French cuisine

I have come to the conclusion that those who say they "don't really care for French food" are picky eaters. I, on the other hand, am willing to try new foods and I view that as an important way to learn about the foreign culture.

Yes, all cooked meat here is still pink and eggs are also undercooked by American standards, but it is not killing all the French people who regularly eat them that way. So why not?


And how could you not love French food, which is viewed as both a study and an art?

Gelato

Crêperie

Nutella and banana crêpe

Ham and egg crêpe

Fresh seafood on the Mediterranean in Collioure, France

Croque-madame

A croque-monsieur is a grilled ham and cheese sandwich, and a croque-madame is a grilled ham and cheese sandwich with a fried egg on top.

Sandwiches, quiches, pastries

Pain au chocolat

Cheese and sausage

Meringues

Vin chaud (hot wine)

Fresh salad at Nos Ancêtres les Gaulois restaurant

Nos Ancêtres les Gaulois

Fresh fish at the Sunday market

Olives

French and Italian grapes

Chocolate, banana, and coconut crêpe

Sausage and mushroom galette, and chocolat à l'ancienne at a restaurant in Chantilly, France

Chocolat à l'ancienne is a hot chocolate drink with the chocolate and steamed milk served separately.
 

Chocolate mousse, crème brûlée

Café gourmand

Café gourmand is a dessert option. Coffee is often ordered after a meal in France, and this option comes with several desserts on the side.

Macarons at Ladurée

Apple tart with ice cream

Chicken burger with blue cheese

Pot de crème caramel for breakfast

Baked apple and baguette dessert

Apples from the Bretagne region of France

Gaufres in Brussels, Belgium

Chocolate barks in Brussels, Belgium

Belgium is known for its chocolate as well, and the streets of Brussels are lined with chocolate shops.

Moules frites in Brussels, Belgium

Mussels and fries are another specialty of Belgium. French fries actually originated in Belgium, and you can buy them at stands along the streets just like waffles and crêpes. Belgian legend says American soldiers stationed there during World War I heard the Belgians speaking French, which was the official language, and thus gave credit to the wrong country.

Demonstration at Choco-Story chocolate museum in Paris, France

Cidre in Normandy

Cider is a specialty of the Bretagne region, where there is an abundance of apples. There are two types of this sparkling, alcoholic drink: sweet and dry.

Crêpe with apple, vanilla ice cream, and Chantilly whipped cream

Apple crêpe with flaming liquor

Caramelized banana crêpe

Apple and caramel crêpes at Mont Saint Michel

Mushroom, ham, and egg galette

A galette is a buckwheat dinner crêpe. Crêpes and galettes are also specialties of the Bretagne region, and during my weekend there, I tried seven different ones, having a crêpe at each meal.

Tacos at El Guacamole restaurant

We even found a good taco bar in Paris. We recently went there for Sadie's birthday, as she is from Texas and has been missing her tacos.

Italian burger on an English muffin at Le Petit Café

Le marché de Noël

  

Without Thanksgiving, there is nothing stopping the Parisians from beginning Christmas celebrations already. Lights and trees are popping up all over town.

Last night, we went to the Champs-Élysées to visit the Christmas market that stretches from the Champs-Élysées roundabout near the Arc de Triomphe all the way to Place de la Concorde, on both sides of the street. Père Noël and polar bears decorate the booths that line the street, designed to look like a little village and selling anything from vin chaud (hot wine) and crêpes to Christmas ornaments.

And how could we pass up the opportunity to "descende" the large, four-person potato sack slide on the Champs?

We walked up and down the street, eating waffles and riding the ferris wheel, and feeling a little better about missing Thanksgiving celebrations back home in the United States.

Paris skyline

Today, I visited the Institut du Monde Arabe on the Seine. The large building is admired because of its architecture and intriguing design. It features a combination of modern and traditional Arab and Western styles, representing the Institut's efforts to promote cultural contacts between the Arab world and the West. Designed by Jean Nouvel, the building opened in 1987.

