Category Archives: France

France, Lifestyle

Me and My Tom Tom

14 Comments
Print pagePDF pageEmail page

How come I don’t understand what my Tom Tom’s telling me to do? I bought one a few years ago for Relationnel but I’ve hardly ever used it. Now that we live in the middle of Paris, I rarely drive because it’s mostly just as fast to take the metro or the bus inside the city and when we go into the country, Relationnel always takes the wheel. I’d much rather look at the scenary or talk to Black Cat or snooze. So I’m used to hearing the Tom Tom but not to following the  instructions.

I practically turned round in circles in the 16th arrondissement the other day trying to understand where I was supposed to be going and yesterday, when I was going to the sales at Usine Center in the north of Paris, I overshot the turnoff completely. Relationnel tells me I should be watching the screen as well. But I have to confess it doesn’t really help! Maybe it’s just a question of practice. I certainly hope so because once we start going down to Blois more often I’ll be driving to a lot more in places I don’t know, not like in Paris where I can usually navigate pretty well, even around Place de l’Etoile.

In French, they call it a “GPS” but I noticed when some friends friends came over from Australia recently, they called it a Tom Tom. I must say it’s extremely useful when we travel to other countries. I can remember some terrible arguments in Italy especially when I didn’t manage to direct us where we should, one of the main reasons being that Relationnel follows his sense of direction which doesn’t work too well when there are one-way streets. I remember one horrendous day in Pisa when the river kept getting in the way.

But now that he’s got the Tom Tom to talk back to, I don’t have to navigate any more. “Faites demi-tour dès que possible” it says imperiously (I’ve got the voice down to a pat) when we’re going in the opposite direction. “Vous êtes arrivé” (with the liaison and all) when we reach our destination. “Tournez immédiatement à gauche. Tournez à gauche. Tournez à gauche!” in desperation when you’re about to miss the turn. The trouble is I miss it anyway. The voice sounds so real that we start explaining what we’re doing! “Hang on. We need to get petrol.” or “We’re going to the supermarket first” (me) or “That couldn’t possibly be right” or “No way. I’m not taking that direction” (Relationnel).

We tried using a man’s voice but neither of us liked it. I’ll let you look for the psychology behind that.

I could try putting it in English I suppose. Maybe I would understand better.  Do you have problems with your Tom Tom?

Don’t forget to subscribe to new posts – that way you’ll get them directly on your smart phone or in your mail box! And I love to hear your comments!

Australia, Australian customs, France, French customs, Lifestyle

Washing Machines I Have Known

10 Comments
Print pagePDF pageEmail page

I grew up in North Queensland with one of those enormous top loading agitator washing machines that could wash huge loads in record time. We had a drip dry cycle which meant that the machine stopped after the last rinse and you could remove whatever you wanted, such as a drip-dry shirt, drain it on the draining board over the huge aluminium sink next to the machine, put it on a hanger and then hang it up under the house (our house was on stilts), dripping water over the concrete floor and yourself in the process. All of which was of no importance because the water had disappeared within an hour. You didn’t even get your shoes wet because you were bare foot anyway.

This is not my mother! Photo credits : see link below

 

 

When we went on holidays to the Island, we stayed in Kooyang Flats which had a laundry down the back with a wringer machine. My sister and I were coopted into helping Mum with the washing. We loved turning the wringer and it was really quite a game, provided it didn’t last too long. Except for Mum of course. She must have hated it! Back breaking work for the woman who actually had to wash clothes for six people when she was on holiday, knowing that her huge agitator machine was sitting idle at home.

As I told you in a recent post, my experience with washing machines when I moved to France was somewhat different. Initially, I just used a laundromat. Speed Queens are used worldwide I’ve discovered. My first machine was a front loader tumble machine and I’ve never had anything else. It was in the kitchen though. I was horrified the first time I saw a washing machine next to someone’s fridge. There’s no real reason it shouldn’t be there, but it seemed strange. There are three basic reasons for this: practically no one in an apartment has a laundry room, the bathroom’s usually too small and you need a water connection.

