Catch-up…Again, Part II: « You Can’t Stop the Beat » (The Cooking Momentum Really Picks Up)

(N.B. In a similar style as my previous post...)

Thursday (26): After a late night with my paper, I was totally ready for the weekend and the excitement vis-à-vis cooking that we had in store for our dinner guests. Thursday evening, Gerald, Jill and Sam came over for dinner. Ménu: apératifs, pâte de penne avec une sauce de tomates et des boulettes de poulet et en plus du brocoli, la salade, des fromages et pour le dessert, les poires au four avec une sauce de vin blanc (sucré), de la canelle, et du citron. Of course, we also ended with pains au chocolat et chocolat chaud. (If you couldn't pick up what any of that was, make a note and I'll translate it into English, though I think you should be able to understand all of that.) We also played 1 000 Bourne.

Friday (27): I went to a cooking class taught by Elisabeth, at the Fondation. We made tartlettes, a salad with warmed chèvre, endives wrapped in ham and topped with a béchamel sauce that I made, and mousse au chocolat (there was an extra one that Camille and I shared, at Elisabeth's encouragement to finish it). Our end of the table (including Elisabeth) talked about travelling and food for much of the time, eventually leading me to the kind of cooking I've been doing since I've been in Paris. (Keep that bit in mind...) It was Jane's turn to come over for dinner, and so she and another one of her classmates, Elise, did just that. (Whoa, weird English sentence going on right there...) For dinner, we had: apératifs, salmon (me) with wild rice and asparagus (Trevor), salad, cheese, and had a duo-dessert (halved mango with brown sugar and cooked in rum and lemon juice, and strawberries that had been soaked in a mixture of orange juice, lemon and sugar; the mangoes were served with a reduced sauce of the leftover liquids from both desserts). As always, pains au chocolat and chocolat chaud ended the meal. After Jane and Elise left, Trevor and I continued talking and we got onto the subject of our favourites about our experience so far. Eventually, we got to thinking about who some of our favourite professors are and after recounting my cooking story from earlier in the day, we began thinking about the possibility of us cooking for them before we leave Paris. To make the night even more perfect, we figured out how to open the windows to the balcony. Paris is such a beautiful city.

Saturday (28): Trevor and I met up with Gerald and Jill at the Jardin de Luxembourg; quite exciting was the fact that the day was absolutely perfect (especially in terms of weather). Afterwards, we stopped by St. Sulpice and Tuileries (another garden in Paris). Our final destination for the afternoon was the Arc de Triomphe, which we found out students get in for free! About 50+ pictures and 500 steps later, we made our way back down and decided to do an impromptu dinner (as we were still up in the air as to whether or not we wanted to go to a jazz club). We ended up just staying inside and having dinner: apératifs, baked pasta, cheese and for dessert, dark mousse au chocolat accompanied by strawberries in various forms (including a nutella-filled strawberry with chantilly crème). As we finished up our pains au chocolat and chocolat chaud, we heard a key and were surprised to find our host family having returned from their vacation. Before and throughout their departure, Trevor and I had thought they would be back on Sunday. We (including Gerald and Jill; thanks for all of your help!) cleaned up the kitchen and dining room in the fastest time I had ever seen those two rooms cleaned after one of our dinners. Our host family was extremely nice about the confusion and told us that we could have just carried on, as if they had never arrived. In any event, the day still remained as perfect as it could be in Paris.

Sunday (1 March... when did that happen?!): After the adventure of finding hostels and what-not for my upcoming trip to Italy, I heard a small knock on my door. It was Elisabeth, our host sister, coming to get me for lunch. Our host parents made a wonderful lunch for us, incorporating ingredients from the mountain region where they had vacationed. (Un)fortunately, the food was definitely regional (including the names of each thing) and was not committed to my memory at the time. I wrapped up my hostel searches, booking everything that could be booked, took a bit of a nap, and then went to Sacré-Coeur to meet Patrick for Mass (finally after my fourth or fifth time being in Montmartre, I was able to get to Mass there). Afterwards, we stopped by a crêperie and ate some crêpes en route to the Comédie Française, where the BU crowd watched Cyrano de Bergerac. I'm sure I'd think it'd be as great a play as everyone else thinks it is, if I had been able to understand what was going on. In any event, it was quite the fortunate experience to be at the Comédie Française. For the first time in quite some time, Trevor and I went back to my room to have our first meal outside of our host family's kitchen.

