I'm going to take a moment to talk about normal food here. Yes, normal food, as in the kind of thing that I'm used to eating, and not the decadent repast that I wrote about two posts ago.
Fruits and veggies are pretty much the same in France. However, there are a few differences: tomatoes here are so far tastier here than they are in the U.S., and according to Bruno, Coeur de Boeuf tomatoes, which I haven't yet tried, are even better. A very common dish here (I've had it multiple times here) is sliced tomato in vinaigrette. Green beans, likewise; both common and excellent when served fresh, with just a little bit of sauce. On the other hand, the apples I am used to, cultivated in the Cornell Orchards, are much, much better than the apples I've eaten here, which are fairly boring. I miss the massive quantities of onions that I am used to consuming at home. Peaches and nectarines, while they are in season, are very, very common, whereas blueberries are exotic. I had only once eaten fresh figs before, and they might have been the tastiest fruit I had ever eaten -- but French figs, grown, I think, in the south of French, are less interesting than the tomatoes. The close proximity to North Africa and the Middle East makes the transport of such produce, such as dates (1.99 a kilo, from Libya) and so-called Barbary figs, which I had never seen before, much easier. Mangoes are a euro apiece, but I've barely seen any watermelon. Although OJ is common here, I don't think it's quite as ubiquitous as is in the states; and as I mentioned earlier, French people don't know what to do with their ripe bananas.
Oh, how the bread is good here! See an earlier entry for details. Sadly, no bagels. Interestingly, one buys just about all one's bread here fresh, and from a real boulangerie -- except sandwich bread. Even stranger, one of the biggest sandwich bread brands (the Avertins ate it every morning) is called "Harry's" and advertises itself as an "American Sandwich Loaf." According to the packaging, however, it's a German company...
Everybody in France eats Nutella.
Milk is more or less the same, although I had to learn that here, "skim" milk is called "creamed" (ecreme). This makes sense, when considering that "pitted" dates lack pits, "peeled" onions lack peels, and "cored" pears lack cores; however, it's very confusing, during one's first trip to the grocery store. Another confusing item at the grocery store is so-called fromage blanc (white cheese) which looks like, tastes like, and is situated next to yogurt (although yogurt is a little bit firmer). I'm still not 100% certain of the difference in production. According to a dairy vendor, yogurt undergoes boiling, while fromage blanc doesn't. According to a quick internet search, however, yogurt is fermented, while fromage blanc is curdled, and moreover, yaourt is an EU-controlled name, (just like champagne). Cheese ranges from the cheap to the gourmet; however, what I'll call the "workingman's cheese" is not cheddar (which, when you think about it, has to be imported from the UK), but Camembert. I had an amazing cheese the other day, Reblochon, made in Savoie, which is in the East, near the Italian border.
There's a student cafeteria, at which I receive a limited number of free meals, guaranteeing me a hot dinner four times a week. Not a bad deal, considering that I'm not living with a host family, a choice I am every day regretting (I choose to live in the dorms because I thought I would have a French roommate). In the U.S., every corridor in the dorm becomes a small community; here the Residence Lucien Paye, there is almost no contact with the others, though they are perfectly friendly (if somewhat distant) when I meet them.
One last interesting point; there are street vendors here who sell fruit at extremely low prices, who create small stall out of fruit crates, which one can find near or inside of metro stations. These vendors all appear to be of the same non-Francophone nationality. According to Bruno (who thinks they might be Afghan), they used to sell posters.
Next post, I will vent about French academics.
~JD
"Si le roi avait ete temoin de ce spectacle, il aurait lui-meme eteint les flammes. Il signa, du fond de son palais de Versailles et au milieu des plaisirs, la destruction de tout un pays, parce qu'il ne voyait dans cet ordre que son pouvoir et le malheureux droit de la guerre; mais de plus pres, il n'en eut vu que l'horreur" [If the king had witnessed this spectacle, he would have himself extinguished the flames. He signed, from the background of his Palace of Versailles and amidst its pleasures, the destruction of a whole country, because in this order he saw only his power and the wretched law of war; but had he been closer, he would have seen only the horror] (Voltaire, Le Siecle de Louis XIV p. 371).
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