Thursday, April 15, 2010

20 New Things: Eat a True Croissant in France

 

Ok, I gotta cop. I actually did not take photos of any of the croissants I ate while in Paris. But I did eat them! I picked up a croissant with coffee every morning and they were all delicious. The outsides were a bit tougher than the ones I've been (over)indulging in here in Amsterdam, but it didn't make a difference taste wise.

The thing I've learned about living in Europe is that all food is good food. Back in the States, you have to pay a bit more money for food to not taste like a shoe. In Europe, you could go to a run-down looking cafe or a university cafeteria and all of the food will be high quality. This is especially true for Paris.

Save a few meals at cafes, I mostly lived off street crèpes during my weekend in Paris. Believe it or not, I had completely forgotten that crèpes were a part of the French cuisine until I passed a street vendor a few minutes after arriving.


I would estimate that there are two crèpe vendors per block in Paris. Seriously. It was crèpe mania. And I fully took advantage of it. I was on a lemon and sugar (ou citronne et sucre) kick for most of the trip, but splurged on nutella once.

A crèpe in the process of being made. I would kill for some equipment like this. So hard to make them in a pan.

Besides eating my weight in crèpes and croissants, Lorax and I hit up all the typical tourist spots.

Eiffel Tower

Louvre

Arc de Triomphe

Pantheon

Notre Dame

There were a few slightly more off the radar places I had hoped to check out, but I ended up not having access to internet at the hotel and had saved all the info about said places on Google Docs. #FAIL

Still, it's nice to be able to say I've been to all of the usual spots and to have experienced them. I definitely need to go back to Paris to get to know it on a more local level.

One thing I repeated every time I passed a statue or obelisk or engraving on a building was that I wished I had studied it prior to seeing it or that I had the time to in that moment. I feel like there is classical intellect seeped into every structure and decoration of Paris and I am yearning to discover it.

Perhaps next time I visit Paris I will be better prepared. This go around, I was happy enough just getting to see lots of gargoyles.

Notre Dame gargoyle. Didn't Disney name them after Victor Hugo?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

c'est tres, tres cool