I always made sure I washed the clothes when Leonardo was awake because he used to sit mesmerised in front of the machine the whole time. We didn’t have a TV then. He’s always been mechanically minded. I like to think that I was partly responsible for that. If you’ve ever used one of those machines in France, you’ve probably wondered why the cycles are so long. My normal 40° cycle is 1 hour 17 minutes (my current machine has an electronic display) and the 60° cycle is 2 hours 15 minutes. Well, the reason is very simple even though it took me ages to discover it. They are all connected to a cold water supply so they have to  heat up the water which obviously takes time.

When my parents used come to my place on holidays in the winter (I was living in a house in the suburbs of Paris at that time with a sort of back veranda next to the kitchen that had very handy lines that I used during the summer months), they would insist on drip drying their clothes. The only thing they didn’t seem to be able to quite comprehend was that, number one, it was cold outside which meant that it would take days for the clothes to dry, and number two, the dripping water didn’t magically disappear the way it did in North Queensland. I didn’t have any drip-dry clothes myself.

But there are other types of washing machines in France that I have experienced when on holidays in the country. They are top-loading tumble machines. Inside, there is a drum that revolves clockwise from the back to the front of the machine which means that the drum has to be tightly closed or the clothes will fall out. It comes with a unique opening/closing system where you have to match up some catches that are not easy to identify, then press on a not-always-obvious button. Of course few people really know how to manoeuvre the closing system and the opening has to be in the right place for you to do so. When the machine stops, the opening is usually at the bottom of the machine. Then as you take the clothes out, you can be absolutely sure that a baby sock will slip down the side of the drum, unbeknown to you, and cause the mechanism to seize up next time the machine is used. This is not necessarily your baby sock of course. You may just happen to be the next guest. For a long time, these machines were incomprehensibly the most popular in France. They still are to a certain extent because you can get ones that are 40 cm wide instead of the usual 60, a big boon in small bathrooms and kitchens. N’est-ce pas Leonardo?

Kooyang Holiday Units, 13 Hayles Avenue, Arcadia, Qld 4819, 07 4778 5570
Photo credit (not my mother!): http://www.yourememberthat.com/media/10392/Wringer_Washing_Machine/
 

Don’t forget to subscribe to new posts – that way you’ll get them directly on your smart phone or in your mail box! And I love to hear your comments!

France, French customs

No Laundry Rooms in Paris Apartments

2 Comments
Print pagePDF pageEmail page

Me on my moped in 1975

One of the first things I discovered when I arrived in France was the very different attitude towards washing clothes. I rented a room in an apartment in Pau, in the south-west of France, with two other students and we shared a bathroom. The landlady lived in a separate part of the apartment and presumably had another bathroom. There was no washing machine and nowhere to hang clothes. So I set off to find a laundromat. There were plenty of laundries and dry cleaners, but it took me a long time to track down the only laundromat. I soon learned that the unmarried teachers at school took their washing home to their mothers every weekend. I had to use my moped to go to the laundromat and lost a favourite pair of trousers off the back one day! Yeah, I can hear you – why weren’t they in a bag?

When I finally had a place of my own in Paris, it actually had an airing cupboard, something I have rarely seen since. The concept of a laundry room as such, which exists in most places in Australia (well, the ones I’ve seen anyway), is unknown here where every square metre counts. Most people in apartments either use  contraptions above their bathtubs that you raise or lower or simply put collapsible clothes horses in their living room or bedroom. Bathrooms are rarely big enough to take them except for one that opens up on top of the bathtub and that you have to remove before your bath. One of my friends dries her clothes on the heated towel rack.

Whenever I go to Black Cat’s place, there is always someone’s washing on the clothes horse in the small area in front of one of the bedrooms and the bathroom that also contains the oven and microwave. Relationnel’s kids, who live in a separate flat down the road from us, hang theirs on a wall contraption in the kitchen ! There is absolutely nowhere else. Must have been a shock for our Australian exchange student  Brainy Pianist.

