat cheese salad. This involves taking a green salad, romaine lettuce, adding maybe some walnuts and grated carottes and then on the side including two triangles of toast with a warm round of goat cheese sitting on top. This is quite tasty and I’m really developing a liking for goat cheese. Another salad I had in a restaurant was what they called “une salade gourmande.” This included some very nice salad greens and sliced tomatoes along with seemingly every type of charcuterie known to mankind piled on top completely hiding the “salad” part of the salad. Though it certainly ranks as one of the meatiest salads I’ve ever had or, really, ever seen, it was pretty good. And it gave me a chance to try foie gras on the sly since it was included on a bit of toast in the same manner as the goat cheese.
But the most puzzling salads that I’ve found are those that are quite short on vegetables in general. Often they will take blé (wheat) or rice or couscous, mix in a few finely diced onions, carrots and maybe a few other things so tiny as to be unrecognizable, and pass it off as a salad. I am well aware that we have veggie-less salads in the states, for example fruit salad, pasta salad and jello salad (which completely baffle me, but that is a whole different subject), but the fact that you have to be very careful to read the ingredients of a salad before ordering to make sure there is salad involved takes some getting used to. I actually quite like the blé salads, they can be refreshing.
I looked up the definition of “salade” in Le Petit Larousse, a French dictionary which is not at all “petit” and after defining it as what we know as lettuce it listed this:

“Plat composé de feuilles de ces plantes, crues et assaisonnées. ”
Which roughly means: a dish composed of leaves of this plant (lettuce), raw and seasoned.

An interesting definition since salads very often do not contain lettuce at all, and with the rice and blé salads, they often need to be cooked first, even if they are served cold.
I also checked Word’s definition of salad and was met with several responses:

1. a cold dish consisting mainly of a mixture of raw vegetables, whole, sliced, chopped, or in pieces, usually served with a dressing for flavor. Many other ingredients may be incorporated into a salad, which can be served as a separate course or as an accompaniment to other food.
2. a cold dish consisting of a particular type of food such as a single vegetable or a selection of fruit, cut into pieces or slices, and served usually with a dressing
3. any leafy vegetable commonly used to make a green salad, typically the many types of lettuce, watercress, chicory, and endive
4. a confused or varied mixture

So I suppose maybe I am too strict with my idea of salads. As with everything else here, I am truly broadening my horizons. Though, still, I was inordinately excited when I ordered “une salade végétarienne” and received a plate twice the size of my head piled high with practically every vegetable that is in season here right now. Sometimes habits are hard to break.