Hungry much? I mean, I'm not mean, but...

This past weekend has been one of my favourites so far. On Saturday, I got up early to continue my search for a single pair of jeans. I had no success in this endeavour, and realised that an annoying paradox currently exists here in Paris. I'm not the only short guy in this city; indeed, there are many who are shorter than me, and that also happen to be wearing jeans. If they're wearing shorter jeans, that must mean that said jeans should be available for purchase, right? Aïe ! In any case, outside of this, the weekend was really fun.

I completed my early weekend purchasing with the purchase of my Euro bag (some would call it a "murse"). Entouk, it does the job. It was also beginning to snow (which I love over here), and I remember being rather surprised with the increasing number of shoppers in spite of the weather. I got back home around 2pm, and around which time Trevor and I had lunch (even more eggs; I must also say that I think Trevor has perfected his egg cooking). We then decided to go to the Musée du Quai Branly; cultural museum? (Of course!). The museum, architecturally, was quite huge and modern. The artifacts and such were not quite as modern (though we did see a yellow pointalist painting from '96 (i.e., 1996). I did see many interesting things, as all museums have their fair share, though I, of course, was interested in a few areas in particular:

OCEANIA: Australian, aboriginal artifacts
Philippines: It looks like they didn't put the Philippines in Asia or necessarily in Oceania. In any event, I kind of got the chills taking a look at potentially one of my ancestors' belongings.
AFRICA: Cameroon, South Africa (there was nothing from the Xhosa ethnic group, ps).
AMERICAS: Great Lakes regional artifacts (coolest thing was a grizzly bear claw necklace)

After receiving a text from Erin confirming dinner plans, Trevor and I left the museum and completed some much needed grocery shopping. Erin, Liz, and Meredith (though, the professors seem to be convinced her name's Meredyth), arrived and we presented them with our usual five-course hooplah (though I think they were originally supposed to come over for just the hot chocolate in the end. Nevertheless, we started out with apératifs (including pistachios and peanuts), moved on to a main course of baked pasta and cheesy bread, followed through with salad, included cheese and more baguette, and finishing up with mousse au chocolat noir with raspberries arranged differently for each person. Finally, we moved on to the ultimate test and the reason why they came over in the first place (chocolat chaud). I must say I was rather impressed because, after finishing all of that food, pretty much all of the hot chocolate was finished. We couldn't find any regular sized pains au chocolat, but Trevor did manage to find some mini ones for Erin, Liz, and Meredith to try. (ps, the title of this blog entry comes from the regular use of the phrase "I mean, I'm not mean, but..." during dinner)

As we were heading into early morning territory, we had to call an end to the night and we all walked to the respective Métro stations. However, Erin's Métro line was closed, so Trevor and I walked her to the Noctillien, the bus line that's in operation while the Métro is closed. However, as we would have had to wait (weird construction there) about an hour just for the bus to arrive, we thought (at the time) that it'd be a smart idea to just walk home. Eventually, we got to Erin's house and then realised we had to walk all the way back (I think it was about an hour/hour and a half-ish walk across Paris). Suffice it to say, Trevor and I got back to our apartment without much difficulty, and we have this story to tell.

The next day, i.e., Sunday, everyone woke up pretty late, but we eventually met up at Montmartre (second time in the past few weeks for me) and walked around the area for a few hours, making sure to stop at the Sacré-Coeur and the look-out point at the base of the basilica. After our afternoon journey (with beautiful weather, I must add) we stopped at a crêperie for a quick crêpe nearby, and then headed our separate ways. I aimed for St. Clotilde parish for an evening Mass service and got to the church with little difficulty. Although we were in [what I would call] a chapel, it was beautiful inside and felt as though I was in the main parish church. Upon my arrival back home, Trevor and I became stereotypical French (eating baguette and cheese alongside some wine). We worked on some homework and eventually the hours quickly strolled by; of note, Trevor and I also attempted to make post-mid-term travel plans, but luck was not on our side.

N.B. At the time of me writing this, I'm enjoying my weekend so far, even though we aren't doing much travelling.