We actually have a room in our apartment where we can hang our washing out of sight, but only because I divided our large bedroom into two using very high bookshelves to create a dressing room. You have to be careful about ventilation though, because hanging wet washing near clothes containing wool in a heated room can cause havok. The mites had got to Relationnel’s suits before we discovered our error. Now we put them away in plastic covers after they’ve been dry cleaned and he uses a cupboard in another room (my office!) the rest of the time. I have a very high clothes horse that can take three loads of washing and has clever bits on the side that each take 4 shirts.

But that is not a standard installation. When we go to gîtes (holiday houses in the country), I’m always amazed at the laundry facilities (or lack thereof). These are houses in which you could presumably have some kind of system to dry your clothes effectively. Sometimes there are (dirty) outside lines always in your line of vision but never clothes hoists. But you can’t really use them between October and May and then only when you’re absolutely sure it’s not going to rain before you get back from your day’s excursion (provided you remember to put a load on as soon as you get up).

A tancarville*

They usually give you a collapsible clothes horse, often a bit rickety from over-use, but I haven’t worked out yet what sort of clothes you’re supposed to put on them apart from socks, underwear (but not singlets) and children’s T-shirts. You certainly can’t put adults’ shirts on them (and there is rarely a rod in the bathroom to hang them on) and they aren’t wide enough to take a T-shirt properly. If you do resign yourself to bunching it up, you then eliminate all the rungs underneath. Some of the clothes horses have wings so that you can hang up shirts but once they’re up, there’s no way you can get around them.

Then there is the problem of sheets and towels. My solution is to dry the towels in the drier and schedule the sheets so that I can fold the top sheet in half and hang it over the rod in the bathroom (it’s just wide enough) in the morning so it’s dry by evening and put the fitted sheet over the clothes’ horse. When I used to wash the kids’ sheets (and clothes) as well, the schedule was very tight! I was so relieved when they finished school and got their own washing machine (I didn’t feel I could ask high school children to look after their own washing).

And I haven’t told you about the washing machines yet …

* Tancarville is a trademark for a type of clothes horse that came out at the time the Tancarville suspension bridge was built. 
 
Don’t forget to subscribe to new posts – that way you’ll get them directly on your smart phone or in your mail box!
Food, France

Tarte Tatin with Quinces

Leave a comment
Print pagePDF pageEmail page

Last Christmas (not the one that’s just been), Black Cat and Leonardo gave us a voucher for a cooking class at L’Atelier des Chefs in Paris where we learnt to make foie gras a few years ago. We kept putting it off until it was nearly too late (the deadline was 31st December) but finally chose a class and booked it, only to be told two days beforehand that it was cancelled! We got an extension for a month and chose another class in January: foie gras maki, fillet of duck with butternut pumpkin purée and tarte tatin with quinces (this is a very popular and typical French upside-down cake usually made with apples).

Our class of seven people started off with the tarte tatin, peeling and slice the quinces which is a feat in itself they’re so hard.

 

Then we made the caramel. This is not something I’d ever done though Relationnel is quite an expert. You start with a large quantity of white sugar making a little hole in the middle if you’re using an induction cooker because the heat starts from the middle and radiates outwards.

Using high heat, you start melting the sugar. As soon as it starts to liquefy, you use a heat-proof spatula (called a “maryse” in French – I bought one at their handy shop before we left) to gradually incorporate the surrounding sugar.

When it’s completely liquid and a light caramelly colour, you turn down the heat. If it gets too dark, the caramel will become bitter.

Then you add the butter (this is not a low calorie dish), ginger and cinnamon.

Keep stirring all the time until the butter has melted. Add the slices of quince and leave them sitting in the caramel without mixing until the caramel becomes hot again. If you mix them too early, the caramel will go lumpy. Mix well and cook on low heat until the quinces are cooked.

