First day of J and D's visit.

I have been gone for quite a while but I really haven't been pining away. First of all, for all those of you who read the bank post, we still don't have the "codes secrets" for our credit cards. More about that some other day.

First of all our friends J and D came to visit. We had a fantastic time. J is a real shutterbug and took over 1000 photos (thank heaven with his fancy-dancy digital). The first night there I made them paupiettes de veau. I bought the paupiettes already made at the butcher's but you can make them easily yourself by wrapping veal scallopine around some tasty sausage meat and wrapping the packages up into nice tidy little bundles. Then you just saute some minced shallots in butter and oil, add the paupiettes and brown on all sides. Add some wine (I used rose) and let them simmer on the stove for about 25 minutes so the sausage inside gets well cooked. You can add a little broth if the liquid boils down too fast. You want enough to make some sauce. Here is a picture of the paupiettes in the pan cooking down.

The first day here I rousted them out of bed at an ungodly hour to head out to Stes Maries de la Mer because there were going to be abrivados there that day and I didn't think any of us should miss them. I was right. First a little history. Stes Maries de la Mer is the southern most tip of the Rhone Delta known as La Camargue. The legend of the Maries who arrived there is a bit mysterious. It all has to do, maybe, with the Da Vinci Code etc. Also, there is a black saint, name of Sara who is revered by the Romani (aka Gypsies). They have an annual pilgrimage to this place every May.

This town is an interesting combination. It is a fishing village and also backed by a hinterland of cowboys on white horses who round up black long-horned bulls. Very dramatic. An abrivado is when the cowboys round up some bulls and drive them into town to the arena for a good time to be had by all. I'm sure that at some time they really did round up the bulls from the Camargue and drove them into town for bull fights, but not anymore. Nowadays the bulls are driven to the edge of town in trucks. Then two or three of them are surrounded by these very flashy white horses (undoubtedly descended from mighty Arabians) ridden by honest-to-god local cowboys. Once delivered to the arena the bulls' horns are decorated with ribbon rosettes and flowers. Then the local bravos dance all around the bulls and leap over them trying to pluck the ornaments off their horns without getting impaled. Actually, most of the time the bulls' horns are wrapped to prevent serious injury.

An interesting exercise right about now is to Google "Knossos frescoes" and see what you get. If you know Greek mythology you've heard about the Minotaur and King Minos and the Palace at Knossos and Theseus. Those frescoes are about 4,000 years old. Those kids are dancing around the bulls and doing acrobatics over the dangerous horns. Interesting how some things don't change.

Next stop, Arles for lunch. Arles' biggest claims to fame is its Roman Arena, and fish soup. Both are absolutely outstanding. The fish soup is made with local Mediterranean fish so I really don't know how to translate it. I'm going to give it a try when we get back to CA and see if Dungeness crab is a nice addition. We had already been to Arles when B and KJ had come (which I still need to blog about) and found a really nice restaurant facing the Arena. Unfortunately it was closed when J and D were here. We found another, but not so nice. (Of course we always had to be reasonable and watch our ting tings--most French restaurants don't accept checks--and we never knew when we might be near a BNP branch to withdraw more cash, and we don't have credit cards!) J did a doors and shutters thing in Arles, very successful.

Then a little shopping (shops, thank heaven, do accept checks!) and then home. After all, J and D had just arrived from California on Friday night and they were dog tired.

For more pictures, check out J's web site http://itsthemusic.com/ . While you're at it, check out his music! Otherwise you'll have to wait until I figure out how to post photos to this blog more easily. I need lessons.

A really lazy night

Last night I was tired of fancy food. I've been making, or buying, French cuisine since I got here and DH's DNA is 100% Italian after all. He's grousing, talking about getting pizza! Ok, ok, I'll do something Italian. He just wants pasta...with a nice bolognese sauce. Well my kitchen is pretty poorly equipped and tomatoes are just not nice at this time of year (I don't want to talk about those poor insipid hot house things!) At home I rely on the tomatoes I put up during the summer. I don’t have access to those here. Also, I’m feeling lazy. Just plain lazy. I know I have a bottle of “bolognese” sauce here. It’s the ultra cheap one from Carrefour (have you noticed the drubbing the dollar is taking, and this bottle was bought before we had Euros). It’ll just have to do. So I’m warming it up and tasting it and boy does it taste blah! Let’s see, what’s in the fridge? Aha! Some leftover paté de campagne! Why not crumble that up and toss it into the sauce? No sooner thought of than done. It wasn’t bad at all! DH thought it was a bit livery, but not too bad.

