This and that

First of all, thanks to those who responded positively to my blog about wanting to help out the refugee situation.  I talked with some of my close friends in town who were feeling quite the same way and it warmed my heart.  I can't say I have all the answers or THE way to help.  My friends and I all did some researcch and found a few outlets.  We are certainly not the only ones interested in helping and there are channels that already exist, especially on the UK side.

So if you are interested in donating goods or money, the Secours Catholique, a Catholic charity, seems to be a reputable one.  They are focusing a lot on the Calais migrant camp since this is close to our area in France.  Otherwise the Red Cross/Red Crescent is, in my opinion, a good place to donate as well.  Doctors without Borders seems to be doing a lot for refugees on site in Europe as well.

Now back to our regularly scheduled program...(frivolity and food)

Work has been picking up a little, which sometimes means grabbing lunch in between companies or eating in my car.  I took advantage of a two-hour break between classes and companies to eat at McDonald's.  It's always an event for me, being American and all.  I feel special going there.  And in France they have free wifi, so I can surf for free on my iPad.

So on a rainy Thursday when I was feeling a little glum, a trip to Micky Dee's (does anyone else still call it that?) cozied me up.  I ordered their Tex Mex burger (not so spicy) and a caramel frappé (basically a milkshake) and sat down.  At this particular restaurant off the highway, there were a lot of business men and women grabbing a bite.  I found it funny to watch the smartly-dressed folks sit alone and, what else, surf on their phones, as they munched fries.  One business man saw an old acquaintance so they sat together to break the solitude.

I ate and texted or checked my Facebook feed or, gasp, took a look at my lesson for the afternoon.  I do actually sometimes work.  One of my texts concerned something I was afraid I'd overlooked in a file so I checked with my colleague who seemed to have overlooked it as well.  I resisted temptation to text other colleagues for reassurance.  Do you ever feel you are in perpetual conversation with all this texting?

As I was still feeling chilled from having gotten a bit wet walking from my car, I ordered a coffee. When I asked for milk, the cashier told me in that case I would need the double latté, ten centimes more.  So I dug deeper into my coin purse for the extra ten cents.  But in the end she forgot and still gave me a regular non-milk coffee.  So I went back up and asked and she corrected the mistake.  "There's no milk, in this?" I asked, questioningly, not accusingly.  But in France, we are somewhat excused from being overly polite in customer service situations.  How liberating ;) I did make sure to say, "Merci, madame."  And I went back to warm myself (and burn my tongue) with my latté and think about my afternoon.

Notice how the French Mc Donald's logo is green with a yellow M?  In Europe they have changed the colors from the additional red and yellow and, in France at least, are increasing their market share while the US Mc Donald's are struggling a little.  Some in France even have a Strabucks-like display case, as this article points out.

They sometimes come out with some strange offerings though, like the shiny bacon they recently advertised.  It is good that they include more fruits with the kids' menus, but Juliette was not wowed by the kiwi on a stick and finds their apples have a strange taste from the vitamin C preservatives.  As for me, my little McDo ("mack doe" as the French shorten it) trip was satisfying and had warmed me inside and out.  I left, ready to tackle the rest of my day.

Things you can't find (easily!) in France

When I first arrived in this barren land called France back in 2002, they didn't sell Oreos.  Don't even get me started on cream cheese.  And Starbucks had yet to open its first branch on French soil.  Since then, things have changed (for the bettah!).  We can now get all of the above products fairly easily.  And though there is no Starbucks in my neck of the woods, you can buy the iced coffees in the supermarket now.

But the gap between the US and France is still wide.  There are sadly some things still lacking on my supermarket shelves that make me sigh and miss Wal-Mart and Target so badly.  So, as a follow-up to my recent post of things you can only find in France or Europe, here's a frustrating list of things that are few and far between in the land of camembert.

