Food

National Cheese Lovers Day (21 Janvier)

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French Cheese

tur•o•phile (a lover of cheese)
National Cheese Lovers Day January 21st

Fromage `a Trois (Cheese Tasting)

Adventures in Cheese

Cheese

Cheese Quotes

How can anyone govern a nation that has two hundred and forty-six different kinds of cheese?
Charles de Gaulle

French Celebration of Cheese

2018 Paris Itinerary
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Fromage `a Trois

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Three Cheeses
Cheese Tasting

The best way to sample a cheese (or an apple, or a wine) is to taste it among a trio of other cheeses

While in Paris, at the end of the day, we will occasionally assemble in a hotel room (maybe down in the lobby) for some bread, cheese, wine and other snacks

In Chicago, our Meet-Up group schedules similar gatherings, at the zoo, in the park, on the lake . . .

Everyone brings a favorite cheese (maybe even a French cheese?) and shares it’s story

That is also how we visit a cemetery or museum. There is no tour guide or sommelier – we tap the resources of the group and share

Adventures in Cheese

2016 Paris Itinerary

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Chaussée aux Moines

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This is My Paris Fromage (cheese)

One guilty pleasure (which may destroy my French cheese credibility) is always available in Paris convenience stores. You won’t need to go into a cheese shop (fromagerie) to find Chausse aux Moines.

Bread
Some might look forward to their first taste of European butter or an omelett when arriving in Paris. For me, it’s Chausse aux Moines on a fresh French baguette – slathered with strong Dijon style mustard.

This semi soft wheel of cheese, a curious springy hockey puck, is never over ripe, with a pleasant chewy quality and a delicious rind.

Some Cheese Snobs will dismiss me, but for an American, Chaussée aux Moines is superior to Kraft, Cracker Barrel or other generial supermarket cheeses. When my traveling companion ate it, she described it as stinky. (which for me is a badge-of-honor)

Cheese

“Carriageway (or Roadway) of the Monks” Cheese Wikipedia Translation

Life in France: One Stinky Cheese at a Time A Year in Cheese (Kazz Regelman)

A mass produced commercial (“industrial”) cheese, manufactured by a large company with a complete advertising campaign.

Then we move on to the other more authentic French cheeses
Adventures in Cheese

2019 Paris Itinerary

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Adventures in Cheese

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Cheese
The Peculiar Pleasures of Smelly Cheeses
(attributed to Michael Pollan)

Some speak of French Wine
how in France, a glass of wine is less cheaper than a soft drink
(which I have never experienced or appreciated)

For me it is always more about the Cheese
Not necessarily from the fancy street-front Fromageries, but common grocery stores,
usually the 8 à Huit or Marché Franprix mini-markets (a French gourmet version of your local 7-Eleven convenience store)
I occasionally soak the wine (or Champaign) label off the bottle, but all my cheese wrappers are stuffed into a zip-lock to tabulate upon my return to the USA

Here is my amazing (perhaps embarrassing) Cheese “log”:

Chaussée aux Moines (this is my Every-Day Go-To Paris cheese)

Cheese (Fromage) Links

Selles -sur-Cher
Roblochon
Morbier
Saint-Félicien
Valençay goat cheese
Saint-Marcellin
Tomme de Savoie
Beaufort
Brie
Comté (regularly dubbed “France’s favorite cheese”)
Rustique Camembert
Morbier
Reblochon
Munster Géromé
Ossau-Iraty sharp Basque Sheep’s milk cheese
Saint Albray
St-Marcellin
Sheep Cheese
Vacherin (Mont d’O) potent mountain cheese

Cheese Links
https://wp.me/p3hvvc-2t4

My favorite is Le Super Marché Cheese Plate when I can find one, with a combo of soft, stinky and “dangerous” fromage
(or even that piece of cheese which is marked-down because it is very ripe)

The Cheese Course

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Top 10 Paris (Food)

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Fallafel
David Lebovitz: Living the Sweet Life in Paris
10 Insanely Delicious Things You Shouldn’t Miss in Paris

Jacquelin Carnegie: Fromjmer’s
5 Fabulous & Affordable Places to Eat in Paris
Guillaume Plisson’s favorite restaurants in popular Paris neighborhoods (3e,4e,7e)

Denise Rehrig: Good Morning America (ABC News)
Top 10 Foods to Try in Paris

Thrillist: 50 Things You Need to Eat in Paris Before You Die
50 things you need to plow through before you leave the city or die,
which, considering this list, might have equal odds.

Shared Appetite: Eat. Cook. Share.
The Top 10 Foods You Have To Eat in Paris

The Daily Meal
Top 10 Places to Eat in Paris on a Student Budget

CNN Travel
10 Best Restaurants in Paris: Bryan Pirolli (2013)

10 Days in Paris
Top 5: Dude Food , Top 5: Best Sandwiches , Top 5: Food Trucks ,
Top 5: Juiciest Steaks , Top 5: Poissonnière Restaurants , Top 5: Mexican Restaurants

Raymond Blanc’s favourite restaurants in Paris
The French chef picks his top tables in the French capital plus dine like a pro with our guide to eating out in the City of Light The Sunday Times

Paris Wise
Yù jūn yī xí tán, shèng dú shí nián shū (A Chinese Proverb)
“A conversation with a wise person is worth of ten years’ study of books”
Christopher Back’s excellent blog explores what we love about Paris, including essays on cheese, coffee, bread (boulangerie), art, the Louvre and much more
all you need to know “paris-wise”

Paris Dining Venues
Food Links We Like

2018 Paris Itinerary

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Je ne sais quoi

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Bread
Bread …
I can get a good loaf of “French” bread at the local Jewel food store. It’s got a complex taste, elastic crumb and chewy crust. The baguette that I’m thinking of might be from “La Brea” bakery of California – maybe frozen then baked fresh today. We’ve had American wines, cheeses, breads and restaurants comparable to what you might find in France for some time.

“I don’t know what”

The difference is that in Paris, I walk into a boulangerie and request my bread from a French woman who will not permit me to order in English. If I lapse into my native tongue (I blurted: “does that have grains & seeds?” when ordering a pain aux cereales) she commences a squawking – like a wolf has entered the hen house. And I respect it, admire it and pray that it will never change.

This is one of my Parisian simple pleasures. If they could do that at my local Jewel, I wouldn’t need to book the expensive flight to France.

Je ne sais quoi (zheh-naye-say qwah)
Literally: “I don’t know what”
It is the intangible quality that makes Paris distinctive and attractive

Bread

2015 Paris Itinerary
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