So there’s my cooking tip for the day. If you’re stuck in France (!!!!!!!!!!!!!) and want an easy Italian dinner, add some leftover paté de campagne to some bottled tomato sauce. Drink lots of red wine and it’s still a great meal because you’ve got DH there and life is good after all.

After dinner we watched a bit of French TV. DH is attempting to learn to speak French and we figure that watching TV is a good way to total immersion. (I’m so bilingual that I actually have some difficulty understanding English when I am immersed in French.)

So far DH has found 2 shows (other than the news and soccer) that he likes. One is Kaamelott, a French send-up of the Arthurian legend done with a lot of Asterix-style plays on words. This is a real challenge for DH but it’s entertaining enough that it doesn’t matter if he gets it all. You can find Kaamelott episodes on the internet (which helps DH because he can play them over and over until he gets it). You can also get their DVDs but I don’t know if they exist for our “region.”

The other show he likes is actually a Canadian show titled “Un gars, une fille.” This is just banter between a man and his wife. Lots of plays on words, some of them sweetly risqué. Obviously this is done in French Canadian. Now, here’s the thing, in France it appears with French subtitles. At first I was offended, but then I realized that it’s actually necessary. The French Canadians have made the best of both worlds. Whenever there’s a lack of a French word to adequately describe a situation or state, they either find an English word and just drop it in or they make one up. For instance, there’s no French word for slush. When you live in Quebec, slush is a big deal after all. Think about it, slush is slush! The subtitles translate it as “neige fondue,” (melted snow). That’s just not representative of slush now is it? What DH likes about the show IS the subtitles. He says he can understand what they’re saying because he can read it at the same time he hears it. We haven’t found it on the internet yet. We’ve found the French version (done by French actors) but without subtitles…

So there you have another exciting evening in Montpellier, France! You all have a wonderful day.

Doing battle with the bank

Remember on one of my last posts I mentioned that I had to go do battle with the bank? Well here’s the deal. I’m posting this as an educational/cautionary tale as much as to relieve some frustration.

When DH and I arrived we knew we would have to get a French bank account. DH would be paid by the lab and we had to have an account to deposit the money. We did a bit of research and, based on the size and stability of the bank, and also the proximity of the nearest branch to our apartment, we chose BNP Paribas. Here is what happened.

We arrived at the bank and were sent up to see M. K. He was to open our account. We gave him all our information. We told him, twice, what our complete address was. Our apartment is in a large complex with over 100 apartments. Also we are renting. It was critical to put the complex name, building number, and the apartment owner’s name on the address. Both times he nodded in assent. When I saw the documents we were to sign, the address only listed the street address of the complex. My mistake here was to not challenge this. I put it down to a vagary of their looney-tunes database that it didn’t print the entire address.

We were told that we had to prove that we lived at this address. Normally one presents a utility bill with the address on it and that is sufficient proof. Being renters of course, there was no such utility bill. We were told by M. K that the bank would send us a letter and, once we had received it, we would bring it back in and that would be proof that we resided at this address. (It only takes the average nitwit about a minute or two to realize how easy this is to fake.) This of course assumes that the address is correct AND that La Poste works. Well you already know that the address was incorrect. As to the efficiency of La Poste, when we asked DH’s colleagues at the lab what they thought of La Poste they laughed and laughed and laughed. Not encouraging to say the least, but we didn’t know any of this at the time of signing on for this account.

We were also told that we could not access our checkbook or bank credit cards until we had proven that we were domiciled at this address. We figured it would take a maximum of 10 days to get all this done.

Now all this time I am communicating with M. K via email. First off, to correct the mailing address, then to notify him that we still hadn’t yet received the letter. To these emails I get these very terse replies and at that only after my insistence on an acknowledgement for a couple of days. He replied with things like “Le nécessaire a été fait” or “Quand vous avez fait preuve de domicile et pas avant.” Stuff like that. Like he’s some sort of potentate or something. By now I’m doing a slow burn.

Three weeks into the deal we still didn’t have our checkbook or credit cards. The only access we had to our money (we had wire transferred money from our account in the States) was to physically go to the bank and withdraw cash! Finally, the registered letter arrives, I go to the post office and retrieve the letter and bring it back to M. K at the bank. Now he says he needs to wait until the post office sends him proof that I picked up the ding dang letter! That was it. I was furious. If he had listened in the first place we would have received the letter weeks ago and this would be done, right?