1. Mega boxes of medication.  I bought this a few years ago in the States, at Sam's to be exact. It came in a two-pack.  Two bottles containing 500 generic ibuprofen tablets.  I still haven't even put a dent in them.  In France you cannot, for the moment, just hop down to the supermarket and pick up generic meds.  They can only be bought in pharmacies and in much smaller quantities.  (This might be a good thing since with the quanitity of painkillers I take, I might be working on an ulcer.)  Generics only recently got popular here, by the way.

2. Cheap contact lens solution. When my family is coming to visit me and ask me if I need anything, I often tell them to bring this.  It is so much cheaper in the US, compared to the dozen euros for one bottle of Bausch and Lomb in France.  I had one opthamologist tell me if I bought the cheap stuff on the bottom shelf in the supermarket it would hurt my eyes in the long-run.  Besides, I generally only find this stuff in the pharmacy here anyway.  Go, Wal-Mart Equate brand!

3. Molasses. Don't tell anybody, but one of my students in the food industry gave me this bottle.  I made him and his team a gingerbread cake with part of it.  And they were amazed that people actually made recipes with what for the French is considered a "waste" product.  I have yet to find it in stores here but someone said health food stores carry it.

4. Vanilla extract.  It's hard to find the real thing here.  In France they sell sucre vanillé, which is a little bag of sugar that has been soaked or stored with vanilla.  But I don't find it nearly as flavorful as what my mom brought me last Christmas in her suitcase.

5. Affordable chocolate chips.  Although I was a bit surprised to see how the prices had gone up the last time I was back, it's still cheaper to get a big bag there than in France.  For some reason the bags they sell here are little bitty, as if to tell people not to make too many and watch their weight.  I have yet to try the self-serve bins with chips in some supermarkets.  Then and only then will I tell my mom I'm good in the chip department.  Thank heaves for her care packages all these years!

6. Affordable baking soda.  You can find it here, but it seems pricey when I know it's dirt cheap in the US.  Another thing that throws me off is that here it seems to be exclusively for cleaning and is often found in the cleaning products aisle or next to salt and vinegar.  It's rather unheard of to use it in recipes here.

7. Oodles of cake mixes!  The French do have ready-made cake mixes, but perhaps it's their penchant for home-made or the presence of bakeries on every corner that makes the baking aisle seem so small in my eyes.  So on a trip to the UK a few weeks back I picked up this carrot cake mix.  Like the package says, "Love Betty!"  She sure helps us busy moms out!

8. Frosting!  What goes better with your cake mix than some ready-made frosting.  They might sell some here but it's rather limited in terms of flavors and is often quite a small package.  Again, maybe they are encouraging us to make our own?  This particular can came from my friend Elsie who had a friend buy it for her in the UK (frosting smuggling ring!).

9. Cheap peanut butter.  You can find it but sometimes the prices seem outrageous. €3.12 for 340grams (12 oz.) whereas this US one contains more than twice as much (794 grams/28 oz.) at basically the same price.  I'm not a huge peanut butter fan but I think I'd be paying through the nose if I were. 

10. Cheap bubble bath.  Another thing I asked my dad to bring last time was bubble bath.  For some strange reason I can't find it much around here.  Or if I do it's in small quanitities or in a decorative bottle and thus more expensive.  Don't French kids take bubble baths?  And shower gel just doesn't foam up as much.  Believe me, I've tried.

So what do you have trouble finding where you live?  Even in the same country there can be regional differences in product distribution. 

A special shout-out to my family and friends who made this post possible through their care packages and gifts and suitcases filled with Wal-Mart goodies! 

Because I'm all about that bread, 'bout that bread (no bagel!)

That is a bold-faced lie.  I love bagels.  It used to be my breakfast of choice when I lived back in the US of A.  I'd put my frozen Lender's bagel in the toaster oven and afterwards spread some margarine on it, sit back on the couch and watch the Today show.  Man, I miss Ann Curry*.  Sometimes I'd add a fruit yogurt to my breakfast, along with juice.

But when I arrived in France I saw just how important (read: obsessed) the French are with bread.  Though you will of course find those who eat cereal and yogurt, the vast majority seem to prefer their hunk of baguette and a bowl of hot chocolate (or a cup of coffee).  And although some will buy "industrial" bread that stays good for a while and is pre-sliced, most folks like to buy their bread fresh out of the oven from their local bakery or from the bakery section of the supermarket.

