The Cheese Portal

At the event we went to this week at Alliance Francaise, the cheese was provided via a vendor who has an eye-opening or mouth watering cheese website describing every French cheese, with a cheese map describing where the cheese comes from, what it tastes like, its consistency, how it is made, in other words everything you ever (or never) wanted to know about French cheese.

www.iledefrancecheese.com.

Bon Appetit.

New Articles

A whole edition of Departures is All France all the time. Many wonderful articles. Hours to read but time well spent, Paris, Provence, Biarritz, I am ready to fly now (if only).

Also, courtesy of an article in this month's Travel and Leisure, I now know the difference between an antique (more than 100 years old) and brocantes (only 50).

Learning French

Unfortunately, when in school, I never studies French, just Spanish. Spanish is a simple language. The words look like what they sound like. I can understand Spanish when it is spoken, slowly. Even quickly, I can pick out words. French spoken quickly sounds like mish mash to me, a blur. After 10 years of traveling in France, without formal studying, my French is what I call restaurant and shopping French, lots of nouns, some verbs, some adjectives, but no idea had to conjugate a verb, and to structure a sentence. When I see the words written, I have no idea how to pronounce them. D. and I have been talking for years about taking classes so he could improve and I could start really learning. So, next week we start at Alliance Francaise in NYC. Last night we went to a very nice introduction there, a wine and cheese event. It is a very frightening prospect to contemplate a formal class with homework to add to my existing work and personal schedule, but it is time to learn.

By the sea in the fall

Recently, on a nice day during the week, my husband suggested we take a drive for an early dinner, as we say in New Jersey "down the shore." So, long story short, we ended up in Asbury Park, an unlikely spot that has seen many hard days but is improving, on the boardwalk, at a very nice Italian restaurant called Stella Marina. And, as my life is really two-degrees of separation, not six, while eating, we saw neighbors from our street coming in to eat a later dinner. How unlikely is that? The Jersey Shore is definitely not for us during the summer, but after Labor Day or in the spring, it is worth the drive for a walk on the famous boardwalks lining the beaches, for a Sunday brunch, and sea air and breezes.

It was a lovely, enjoyable, peaceful, evening by the water, as we soaked up what may be one of the last nice days of the year, before the fall turns colder, winter comes upon us, and we begin to focus on our plans and images of the next summer to help us survive the grey, bleak, short days of winter.

Julia non persona in France?

Article attached about how Julia Child is not well known in France, and how some feel she did not represent French cuisine well in the U.S.

www.nytimes.com/2009/09/17/world/europe/17julia.html?hpw