I got home and called BNP’s Customer Relations. I always try to be as nice as I can to customer relations people. It’s not their fault that somebody on down the line messed up and I know that so I’m polite. So I’m explaining the situation and I’m being polite and the more I explain the madder I get so by the end I’m screaming at the poor woman on the other end that I don’t ever want to see M. K again. I don’t ever want to hear his name; I want him out of our affair. I did apologize to the nice lady later. She assured me that I would now have a new conseillière, a Mme L, and that from now on she would attend to our needs. Well, that was one good thing. I asked for her email address and promptly sent her the email stream between M. K and myself. Lo and behold I got a very nice, polite, email back within a half hour. This was much better! Then I get another email from Mme L informing me that, unfortunately, I would now have to get a “lettre de bonne renommée” from our bank in the States!

So now I have to wait for our bank in California to open so I can call them and get a “lettre de bonne renommée” Fedexed (because I’ve learned my lesson about La Poste). Well, I couldn’t get through to them. It seems that there was some construction going on near their main office and the phone lines got cut so there was no reaching them that day (so you see, the French don’t have a monopoly on ineptitude). I spent all day trying to get through. (Thank heaven for Skype. If you are planning on spending ANY time overseas at all, get Skype, don’t hesitate, just do it. Make sure all your relatives get it. Just do it.) Another day wasted. Still no check book or credit cards to access OUR money. Next day the phone lines are up and running. I get hold of a nice lady at our bank and, after a bit of research, realize that what the BNP wants is a letter of guaranty from our bank. Never mind they’ve already received two wire transfers from this same bank, they still want a letter of guaranty! Great. So I get the letter Fedexed (to the tune of $65!!!) and DH and I head for Barcelona for work and pleasure with no credit cards. (You can only use credit cards with a “puce” on them at the tolls on the toll roads. You can’t use the kind of card where you have to swipe a magnetic strip.) It’s now been three weeks since we opened the account.

Now, we’re still getting cash all this time. You can use your US credit cards in ATM machines all over Europe and get Euros. But the point is we have Euros already in the bank and can’t access them.

From Barcelona I track the package and know that it has arrived at the bank. I email Mme L to ask about it and get no reply. What now? We get back to Montpellier and, first thing Monday morning, I get an email from Mme. L. Her daughter had been sick so she had to stay home on Friday. I can completely dig this so all is forgiven. Then a new email; we now have to prove that we live at our address in the States!!! WTF!!!! Of course we need a utility bill. So another call to the States. (I tell you, Skype, Skype, Skype!!!!) And again, just to make sure the French haven’t cornered the market on idiocy, I get some nimwad who tells me I can’t get a copy of our statement because I’m not the primary account holder, that’s my DH! I ask her if my name is somewhere on the account, oh yes, can I give her the last four digits of DH’s SS#? yes, but that’s not enough. I have to wait for DH to get home from work (the IT Nazi at the lab won’t let him install Skype on his computer at work) to call PG&E and get an electronic copy of our utility bill. When he calls, much exercised at this whole thing, he’s told that what the first nimwad told me was absolutely incorrect and that I should have been given all I needed first thing!

Fortunately, I am able to forward a PDF of the utility bill to Mme L. and she can print it. Hurray!!! The end is in site, yes? No. She has to forward all this to the “cellule de validation” and she doesn’t know if they are behind or how long it will take them to get this cleared. We opened this account on Oct 1. It is now Nov 2. By now we are just numb. But wait, is that light at the end of the tunnel? On Nov 5, we get an email that our account has been cleared and we can come get our check book and our credit cards. I can’t believe it. I email back, can I get both cards or does DH need to be present? Oh, he needs to be present. OK. So I dash up to the lab to pick him up and we go to the bank. Yes, here is our check book. Here are our credit cards. But wait, there’s a new wrinkle. We do have our “codes secrets” don’t we? No, we never got them. You were supposed to have received them in the mail!!!!!

Mme L. is really a sweet thing and even she’s getting peeved at the ineptitude of this whole story. She has our “codes secrets” reissued and we are now waiting for them from La Poste. Once we have received them we need to withdraw a sum of money from a BNP-recognized ATM machine. This will then activate the cards and then we can, finally, use them with retailers!!!!!! We leave to go home in less than 6 weeks.

What is remarkable is that this country functions at all. (It's November so everyone goes on strike.) One of our colleagues at the lab spent 5 years in the States before returning to France. He is constantly amazed that things actually manage to work. I mean the BNP Paribas bank is not a slouch. They own Bank of the West. They are partnered with Citibank. How do these people interact when at the bottom levels there is so much ineptitude? Why were we not told from the get go that we would need all these documents. Can you imagine going into an American Bank, depositing your money and waiting almost 6 weeks for a checkbook?