That image of the Frenchman (in a beret!), riding a bike with baguettes under his arm is not far from the truth.  And I have actually seen people doing that on more than one occasion (ok, minus the beret).  On the TV news here they often refer to the price of a baguette to indicate that flour prices are rising, and it is such a basic staple for the French meal.

Most French people or those who happen to be living in France like myself, have a mental conversation in their heads around 4 p.m.  For me, it goes something like this:

Hmm, do we have any more bread at home?  Maybe a few slices, but they're a bit stale. Ok, when can I stop by the bakery?  Darn, it's closed on Wednesday.  Oh, I'll just pick something up at the corner store.  Or I've got those pre-cooked ones in the cupboard that I can pop in the oven in the morning.  Phew, we're saved...But I still miss Ann Curry.

Purists like my parents-in-law would never dream of buying the pre-cooked demi-baguettes (half-sized).  They have recently had to adapt their bread-eating habits since the bakery in their village closed and the baker who used to deliver to their house stopped doing so.  Now they ask Remi to pick bread up on the way or have to get some when they drive to the supermarket three villages away.

I, however, am covered up with bread possibilities in my little metropolitain area.  There are bakeries in every neighborhood, supermarkets galore and even bread from the frozen foods store that I can let defrost in my fridge.  But, to be honest, the bread from the real bakers is the best, and there is something about a chunk or slice of fresh bread that is still slightly warm and lightly crusty...

Here is the low-down on the bread types in my part of France...

When you go to the bakery, the first thing is to decide what kind of bread you want.  The choices can be confusing!

My favorite is the pain de campagne, a kind of half-whole wheat one.  I generally buy it sliced (coupé), and at a bakery they will cut it for you.

So the conversation would go something like this:
Me: Bonjour (ah, don't forget that or they'll see straight away you're an eager tourist!).
Je voudrais un pain de campagne coupé, s'il vous plaît. (Hello, I'd like some "country-style" bread, please.) 
Baker: C'est tout? (That's all?)
Me: Oui, merci. (Yes, thanks.)


There is also the pain complet, more like a wholeweat. 

But the one that seems to sell the best is of course the traditional baguette.

This can come be white bread or any of the above bread types (campagne, complet).  It can even be dressed up in different shapes like this braided one I found recently.

That floury goodness was just calling for some Nutella.

 Do not mistake brioche for bread.  Brioche is a very buttery version of bread that is often eaten as a dessert (though you can eat it for breakfast, too).  Let's say it's more of a Sunday breakfast thing, just as we Americans might not have bacon and eggs every day. 

When I first came to France my host family insisted that one shouldn't put butter on brioche since it is already very rich.  Jam is ok though, or you can just eat it plain.  Apparently it was this, not cake, that Marie-Antoinette suggested the peasants eat (since they didn't have any bread, it does seem logical that brioche is an option).  Gotta love the girl for trying.

It all just goes to show that the French have been thinking about breakfast for literally centuries.

So what is your breakfast of choice and how do they feel about bread in your location? Do you come from a "white breaded world" (you uptown girl, you).   "Never was a cornflake girl" myself.  And I've never had "kippers for breakfast."  (Bonus points if you can identify those references.)


*Ann Curry is a supercool American journalist who was on the Today show for years.  She kind of got ousted or put to the side in the past few years.  She's got more elegance in her little finger than most people do in their whole body.

Seedless or seedful

The main difference between France and America can be summed up with one tiny example, no bigger than the top part of your thumb.  So small and yet so significant: the seedless grape.  You can find seedless grapes in France, but they are not the norm.  In fact, most supermarkets don’t even carry them.  But in the US you are hard pressed to find grapes with seeds. 

Why?  My two cents worth: in France they like for things to be difficult.  The harder the better.   Passing your high school exam in France is a rite of passage because it involves about a week’s worth of tests, including oral ones.  Learning to drive is nothing short of an ordeal, with a tricky written test called “le code” and a 35 minute driving test that potentially involves parallel parking.  Not to mention that getting an exam date can take months!  

