Rats Love Farmers' Markets

So those of you who've checked out A Year in Fromage will have noticed that you're already familiar with some of the material. Yup, it's true: You have been my guinea pigs. But not my dead rats. For those, you'll need to check out the new material on A Year in Fromage, but I wanted to make sure you knew about it here:

There are not one but two taxidermy shops right by Pippa's elementary school. Even after two years in Paris, and with her new middle school big-girl status, Gigi still refuses to look in the windows, much less the stores. So I guess I won't be taking her by Aurouze, which Anthony and I happened upon recently while walking through the 1st arrondissement. With twenty gorgeous nearly-antique dead sewer rats hanging in the window from the same number of nearly-antique traps, it's quite a sight to behold. These are 91-year old dead rats, and I know this almost-precisely because the sign proudly proclaims, "Captured around 1925 at Les Halles."



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And another story that will be new to you, and is much more appetizing:

These pretty pears, with the tips of stems dipped in bright red wax are Passe-Crassane. Why the wax? To cauterize the end and prevent dehydration. They remind me of the beautiful $100 melons I used to occasionally receive as a gift when I lived in Japan, but less uniformly perfect. Forget about the occasional Bosc (how boring), here we buy Guyot Rosée, Comice Extra, Packam, Conference, William Rouge, Abate, and others I can't even name.

 

 

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A Year in Fromage

After almost two years of imagining, planning, procrastinating, and -- occasionally -- self-doubting, I have launched my one-year, daily writing project called A Year in Fromage, which looks at life in France, one stinky cheese at a time. Check it out! Sign up to follow it daily! Pass it on to your contacts who love cheese or France (or both)!

In fact, I'm two days into the cheese-a-day project by now. Only 363 more to go! If you've already tried to sign up for the e-mails but couldn't figure it out, I do want to tell you that I figured out (ha! of course Anthony figured out) the technical glitch on the site, and now you can, indeed, sign up to follow by e-mail. For today's post, enjoy both a story, and a cheese, that really stinks.

Loyal readers of this blog may recognize today's story, from one of my earliest days in France, but much of the material on that site will also be new. I'm trying to figure out how to reconcile the two blogs I've got going. This is what I've come up with for the moment:

I'm going to continue writing in this blog the stories and observations that are more personal. Also, I'll try to give you a nod over to the most recent all-new postings at A Year in Fromage. However, even for the re-purposed posts you may already have seen, they will have added cheese elements, so there's always something new there.

I once said I felt like I was working 4 full-time jobs: parent, travel agent, writer, and administrator of the small business I was running from afar in San Francisco. Well, that business -- a French-immersion preschool -- has since closed (to my great relief, frankly) and I'm now down to "just" 3 full time jobs. In reality, it means I actually get to spend much more time writing, which I love. I've had one piece and photography published in the Wall Street Journal and have just turned in another that will be published soon. I've been working on some creative projects, including A Year in Fromage. So, I hope you enjoy both blogs!

Chocolate Chip Champion

My friend Mei and I like to champion here in Paris (and abroad) that ugliest but perhaps most delicious of desserts: the American cookie.

The first year of gymnastics regionals, Gigi's team got 13th out of 13. The second year, when she came home with a 9th place, Anthony congratulated her enthusiastically...until she told him there had only been 9 teams. Well, much like this, I fancy myself quite a delicious cookie maker, but then I only have a couple really good non-French friends here, and the only other American's cookies I've tried are Mei's. And, objectively speaking, hers are better than mine. So there may only be two contestants, but I'm the Silver Medal Champion Cookie Maker of My Paris!

And my cookies do whoop the pants off any chocolate chip cookies I've tried that were made by any French person. I have to admit that the cookies I make here also whoop the pants off the cookies I make in San Francisco, and I've figured out the secret: I use all-American ingredients except the butter. French butter has less water in it, and is generally richer and more unctuous, and the cookies are all the better for it.

If you're wondering why there are so many cookies on my counters, and why some of them are upside down, there's a logical explanation for both. Gigi likes me to make her cookies for her class for her birthday. She's in a class of 29 kids, plus a teacher, and I feel like everybody should have at least a couple cookies. So you do the math: that makes a whole lot of cookies, which I must mix by hand -- no KitchenAid stand mixer. It's better than a gym workout for the upper arms, except that I eat more calories worth of raw dough than I burn.

And why upside down? Along with no stand mixer, I also don't have a cooling rack, and I've discovered that putting them bumpy side down allows them to cool without getting soggy, as the steam can find nooks and crannies through which to escape.

Sure, I could buy chocolate chip cookies. There is a cute little shop on our island called "Anne's" which sells single, regular-sized (say, 3" diameter) cookies for 2.7€ -- or about $3.50 -- each. Meanwhile, I can go to Thanksgiving (the store in the nearby Marais neighborhood, not the holiday) and find critically important ingredients for not too much money, including real light brown sugar for under 4€ and baking soda for just a couple more. Still infinitely cheaper than buying at Anne's, where we would need to take out a second mortgage in order to buy a couple dozen cookies.

 

The expensive ingredients are the real liquid vanilla and the chocolate chips, and I have cabinets full of both, thanks to a steady stream of visitors. However, I refuse to make chocolate chip cookies for any of my visitors from the States. I only make them for other ex-pats who need a taste of home and for French-people who, I must tell you, are completely won over by this ugly-but-delicious American dessert.

Coming Home

No, it's not what you're thinking. We're just back from a fall vacation to sunny Spain, and upon our arrival we see the obligatory airport sign that says "Bienvenue à Paris," but we think it should just say "Welcome Home." It certainly feels like we've come home, and I feel it more strongly than ever. Driving through the streets of Paris, it feels familiar, comfortable, and just as much like "home" as any place else to me. We've been here over two years, and I love all the things that have become a normal part of my life: the rippling waters of the Seine from my desk, our neighborhood markets, the view of Notre Dame, the leaves turning yellow along the quai, fresh croissants from the boulangerie, the walk to the metro stop through medieval streets, my dance class, tea with friends, and even -- slightly, affectionately -- the way our water heater occasionally conks out for no known reason while someone's in the middle of a shower (the sound of the scream sends us with matches to reignite the pilot light).

I have to say that I feel more at home in Paris than anyplace else I've ever lived, with the exception of San Francisco. Even having spent around six years in Tokyo in my twenties, I never felt like that was home in the same way. That's understandable, perhaps, given the linguistic, cultural, and racial barriers, and also because I was there when I was young and single. Here, I've got a real family life, and friends and community through schools, activities, work, and neighborhood.

Home is where the heart is, where the family is, and where the comfortable pillow is. Vacations to exotic places are wonderful, but it's also nice coming back to our simple ole' home by the Seine.