Here’s another good one. At our branch of the BNP Paribas, there’s a sign that warns that if you want to withdraw more than 1500 Euros in cash you need to give them 48 hours of lead time, 48 HOURS!!! Can you see that in an American bank?

So I have to go down to the post box to see if our “codes secrets” have arrived. All of you have a great day!

First big dinner in Montpellier

A few weeks ago I hosted a dinner for seven. We’d only been in Montpellier for three days so I was pretty proud of the fact that I was able to pull this off. I couldn’t have done it without the help of my new friend J who was here with her husband attending the same conference mine was.

The main course was “rôti de boeuf en croute.” Does that sound impressive or what!?! Okay, translation, “roast beef in a pastry crust. “ First I went to the local butcher. People always say to go to your "local source." I don’t know if the source of the meat was actually local, but I do know that I didn’t want to lug a chunk of meat home from some far distance on foot; the closer the better. (This was also before I became an afficionado of the Carrefour, but this meat was better than Carrefour's.)

First I explained to the butcher that I was preparing a meal for 7 adults and preparing it in a vacation rental apartment with a minimally and eclectically equipped kitchen. I knew I wanted beef. He said I needed just a little more than one kilo of “rosbif.” I was flabbergasted! Two and a half pounds of meat for seven adults, five of them men, and a couple of them big eaters; this was astonishing. I didn’t want to gainsay him so I bought the meat and figured we would have to get A LOT of vegetables to satisfy these guys. Now about the roast, first of all the color was different from what we see in the States. Here in France it is a bright red, not the bluish red I usually see. Apparently this is the result of two different practices. First French cattle are grass fed, second it is not hung to age. It is fresher than beef in the States. French beef seems to be devoid of fat except for what the butcher adds on to it. (This was very nicely done with an artistic flourish to the fat added to the top of the roast.) It doesn’t appear to be “marbled” at all.

He told me to cook it at high heat for no more than 20 minutes. I told him I was cooking it “en croute” so he said to cut back on my cooking time. Cook it just the amount of time you need for the crust to be cooked. Needless to say, this roast was going to be pretty rare! But it didn’t have that raw look, or taste, that beef in the States has when it’s cooked “rare.” It was still red but definitely tasted cooked. We had leftovers, even after some seconds! The butcher was right!

I cooked the roast "en croute" as I said. We needed crêpes and we needed puff pastry. I knew where to get the crêpes, the épicerie (small grocery store) that is open 7 days a week had some I had seen on Sunday when we arrived. So that was easy. Then we had to find puff pastry. We tried the boulangerie, alas, her husband, the baker, had just left and she didn't know where the puff pastry was. J and I were getting worried. Then we went to the "primeur"(greengrocer) and just asked. Sure enough, she had some!!! Couldn't believe it! (You see what I meant now about going from place to place when you know that Carrefour is going to have it.) While at the primeur I spotted the last of the heirloom tomatoes, some mozzarela, and a lovely basil plant. Got them all and planned a caprese salad. Also spotted some fresh cêpes (boletus for mycologists and porcini for everyone else) and got those too.

Now we were set...we thought. We got to the apartment, the two of us hauling our load in the rain (didn't I mention that?) and started setting up. I was sure I had seen some port wine in the buffet. Nope! No port wine. BUT, there was this cherry liqueur, not the grappa kind, but the sweet syrupy kind, and a quarter of a bottle of red wine. I mixed the two together and called it port wine! Worked pretty well actually.

So here's what we did:

Ingredients for the roast:
2 ½ pounds of beef tenderloin (that's the closest approximation to whatever the "rosbif" cut is here in France)
a couple of crêpes (these can be bought already made in France; you might want to make some ahead of time and just freeze them between sheets of wax paper and wrapped in foil)
a sheet of puff pastry (Pepperidge Farm is good but you need to roll it out so it's thinner)
salt and pepper

Ingredients for the sauce:
a can of beef broth
a cup and a half of port wine
dried porcini mushrooms soaked in hot water and chopped (unless you can get fresh cêpes then go for it!)
a bay leaf (bay trees grow all over the place here so I just go pick one)
flour
softened butter

Season the roast with salt and pepper. In a hot frying pan add olive oil and butter. Brown the roast on all sides about 3 minutes per side. Take it out of the pan and let it return to room temperature. Wrap it in the crepes. These will absorb the extra juices and allow the puff pastry to rise. Now wrap the roast in the puff pastry. Try to be artful about it but don't let it overwhelm you. Roast at 450 °F for about 25 minutes. Make sure the pastry doesn't burn! Oh, forgot, if the roast is tied, untie it before wrapping it.

