Vicarious France 1 - Food

I am so sorry I haven't been here for such an age.... so much has happened in the last month it will take me an age to catch up.

As many of you know James (son of 16 yrs) and I have been in France working. I took lots of wonderful pictures to share with you and then my laptop died. My client kindly lent me her laptop but the laptop spoke only French. It turns out I don't understand the French for "download to a file"......many of the photos are no more. However I have plenty others to share....I hope to give you a taste of our French trip.

It has taken an age for the laptop to be mended and for me to get all my info back onto it - this time it needed a whole new hard-drive - but finally I am back in Blogger and ready to share.

Before we left a friend said "I want to share France Vicariously"...so no paint in this post just Vicarious France concentrating on food.

A Cheese Dream

This cheese shop was my idea of heaven

Cheese and Wine - it gets better

Cheese Wine and Marble.....I could barely leave

I almost had to be restrained - the shop front was wood-grained

I love French food markets ...actually most French markets of any kind are good but the market in St Germaine en Laye was particularly gorgeous

Why does my son hate shellfish...how is it possible

The radish as an art-form

Our Pretty Boulangerie,

Every morning James would visit the Boulangerie that was only moments from our door and order our bread in his little used French accent and be bombarded with French from the Boulanger, and every day he would stiltingly try to explain that he didn't understand...I think eventually some of the chat became understandable. I think that was her plan. He is a lot less unnerved by being in a foreign country now.

We went to Versaille and there saw exquisite Macarons Parisien in the patisseries.......check these out

I could be temted away from cheese by these pretties

The back painted glass ceiling of the patisserie...fabulous

Macaron Tarts....how indulgent

Queen Marie Antoinette was dining frequently on these tasty sandwich cookies throughout the entirety of the new Sophia Copolla movie which presumably is why they are alllll over Versaille. The Marchionesse Mad tells us why this is historically incorrect and gives us a bit of histoire and information about the Macaron in this article titled - Food&History: Marie Antoinette and Macarons.

I don't care that she didn't really eat them..it is just deliciously romantic to think she did.