Rose Bakery, Breasts, stalkers

What an amazing day, and its only 2 pm here! I woke up this morning in Paris, again.  I guess this might take some time to get used to but I am loving this opportunity that I have been given.  Yesterday I was stuck in doors for most of the day and wasn’t interested in walking, however today I was out for 4 hours and it felt like nothing (my feet would disagree).  My day started with some googling.  Since I am unable to use gps on my phone I write the directions to my destination on my phone and hope I don’t get lost. Googling turned into a video chat with my mom.  She asked me how my day was and I was slightly confused, but then realized she was talking about yesterday, because it was “yesterday” where she is. 

Yesterday I got a phone! I named it bug because it looks like a ladybug.

I also went to Monoprix yesterday. It’s like a smaller slightly more upscale (?) version of Target, but not really. I spent at least an hour there walking around from the home accessories to beauty supplies and lastly to the two floors of food! I have to say that the selection was wonderful but the set up was slightly odd and nonsensical.  I kept happening upon spices and pastas in different aisles.

I ended up with a jewish mango, a box of tomato paste-ish, thyme, lentils, Chinese peppers (apparently they don’t believe in crushed red peppers here, sin), pasta, some fixings for coleslaw, white sheets and a red comforter cover.  My plan was to end up with pink sheets, which I did, well at least blotchy tie dye looking pink sheets.

Post Monoprix coma, I attempted to walk home with my four bags of stuff but I made it far enough to hop in a cab at a cabstand. Unfortunately an older woman decided to feed the pigeons right next to me and I ended up being attacked by a possessed nasty flying rat. It landed on my head and I think I may have screamed. I spent the last hours of my day wondering how long it would take for a pigeon disease to set in and kill me.

I am so excited to tell you about my first meal today and my day that I have to skip to the end and just show a picture of my dinner last night.  I decided to cook some pasta with the stuff I had picked up at Monoprix.  I sautéed garlic and shallots in olive oil and within minutes I was cooking in the kitchen at home with my mom.  The aroma wafted through my apartment, I was home.

Back to today’s adventure.  I put on my most Parisian looking outfit, a white with blue striped shirt, a navy blue skirt and red flats. Okay, so I looked out the window before I left my apartment and realized that all you really need to look Parisian, is a jacket.

Skip forward 40 minutes, on my way to Rose Bakery. Walking down the street, I was approached by a man who attempted to talk to me for 5 minutes.  He finally came out with this jumbled sentence, “ can I give you my phone, I want to come to your hotel.” After having said no, sorry and bye in French, I sternly said NO and walked away.  I guess life is all about experiences, and once I got to Rose Bakery I had a life changing one. Not only was my walk overwhelming with the beauty of every single building, my breakfast was heavenly.

Walking down the street, I knew I was there without looking at the sign. It was exactly the place I could imagine my mom going to. There were flats of fruits and veggies lining the floor just below the cases on the counter.  Everything looked perfect. The display started with chard filled quiches, then moved to small pizzas with tomato sauce, petit slices of mozzarella and olives, then finally moving to the sweets. There were a variety of loave: citrus, marble, something green with raspberries, and a lemon polenta cake. The display continued with more delectable looking sweets, and then there it was, a pile of small, almost perfectly circular scones. 

After I was told that the kitchen wasn’t open until 12, I decided to try two of their prepared salads. There was cucumber with fennel, a slaw, haricot vert with a light, creamy dressing and little chunks of something and lastly a potato salad.  The lady who helped me, Nikki, an American from Los Angeles, gave me a bowl of haricot vert and the slaw.  It was something that my mom would have made (minus the cream dressing).

I spent a few extra seconds wondering which treat to have.  Although I thought nothing could be better than a Tartine scone, I opted to try one of theirs. The warmed scone came with a two small bowls on the side, one with a medallion of butter and a, what I thought to be, homemade chunky blueberry jam. I like to enjoy the simplicity of the scone flavor, however something drew me to the jam.

First, the scone was more like a current biscuit, with light and flakey layers that come apart like pull apart bread. As for the jam, the flavors burst in my mouth.  It was sweet with a slight tartness.  I began to pull the scone apart layer by layer, slathering it with the jam. It was so flavorful and amazing that I guiltily licked the knife after each glide across the scone. As I sat in the long, narrow bakery, with two other patrons (also American), and Nikki, eating my scone, I shed a single tear. Maybe because it reminded me of home, or that my parents raved about it since last November, but I think it was the scone.

I walked up to the front and talked to Nikki for a bit. She was beautiful, tall with brown hair and a perfect French accent. She had moved from LA last year.  She told me that she teaches English part time and works at Rose Bakery part time as well.  If I wasn’t here for a particular reason, I would have said that I could pack up and go home, I wont find anything as good here. I also got a marble cake and polenta cake to go, neither of which compare to the scone, although the marble cake uses dark chocolate that melts in your mouth.

On my journey home, I took a wrong turn and ended up meandering around and happened upon Monoprix, where I bought some white, comfy slippers for my poor feet.  I also came across this cute flower shop. 