While the meat is cooking pour the beef broth and "port wine" in a saucepan and add the bay leaf. Reduce down to about half. Remove the bay leaf.

Strain (keeping the liquid) the mushrooms and dice them up. Strain the mushroom liquid through a wet paper towel. Add the liquid to the sauce.

If you're lucky enough to find fresh cêpes, wash them very well (go ahead and use water! they're dirty! you're going to use them right away, right? after all, Jacques Pepin washes his mushrooms!) dice them up and sauté in butter (no olive oil) just pour the whole thing into the sauce, don't strain anything!

Make a beurre manié (combine a bit of flour to softened butter). Add the beurre manié to the sauce and whisk until thickened.

Now make a big deal out of presenting this roast at the table. After all, you have pulled something off here!!! I'm lucky, my DH made a big deal for me. I really do like him. You can carve it right at the table or go back into the kitchen and do it there.

The wine flowed freely and so did the conversation. J and I are well weathered (yeah, it's a pun) scientist spouses and we both enjoy the technical stuff so it's just great.

How this blog got started

I just posted some of my experiences here in Montpellier France (we're here for 3 months while my DH does a mini sabbatical at the local CNRS) to the Knitter's Review Forum and got some requests to PLEASE share my experiences here in France. It took me a while to figure out what to call myself. I do a lot of different things, but I guess I like to cook (and eat!) the occasional great meal most of all. Hence the name "fine gueule." In French this means someone who has a fine mouth, as in for eating.

So it makes sense that I want to talk about food. First of all, I haven't been going to the marchés much around here. I know, I know, they're supposed to be all sorts of quaint and charming, and they are...but, if you are looking for variety and choice, nothing beats the Carrefour! This is the French answer to the supermarket/big box. The advantages are the same as supermarkets in the States; a place to park (a VERY big deal here), lots of choice, and an easy schlep home. I'm not 20 anymore so these things matter. You can spend a lot of time walking from one store to the next trying to find the right light bulb to replace the one that exploded in the kitchen last night, or you can go to the Carrefour and know that you will find it.

My friend B, who was here last week, took a picture of the cheese aisle (yes, the AISLE) and I'll post it when I get it. (My camera is crummy so you'll have to wait until my friends take pictures.) Carrefour also regularly hosts local food artisans who sell their wares. This is an idea American grocery stores should look into. This means you also get the stuff you would normally get at the marchés.

So last night here's what I fixed for dinner. Start with a couple of skinned and boned chicken breasts. Here in France that means you have to choose from a variety of different types of chickens in different parts of the country. Some are from the basse-cour, and others are from the mountains. Any way you look at it, it takes a while to make the choice. Because the dollar sucks the big one right now and we haven't been paid in Euros yet, I picked the one on special. I already had shallots at home, as well as champignons de Paris (white mushrooms), fond de volaile (powdered chicken broth--which has about 1/10th the amount of salt of the ones back home), port wine, crème fraiche (that I don't have to make here--hurray!!) and white wine.

So here's the list of ingredients:

olive oil
butter
salt & pepper
2 boned/skinned chicken breasts, dredged in seasoned flour
2 big shallots, minced
1 lb white mushrooms, cleaned and sliced
chicken broth (home made or powdered, just be careful of the salt)
white wine
port wine
crème fraiche (to make your own, get heavy whipping cream and CULTURED buttermilk, pour cream into a glass jar, add 3-4 tbls of buttermilk, leave in a warm place overnight, voila, crème fraiche! Now store in the fridge.)

And now the recipe:

In a hot frying pan, add olive oil and butter, add shallots and sweat for a bit. Add the chicken breasts and brown.

In a separate hot frying pan, add oil and butter. Add the mushrooms and a bit of salt. Cook until they are done, but not mushy. Take them off the heat while waiting for the chicken to be done.

Once the chicken has browned, add white wine and cook down a bit. Then add chicken broth. (I have no measures for this, it should come up to half-way up the frying pan.) Cook until the breasts are cooked through. Add liquid if necessary so that you have enough for sauce. Remove the chicken breasts to a warm platter.

Back to the mushrooms. Add the chicken gravy to the mushrooms. Add a good dollop of crème fraiche and a couple of tbsp of port wine. Cook down for a few minutes. Pour over the chicken breasts and serve. I didn't have any, but I would have added minced parsley to the top of the thing because mushrooms and parsley are just a natural together.

I served this with pommes-de-terre rissolées (fried potatoes) because DH really likes them, and a green salad. Fruit for dessert. Frankly, I think that pommes-de-terre vapeur (steamed potatoes) would have been better, oh well...

I have to go do battle with the bank now. I'll post about that next.