 

In the meantime, you cut out a disk about a centimetre bigger than the case all round and prick it to stop the flaky pastry blowing up. We were using individual tart cases but you can use a larger one of course.

When the quinces are cooked, you put a layer into the tart case piling it up a bit, then cover with the pastry, turning it under on the sides to seal in the quinces. You can line the cases with greaseproof paper if you think the tart will stick.

Cook in an oven at 210° for about 20 minutes for small tarts, a little longer for a large one.  Remove from the oven. When the tarts are warm, you turn them out. We topped them with a salted butter caramel cream emulsion that I will not tell you how to make because you need a siphon and I’m sure you don’t want all those extra calories anyway! The trick was not to squirt it on the person sitting opposite you. You can just serve it with a bit of crème fraîche the way they usually do.

Quantities for 6 people
 
Castor sugar (fine graulated): 150 g
Quinces : 3
Powdered cinnamon: 10 g
Unsalted butter: 30 g
I sheet of flaky pastry
Fresh chopped ginger: 30 g
 
Don’t forget to subscribe to new posts – that way you’ll get them directly on your smart phone or in your mail box!
France, French customs

Who’s Getting Married in France?

5 Comments
Print pagePDF pageEmail page

The posters are up for the Paris wedding fair. I think it’s amusing that it’s being held in Palais Brongniart which I thought was the precinct of the Paris stock exchange. One thing I’ve noticed in recent years is that wedding dresses are looking more and more like evening dresses, showing as much flesh as possible. My wedding dresses (note the plural) are definitely old hat. Not that French women are having weddings much these days, according to the statistics. It’s certainly the case of Black Cat’s friends. I asked her why. It seems that most couples don’t get married because it costs so much. Well, if you’re having your hens’ party in Madrid like one of her friends, I suppose it does!

So what are they doing instead? Well, they’re pacsing. The PACS (pacte civil de solidarité) is an agreement between two adults of the same or different sex to organise their community life. The current form dates from 2005 and is very similar to marriage except for certain rights (entitlement to a percentage of the other person’s retirement after death for example) and the fact that you don’t have to go through a divorce procedure if you want to end the contract. That in itself can be a bonus, but it hardly seems the ideal way to start your life as a couple!

You register the agreement with the court and can even have a ceremony similar to that of a registry marriage. Curiously, it is not same sex couples who are becoming pacsed the most but heterosexual couples. It seems that young people feel perfectly comfortable with just inviting their close friends along to their PACS ceremony but wouldn’t dream of not having all the second cousins and sixth-best friends to their wedding.

I don’t know if anything similar exists in the English-speaking countries.

Don’t forget to subscribe to new posts – that way you’ll get them directly on your smart phone or in your mail box!
France, Lifestyle, Paris

Power Walking down to Concorde

8 Comments
Print pagePDF pageEmail page

Just power walked down to Concorde and back through the Tuileries Gardens but grossly underestimated the temperature. The thermometer says 9.5° but I forgot about the wind factor. Next time, I’ll wear my cap with ear flaps (hoping I don’t meet anyone I know, Black Cat in particular) and my inferior Australian suede gloves (because I still haven’t got my new rabbit-fur ones from Italy). Or I could just use my exercise bike and watch a movie at the same time (if I can get the technology to work).

But if I did that, I’d miss the pianist on Place du Palais Royal and the guy with the giant bubble ring that all the kids love. I wouldn’t see the glass pyramids of the Louvre or the pink marble Carrousel Arch with its gold figures and green horses. I would miss the sun setting over the Eiffel Tower and the giant Ferris wheel looking so out-of-place with the Obelisk peaking out behind, mocking my fear of heights. I wouldn’t see the kids sailing their boats on the pond and looking like an Impressionist painting (except for their jeans and anoraks) nor hoping for a ride on the Olde Worlde carousel.