To top the day off, I had a quick, lovely visit from the Rocherolle family. It is so nice to see a familiar face in a foreign country.

Tonight I am going out for Emilie’s birthday! I hope to have a fantastic time with her and her friends. What a lovely ending to an amazing day.

One last thought. Breasts must not exist in Paris. From a short study done by myself in the last 2 days, I have concluded that the French are much worse than Americans in the inappropriately staring department, and its not just the men.  Yes, I have breasts, I also have eyes, and they are on my face.  They’re here, I’ve had to get used to them, so do you Paris. Keep it moving!

Bisous

My first post in Pairs!

As we speak there is a nice “small man” as he was described to me cleaning the condoms and mountains of dust and dirt on the floor.  He also placed his helmet on my freshly washed mattress cover.  This ought to be good.  After a lovely gathering celebrating my new journey, I hopped on my Air France flight.  I hauled my 3 bag carry-on load down the aisles of the plane back to my seat where, I was delighted to sit next to a lovely young French girl.  Luckily for the first time in a plane, I slept, only waking up every hour on the hour. As the sun began to come up the girl next to me opened the window of the sunset.  My first picture of the trip!

I exited the plane in Paris.  My adventure had begun. I road the bus with the rest of the passengers to the terminal to retrieve the other 2 bags I had checked.  I couldn’t help but think about what an awful place LAX is and how if it did the same thing and bus people to a terminal, wouldn’t they slowly be able to build a new one.  Then I remembered that our economy is in the toilet and that wouldn’t happen any time soon. 

I walked to the customs part of the airport I decided to use some of the French I had learned.  I walked up to the counter and said hello the lady and asked how she was.  As I handed her my passport she was slightly shocked and delighted that an American had taken the time to learn French. She asked me back if I spoke French, I nodded and said a little.  The  French are extremely proud and in this case, a little went a long way. Instead of asking questions, she stamped the passport and sent me along.

My bags arrived, one within the first minute of their being unloaded and put into the belt.  I had flashbacks to Hawaii when they opted out of putting my bag on the plane.  As I sat in the terminal I took a picture of my first real French thing for Claire.

I arrived at my apartment to find a man waiting for me.  He was there to do a check to make sure everything was functioning properly and account for any damage. 

I wont go into detail about the frustration of yesterday walking into an insanely dirty apartment and will skip forward to my dinner with two of my favorite Frenchies, Audry and Emilie.  

They met me where I was staying and boy was it nice to see their beaming faces.  I think I had a smile as big as the universe when I saw them.  I could not have been happier to see them on a long and stressful day. The air was perfect and refreshing.  I felt like we were in Sex and the City, three girls walking thought the streets of Paris looking for a place to eat.  We walked my district and found a lovely café.  The 10 small outdoor tables were taken so we ate inside.  The couches were purple suede and the tables were small, so we put two together.  The waiter was a slender man who Emilie said reminded her Jim Carrey.  The other waiter had some gnarly teeth and kid of reminded me of the creepy guy that kept cutting Drew Berrymore’s hair in Charlie’s Angels.  I ordered a goat cheese salad, Audry had a salmon pizza and Emilie, penne carbonara. 

We had a lovely time catching up before I fell asleep at the table.  The temperature dropped as we walked home, but it felt great to be in Paris with my girl friends.  I guess its time to start learning French.

Well Paris, I hope you will enjoy me as much as I will enjoy you.  

Hawaii...above the clouds

Hawaii

A last minute dose of family time.

White sand beach, beautiful turquoise and blue water and all I can think about is the slew of items I will forget to pack for Paris. The waves crash on the sand in front of my feet as I lay next to my sister under a slightly romantic shaded couples pod.

Hair brush, nail clippers, emergency with electrolytes, ginger chews.

After a long first full day in what some would call paradise, personally my paradise is a less overwhelming hot place called Santa Monica, I found myself longing for a kitchen to cook in. Luckily on this trip my longing was satisfied with the dinky supply of kitchen utensils and meager spice selection.  

Claire set up a nice one man cooking challenge. She and Dad were the judges and Mom stepped in as a mentor.  

The ingredients for the first challenge were flour, blueberries, cinnamon and peanut butter.

To start, I will tell you exactly what we had in the pantry to work with: saffron, vanilla, cinnamon, powdered sugar, 3 salt and 4 pepper shakers, hot pepper flakes, a small bag of flour (less than a cup bought for mac and cheese), 1/4 box of granulated sugar, cumin, beef bullion, some other less useful spices and the small selection of foods we had picked up from the market the day before.

I stood in the kitchen utterly stumped as my mom suggested baking something or a pavlova (that was suggested at least 5 times).

I finally settled on cinnamon and sugar tortilla dippers with blueberry sauce and a cinnamon peanut butter dipping sauce.

For those of you who are wondering where the flour went, I used a tiny bit to thicken the blueberry sauce (mostly because I had to use the ingredient and had no baking powder or soda to use for a baked good).

I presented it as a play on campfire food.