The Rest of My Weekend and Les Restes

Well, so much for the touristy bit of my planned weekend with Lauren. Instead, we decided to just go ahead and go with the flow. We didn't actually get moving around Paris until about noon; before that, we took our time eating breakfast and getting ready for the day. Eventually, we made our way to Montmartre--reminiscent of my brief visit there freshman year of college--and somehow seemed to stumble upon the Sacred Heart of Montmartre (i.e., Sacré-Coeur). We made our way through the pilgrim's path within the basilica. About a quarter of the way in, I stopped in the bookshop area and purchased a text which included the order of the Mass, in French. Before even getting to Sacré-Coeur, I was able to purchase a new beret (I still think it was taken out of my suitcase during the baggage check, but I'm not quite sure...), and we tried vin chaud in a little courtyard outside of an adjoining parish. Following our visit to the basilica, we headed further down, just before t he tourist trap area, and after doing a bit of window shopping/shop exploration, had a mid-afternoon lunch at a pizzeria. Since it was cold and I wasn't thinking about the evening weather in terms of dress, we headed back to my room to warm up and fetch a proper jacket. I introduced Lauren to the chocolat chaud that Trevor and I usually end our day with (not the best idea when the day isn't yet over); afterwards, we didn't quite want to move. Even still, though, we found the energy to go back out and walked (and re-walked) the Champs-Elysées. At one point, we stopped in at Sephora. I had been to one in Michigan, and the one there had nothing on this one in Paris; there were so many choices of everything, and that along with the mélange of smells was quite a bit overpowering. After a quick stop at the Disney store (they played the French version of "He Lives in You"; SO great!), we decided to get some dinner which, had been decided a long time ago, ended up being sushi, to celebrate Lauren's 21st birthday. We quickly found the Japanese restaurant that's only a few blocks away from the apartment building. I had salmon sashimi with rice (I think that's what it's called), and a variety of dumplings that reminded me of Filipino cooking. I must admit I rather like Japanese food here. To wrap up the night, we stopped in at the brasserie that's right next door to the apartment building, and toasted one last time to Lauren's b-day.

Today (Sunday), Lauren and I went to Notre Dame for a Gregorian Mass service. I have a bit of trouble following Mass in French; it was quite a bit difficult to follow it in Latin, especially without the guide sheet. After Mass, we came back to the apartment building and after Lauren finished packing, we went downstairs to join Trevor, Christine and Antoine, and eventually the kids, for our weekly lunch. It was relatively shorter, in comparison to our past meals, in large part because Lauren's train would be leaving soon. Comme toujours, Christine made a wonderful lunch. We began with an apératif, this time including quite a bit of Spanish influence. Following that, for our first course, we had salad, along with a flaky crust dish with somewhat of a salmon filling. I don't quite understand what's going on with my fish consumption, but I don't seem to be complaing much about it. For our second course, we had wonderfully-cooked chicken alongside rice. Our third course consisted of some cheese, and homemade bread. We then tackled the dessert which (at first, I got extremely worried at the mere possibility that it was made of mango) Chiristine quickly checked and confirmed it was made of passion fruit.

After lunch, Lauren and I lounged a bit to gather more energy, and then headed for Gare de Lyon, where I dropped her off a few minutes before she had to leave. After our good-bye exchanges, I rushed off to the grocery store to soon find out (again) that they were closed, but not as late as other stores are on a given Sunday. Failed by my attempt to purchase the items on my grocery list, I went back to my room to clean up a bit and began to continue my studying. Thankfully, I have only one class tomorrow and was able to get through the article (i.e., my only assignment for Monday).

Now, I could get ahead in my work... at least, that was the thought that Trevor and I had. We soon realised, however, that our study habits needed to relax for the time being, and thus began eating dinner. If you look it up in the translating dictionary, les restes is the French term for "leftovers," which Trevor and I had this evening. As we went through the night, we eventually (and accidentally) formed a five-course meal, and finished quite a bit of food in the refrigerator. I definitely need more room after tomorrow's shopping extravaganza. Tonight, we had:

*Boiled potatoes with raclette (a cheese which is melted for this dish) and prosciutto
*Leftover cream of mushroom chicken (Trevor had some of the leftover rice, as well)
*Salad with tomatoes
*A hodepodge array of desserts, including a berry-mousse dessert I artistically concocted and focused my attention on for quite some time. Eventually, I'll get photos uploaded so you can see my creations.
*Chocolat chaud with pain au chocolat

Tomorrow, Trevor and I have also decided to finish the rest of our leftovers, that time around including the salmon I cooked last Friday.