Neither would I be reminded on seeing the Orangerie that I haven’t been back since renovation to visit the wonderful oval rooms with Monet’s waterlilies (shame on me). I wouldn’t see the seagulls calling and screeching over the fountain. I wouldn’t have that stunning view of the Louvre spread out before me as I power walk my way back. I’d miss the man who hires out the sail boats pushing his boat-laden trolley home at the end of the day.

 I wouldn’t see the lovers kissing on benches (they don’t have cold ears) or the foreign tourists having their cheese and wine picnics (and ignoring the cold). I wouldn’t see Henry (and not the more strait-laced Thomas) Moore’s Reclining Figure at the foot of the Orangerie or the 18 Maillol statues down the other end. I would miss the open-mouthed fish at the bottom of the lamp posts next to the Decorative Arts Museum. Not to mention the giant monkey leaning out the window!

I wouldn’t be treated to the welcoming smell of roast chestnuts as I come out onto Rue de Rivoli. Neither would I go past the Comédie Française where Molière died in his chair or see the Night Revellers’ Kiosk. I wouldn’t see all the kids playing among the Buren columns and proudly wearing their crowns (they had the galette des rois today). I wouldn’t see all the people crowded into Miss Bibi’s tiny jewellery shop nor would I have the pleasure of feeling my ears get warmer as I walk up the stairs to my apartment.

But, more than anything else, I might forget just how lucky I am to actually live in the Palais Royal, right in the centre of the City of Light!

Don’t forget to subscribe to new posts – that way you’ll get them directly on your smart phone or in your mail box!
France, French customs

Le Mesnil Jourdain – a little corner of Normandy

1 Comment
Print pagePDF pageEmail page

The little village of Le Mesnil Jourdain in Normandy has some wonderful half-timbered houses, both new and old, in addition to the manor house we stayed in over Christmas. Can you tell the old from the new in the ones below?

The oak structure was built first and the holes filled in with wattle-and-daub (upright branches interwoven by smaller branches and covered by a thick coat of clay mud), laths and plaster, or bricks. Nowadays, they are usually renovated with concrete and whitewashed.

The misshapen walls on these old half-timbered buildings are the result of age and not sloppy craftsmenship of course.

This one has a thatched roof. Irises are often planted on a bed of clay along the roof ridge. This is to make sure the ends of the thatch are firmly anchored in place.

From this side, you can tell it’s of recent construction but from the other side, only the regularity of the timbering gives it away.

Once the main building was finished, the towers were added to one end to take the staircase up to the upper floors.

Don’t forget to subscribe to new posts – that way you’ll get them directly on your smart phone or in your mail box!
Accommodation, Croatia, Food, France, Loire Valley, Paris

Happy New Year! Bonne Année!

10 Comments
Print pagePDF pageEmail page

These are the first snowdrops in the private woods behind the house we are buying in Blois, La Closerie Falaiseau. The photo was sent to us by the current owners. That, of course, is our big adventure for 2012. On 17th March, the house will be ours. We’re planning to spend Easter there with the family.

As we watched the Eiffel Tower shimmer and shake from our window in Paris at midnight and drank our champagne, we imagined ourselves at the same time the next year in the Closerie next to a roaring fire, snug inside our four-hundred-year-old walls!

The incredible Plitvice Falls

This has been an eventful year: a week in Seville in February and a week in Orthez in the Pyrenees in April, taking up again with my very first friend in France, Elizabeth. Relationnel went surf fishing for 10 days in May in Normandy, where I joined him both weekends to cycle. We then spent five days cycling in the Loire Valley in June. In the summer, we took four weeks off and drove to Eastern Europe, visiting (and cycling) in no less than nine countries (France, Italy, Croatia, Bosnia Herzogovina, Slovenia, Austria, Liechtenstein, Germany and Switzerland), speaking four languages (French, Italian, Croatian and German), dealing in three currencies (euros, Liechtenstein marks and Swiss marks) and clocking up more than 5,000 kilometers. Highlights included the incredible Plitvice lakes and falls.