Pictures are unavailable for the first challenge at the moment.

Later in the day I took two market trips and came back with some of the ingredients chosen for my next challenge.

The next four ingredients were marshmallows, graham crackers, bananas and peanut butter. I continued on my play on campfire foods.

Since there is an electric stove and no real fire source other than the tiki torches that lined the path on the opposite side of the golf course, I had to use goat think so I popped the marshmallows in the oven. When they were baked they looked like giggly puff (the pokemon) without the creepy face.  Since I had bought chocolate ice cream for my brother at the market, I substituted the chocolate with the ice cream and sautéed the bananas in butter and the cinnamon sugar I had previously made. YUM

Not only was the dessert incredible, the challenge was such a fun experience, as my sister dragged Dad out of his chair to judge the dish. There was quite a bit of laughter and tears from laughter as my dad used what he has learned on Chopped to analyze and critique the flavor, presentation and texture of the dish. As soon as all the melted chocolate was lapped up from the judges' chins, Claire declared that I was eligible to move on to the next round, competing against myself. 

atermoyer

With a healthy dose of family time just around the corner I'm starting to realize that I'm going to miss my family and friends.  It began Sunday with an almost full water works that took place in the kitchen by none other than Mama Cath. It is obvious that I will miss my family.   I suppose Claire's return from NY after a

5 year escape, is one of the things I will certainly miss. I have changed since 17 and so has our relationship. We are no longer the zebra and croc at the river, we are zebras migrating across the Mara, making sure the other doesn't get eaten by the croc.

(I admit, that's a pretty lame analogy, but it's pretty accurate, she might get eaten without me).

I will also miss my brothers random stop ins when he demands the focus be placed on him, everyone MUST stop to check for his camping gear, watch him while he eats or just play rockband with him (you have approximately 3 months to master the lead vocals... I'm not a one man band). I think we have E to thank for the stop ins.

Mom will certainly miss my helping her although I won't miss that, but I will miss cooking with her and our unspeakable telepathy. As for my pips, I'm one skype away to remind you that some thoughts just belong in your head.

Some of you might think I'm absolutely out of my mind for writing a "dedication" as if I was moving away for years, but for me, going away for months is a first (JLC). I've spent the last 22 years, 8,030 maybe 8,000 nights of my life sleeping at home, and I just graduated from college.   

Later Sunday night, I had a lovely froyo date with GM. Although we only briefly talked about my pending reality, I felt a slight loneliness that I've never really felt before. It's only normal, but I have some of the best friends a girl could ask for and I will miss them deeply. Not to mention FA who might make it hard to stay within the data limit because of our constant bbming.

One thing I certainly won't miss is packing. Although I'm extremely methodical, my room still ends up looking like a tornado swept through the place.

Luckily my mom headed the cleanup mission. We emptied the closet, looking through each drawer one at a time, picking out the things that I would need for my trip and neatly setting them in piles on the floor (this process took about 5 hours spread over 3 separate occasions). The stacks were dark, black/ winter color shirts and jeans, leaving the pop of color, if any, to the scarves.

It was on the Air France website that I had my first (for the trip) encounter with that other measuring system that Lorien and the rest of the world is accustomed to. I’m allowed 2 suitcases with a weight of 23k each. Thanks to the Internet, I immediately googled the conversion and realized that I'm allowed 100 lbs total.

I grabbed the scale from my bathroom and weighed the empty suitcase. With all these restrictions these days, a ten-pound bag really puts a hamper on my chic Parisian style attempt. Although the airline may not think that I need 6 pairs of boots plus all the other shoes I'm taking, a woman needs her things (and stuff).

With 40 lbs left in each bag, I filled the first one with shirts, sweaters, boots, most dresses and scarves. I zipped the suitcase, the one with the white and red polka dotted scarf, and lugged it onto the scale, it read 51 lbs. I took two pairs of shoes and two dressed out and put them on the scale, they weighed about two lbs total. Just to make sure I put my life back on the scale and it weighed in at 40 lbs, go figure.

I filled the next suitcase and it also weighed in at 40 lbs.

What is a girl to do?

Not to mention, the whole time I was thinking about the potential for one bag to get lost on it's direct flight to Paris, a fear I discussed on Sunday with Lilwhy.

My still not-fully packed bag is the equivalent of a half written term paper due in a few days or as the French say, atermoyer. 

Au revoir

First is the worst...

I'm already having a hard time with this thing.  This is what I wanted my "about this blog" to say, but it was far too long. I suppose now I can add more.

I will be departing on August 29th for Paris.  After being nagged, I finally decided that recording my trip via blog is much better than trying to remember everything then report back to my mother daily through emails. I am going to Paris to learn patisserie from the fine instructors at Le Cordon Bleu, but also to "find some independence" as mom likes to say. I love my home, my family and my friends and will  miss them greatly.  I believe some thank yous are in order. Thank you Claire for something, Nick for something else and my parents for loving the daylights out of me and giving me this most incredible opportunity. 

Come on my journey with me so I'm not a lonely Winter in Paris.