It sometimes seems that life in France is a series of hurdles and tests to be passed at nearly every turn. Maybe people like to suffer or at least whine about it afterwards.  Don’t even get me started on anything involving the government administration.  I spent my time in the civil servant equivalent of hell each time I had to get my foreign visa renewed before I actually got married here.  

Meanwhile, back in the US of A, we seem to pride ourselves on the exact opposite.  Convenience is our motto.  That’s why we invented convenience stores.  And Lunchables and pharmacies that are actually open on Sundays.  And drive-through doughnut shops!  And, oh, yeah, we sell seedless grapes!  Because why would you want to spend all that time spitting out seeds (or like some French people do, actually swallowing them), when you can just enjoy the sweetness more simply.  For Americans, this just seems to be a given.  And it makes feeding kids a heck of a lot simpler.  

 

To be honest, I will admit the taste of the grapes here is different, heartier, richer.  Perhaps the breeding to get seedless grapes has indeed made the flavor more standardized in the US.  But as I said, it really does epitomize for me how radically different these two cultures can be.  The French system isn’t all bad.  The idea of slow food (actually an Italian concept) vs. fast food and taking your time to enjoy and savor is a worthy one.  But sometimes I wish the French would lighten up a bit.  Life doesn’t have to be so hard and tortured.  Strangely enough there is a French expression about having a problem, in which the word for a pit or seed is used to signify a problem: on a eu un pépin.  Literally, we had a seed.  

Maybe it’s all part of a “toughen up” approach the French favor.  Suffering to build character?  When Juliette got her booster shot last month, I expected the doctor to pull out stuffed animals and reward her with a cute band-aid.  Instead he told her to wrap her arms in a certain way and that I was to hold her still.  He instructed her not to look but she did anyway, and he said neutrally but firmly, well, too bad for you.  There she was looking so fragile with her blonde curls over her bare shoulders, and suddenly big fat tears were dropping down her red cheeks.  The doctor, who is actually a really nice man, said she cried because she had looked.  Then he put a bit of cotton and a non-descript piece of medical tape on the spot.  And that was that.  

I guess I like a bit more sugar-coating in my seedless life.  I expect sympathetic smiles and reassuring words from health care workers and waiters who are happy to see me in their seating zone.  I’m American like that.  And no matter how long I live in this seedful country, I will always be a little surprised and very nostalgic for my more convenient and comfortable homeland.

Only in America

Only in our grocery stores...

We are a bit food-obsessed in America.  We like our sweets but we are conscious of the bad fats and bad sweeteners (even though you will still find them in certain foods, especially sodas).  It always amuses me to come back and see these labels.  France is just now catching on to the trans fat thing but they don't seem to use much of the high fructose corn sweetener. 

Likin' the new slogan, too! But I still prefer Krispy Kreme.

In Spanish, too, thank you.

Only in Florida...
Where the Trump International Golf Course is next to the Palm Beach prison.

Where you can't buy happiness but you can live there.  And ironically this was a very modest neighborhood.

And the Publix grocery store on ritzy Palm Beach Island looks like this and has valet parking.

And the beach where the rich and famous play looks like this:

Only in Alabama (or the south)...

Can you find stuff like this in the grocery store...

I didn't even know what chitterlings were.  Apparently made of pigs' intestines.  I know I make fun of weird food in France, but we have our share of it, too.

Like pigs' feet.  Logical to get them in a value pack.

The Bubba burger is apparently good.

And a Sunday breakfast consists of ham (that's Juju's hand sneaking a bite), cheese grits (corn-based) and eggs.  Thanks, mom!

And you can find great old favorites like green tomatoes (for making fried green tomatoes) and okra (the world's slimiest vegetable but so good fried!).

And fruits that sound so gracious just by name and remind me of when I read To Kill a Mockingbird, that southern classic.  Can't say that I've even tasted scuppernongs.

Enjoying myself immensely here and hoping it doesn't go by too fast!