It is a large, glass building with thousands of photoelectrically sensitive apertures, which open and close by electric motors in order to regulate the amount of light and heat that enter through the windows.

You can visit the ninth floor terrace for free, and when I was there at noon, there was only one other woman there. This makes it a great location to enjoy the view of Paris along the Seine, and you can even have tea in the rooftop cafe or return to the ground floor to visit the bookstore.

The Basilica of Sacre Coeur is visible from the terrace, and you can head there for another free skyline view of Paris. Although unlike the Institut du Monde Arabe, Sacre Coeur is crawling with people, including large tour groups, street vendors, and pickpockets.

Laundry day

I am lucky to have a washing machine at our house here in Paris, because many students have to go to the laundromat to do their laundry.

Yes, we have a washer. But this is no large washer that brags about how it can hold 40 pairs of jeans. Like many other things here, it is on a much smaller scale than the American version I grew up with.

Yet while it is significantly smaller, it is nonetheless capable of holding several weeks worth of laundry. I find it extremely impressive.
The washing machine has inside of it a metal wheel with a small, spring-release opening to add clothing items. The metal wheel then spins on a horizontal axis as it runs -- the reverse of how washers typically operate in the US.

Furthermore, my experience has been that they do not worry about separating the clothing here prior to washing; everything gets thrown in the same load. Colors, whites, and delicates all get washed simultaneously. I assume this is related to the emphasis on water conservation that exists in France.

Usually my host mom starts my load, and I pull the clean clothes out later and hang them up to dry on the drying rack in my room. While some French families do have a washing machine, they do not have dryers; all laundry gets hung up to dry. When it was still nice out, I would throw open the window to help my clothes dry faster, but now it is too cold to do so. Still, the clean clothes serve as a nice air freshener for my room!

The essentials

I ALWAYS over-pack, so packing an entire semester into a suitcase and a carry-on was a huge feat for me. While I have not actually needed each item I brought along, there are several things I am particularly thankful I threw in:


Rain boots. While obviously not necessary, they are great to have as an option because there seems to be a permanent rain cloud that lingers over Europe. And as my mom told me, if your bag is already overweight and you know you will wear them, you might as well throw them in.

Sturdy umbrella. I cannot express how important this is. Do not opt for the small ones with the matching bag that appear to be more convenient because they are cheap, they will break in the wind, and you will have to buy a new one. A durable, neutral colored umbrella with an easy-open button is the best choice.

A purse that zips closed. When it rains, you want at least the contents of your purse to remain dry. That zipper is also necessary in a city of pickpockets (duh). And sometimes you indulge in Belgian waffles, and sometimes whipped cream falls off that waffle into your open purse. I have seen it happen. It is a mess.

Small purse. Clubs and bars will sometimes have you check your jacket and large bag. While small purses will still be inspected, you will not have to check them.

Duffle bag. You will need one to take on weekend trips, or when it is time to go home and you find you have acquired more things than will fit in your suitcase.

Dr. Scholl's shoe inserts. These are lifesavers and can be switched into whatever shoes I put on. With all the walking done here, I am so thankful I threw these in.

Lint roller. Turns out my host family has two cats that love my room, so it is a good thing I brought one of these.

Apple World Travel Adapter Kit. No need for the giant converter when I can just slip a different piece onto my current charger for either my laptop or my phone.

Travel journal. I do and see so much, it is hard to remember what I did yesterday, let alone a few weeks ago. I will need these written explanations to later describe the hundreds of photos I have taken, plus it is nice to have a place to collect bits of information I learn from my host family.

Travel size toiletries. Get the travel size bottle set from Walgreens that comes with its own bag, and fill the bottles before you leave. When you arrive, it will take you no time at all to pack for those weekend getaways.