Relationnel then spent a week trekking in the Alps in September before we both went to eastern Champagne to cycle around the largest man-made lake in Europe and visit the eleven half-timbered churches in the region. In October, Relationnel turned sixty and Leonardo decided to pull up his roots and go to Australia to live and work, helping me to set up the blog before he left.

Relationnel and I then went went to the Loire Valley for a few days to start looking for a place to live when Relationnel retires in June 2014.  We fell hopelessly in love with the very first house we visited, built in 1584. Who could resist? Since then, we seem to be caught up in a whirlwind. 

Today, as we ate our oysters on Sunday, we talked about everything we need to do. It’s a little overwhelming to say the least. We want to divide La Closerie in two and rent out (or exchange) the ground floor. Once he retires, Relationnel is going to completely renovate the “Little House” next door which is part of the sale so that we can use it as a short-term holiday rental and invite friends to visit. This means furnishing La Closerie (dépôt-vente, here I come!), setting up a website and organising rental.

This year, we’ll also be going to Australia in September/October where I’ll be organising a big family reunion on my father’s side in Armidale (there are 39 cousins in my generation and 54 in the next generation!), the first in 50 years, and spending two weeks in Tasmania (on a home exchange!) plus a couple of weekends in Sydney and Brisbane. We hope to organise other home exchanges in Europe during the year.

I’m also giving up my university teaching in June after 16 years.  I’ve loved teaching and gained many friends among my graduates over the years, but I feel it’s time to move on to other things.

And, of course, I’ll be continuing my blog. Thank you to all my faithful readers for your encouragement.  Bonne lecture, as they say in French, for the year to come!

Food, France, French customs, Paris

Holly and Mistletoe

3 Comments
Print pagePDF pageEmail page

I know it’s supposed to be holly and ivy though I don’t know why because most of the ivy – well, the Viriginia creeper anyway – loses its leaves around here in winter. Our holly and mistletoe come from Normandy. We had a lot of problems finding holly with red berries this time but the mistletoe, which is a parasite of course, had grown lower on the apple trees so Relationnel didn’t have to stretch his arms as much!

Photo by Black Cat

When I was a child, we used to buy real holly (houx) from David Jones at Christmas time but I’d never seen mistletoe (gui) until I came to France and discovered that it grows in large bunches that are particularly obvious when the host tree loses its leaves.

The only problem with mistletoe is that its sticky little white berries keep falling off so I’m keeping the New Year branch we’re supposed to kiss under in a bag until the day. Relationnel is on call this year so we won’t be able to join the throngs on New Year’s Eve on the Pont des Arts which has a perfect view of the Eiffel Tower which shimmers and shakes at midnight. We can actually see it from our window but last year low cloud obscured it, which was very sad. I had to use my watch to check the time.

 

I’m starting to think about our New Year’s Eve feast for two, particularly as it could be interrupted any time if Relationnel is called out. One year we made this terribly complicated capon dish that I got out of “Simply French” by Patricia Wells, but considering the hours it took to make, I found the result very disappointing. So now I make much simpler recipes such as pan-fried foie gras and verrines with lots of interesting bits and pieces that I can vary according to whim and the ingredients I have at home. Far more satisfying.

Verrines – from verre meaning glass and modelled on the word terrine which comes from terre or clay – are shot glasses in various shapes and sizes that have become very popular in France over the last few years for serving individual starters and desserts. I love making them because you can be very inventive and they can be prepared ahead of time. The idea is to have different layers and colours so that they look attractive from the outside.

At Christmas we had two verrines for starters: slices of sea scallops alternating with beds of leeks and eggplant purée topped with ricotta and walnuts; and two for dessert: pannacotta on a layer of coffee jelly topped with crumbled brown sugar biscuits from Belgium called speculoos and slightly cooked pear pieces alternating with fromage blanc and candied ginger. Since I had only taken along two sets of verrines, I used ordinary glasses for the desserts.

Now I wonder what I’ll put in them this year?

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...