Cold medicine. The last thing you will want to do when you become sick is walk to a pharmacy (probably in the rain) and try to find the medicine you need, in a different language. When I had a cold, I took some of the medicine I had brought from the US and opted to not deal with translating the dosage, etc. I wanted to know exactly how long I would be knocked out for because I had things to go see the next day!

Vitamins. Entering into a new culture, all you want to do is try new foods and it is difficult to keep track of what nutrients you are missing. Take your vitamins every day and hopefully avoid having to use the aforementioned medicine.

Hand sanitizer. Because, the metro.

Wrinkle releaser spray. When you pull your blouses out of those vacuum sealed bags, you will not even recognize them.

Laundry bag. I know people who have to commute and navigate seven flights of stairs just to go do laundry. Bring a sturdy, easy to handle bag that isn't bulky. If your host family has a washer at home like mine does, they will not also have a dryer. Again, wrinkle releaser will come in handy here.

Scarves and layers. For when you wear that shirt twice in a row, because the French wear everything multiple times between washes. Plus you never know what the weather will be like by midday, and by then you are too far from home to run home and change. The French do not change clothes multiple times a day like Americans are known to anyway.

Neutral-colored undergarments. Bring a convertible bra in nude, white, and black. When you buy that new dress, you should not have to worry about going to buy a new bra to wear with it; bring something that will work with all your clothes. And then by the end of this semester, my undergarments will be so worn and washed that I will probably just throw them out.

Wristwatch. Even if you are not a watch-wearer, you will become one.

Belgian waffles

I just got back from a long weekend spent in Brussels, Belgium. Our university cancelled class for Armistice Day, so some friends and I had scheduled a trip from Saturday through Monday.

The first restaurant we chose upon arriving in Brussels was the Waffle Factory at 30 rue du Lombard, and we returned each following day because we loved it so much. The employees were funny and friendly, and the waffles were spectacular.

The restaurant also has wifi, making it easy to instantly Instagram your waffle (or waffles, in our case) as you attempt to gracefully devour it.

We tried both the lunch waffles and the sweet waffles. The lunch waffles are filled with a combination of meats, cheeses, and vegetables, and surrounded by a waffle shell. I tried the "reine" lunch waffle, which has cheese, tomato, mushrooms, and ham.
As we waited for our waffles, we were able to watch as the cook rolled up the ingredients inside the dough and threw the balls on the waffle iron.

There is a selection of three dessert waffles: Belgium waffles, Liege waffles, and Waffines. A Belgium waffle is made with a batter and is the same as what we consider a Belgium waffle in America, except in a rectangle shape. A liege waffle (my personal favorite) is made with a dough and when cooked is crispy with crystallized sugar. A waffine has a chocolate filling and is circular like the lunch waffles.
You can then choose from Belgium dark chocolate, Nutella, strawberry, banana, caramel, spéculoos cookie butter, Chantilly whipped cream, or powdered sugar as toppings for your waffle.

It is no wonder Belgium's waffles are famous; each waffle I tasted was fresh and rich, and the combination of toppings makes them, while messy, fun to eat.

Liege waffle with spéculoos spread

Worn thin

As a result of the delicious French cuisine, I might not return home with the abs I had last season, but I will surely have nicely toned legs and glutes with all the walking and stair climbing I have been doing in the past couple months. Sometimes I wish I had a pedometer just to see how far I walk in an average day. Other times, I know I would rather not even know. But to get an idea, just check out how large the Domaine of Chantilly and the Domaine of Versailles are.

So consequently, my go-to shoes are officially worn out after two trips to Versailles, one to Chantilly, a weekend in southern France, and of course many days of wandering through Paris.

The cheap Target sneakers I brought along (with no expectation of them surviving to the return trip) are worn thin and stained. As I walked through the rain yesterday I discovered the left shoe has a giant crack through the sole, which naturally was letting water in and soaking my sock.

But is it time to throw them out quite yet? These shoes have led me to so many adventures so far, and they are so comfortable. And so they remain at the end of my bed, awaiting more days filled with walking.


"The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step." - Lao Tzu