Someone told me that the English language has more words than the French language, which I don’t believe – although to be honest, I’ve never counted. I know English can be kind of kooky at at times, but I don’t think we have multiple words for the same things, from a dozen different words for sinks, to a panoply of words for helmets, depending on…
I’ve gotta say, I’ve taken a few dings for not presenting only the best parts of life in a foreign city. People may, or may not, want to hear about dealing with cranky cashiers, rigid administrators, or worse, paper-thin bath towels, instead wanting a perfect story of life in an apartment with a balcony, and watching sunsets every night over chilled glasses of Champagne, toasting…
I’d arrived early this weekend at one of the “hot” restaurants in Paris, where I was meeting a friend for dinner, so I chatted up the barman while having a glass at the bar. Since it’s one of my favorite restaurants, I asked him how things were going because I want them to succeed and continue. He replied, “Well, we just had three groups of…
I was recently chatting with a culinary equipment company about working with them, as I was a fan of their products. After a while of getting nowhere, I was told, “You’re not the right demographic. We’re targeting busy, stay-at-home moms, that don’t have time to cook.” Obviously they haven’t looked at my daily planner because they would have seen that time is something that’s in…
Most people probably don’t think of hard liquor when they think of France. But nowadays it’s hard to pass one of the many cafés in Paris which features les happy hours and not see a round of mojitos on just about every table. From the looks of things, they’ve become more popular than wine or beer. Unfortunately most are not very well made and as…
Nowhere is remodeling for the faint of heart and although I did, indeed, learn plenty of new words to expand my French vocabulary, along with a few other things that I won’t recount here, let’s just say that if I ever this take on this kind of project again, I’ll do things a little lot differently. The best advice I could pass on was given…
I was lucky to be at my friend Kate’s house and extensive fruit and vegetable gardens in the Lot a few weeks back, when the seasons were overlapping. The last of the red peaches were still clinging to the trees, while the branches of the nearby pear and fig trees were filled with wonderful fruit ripe for the picking – and baking. And I couldn’t…
Sometimes I think I am living in the wrong département of France. Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy to be able to walk out my door and get a baguette Parisienne or a sachet of les macarons, libremente (freely). But Breton food is all the flavors I crave: buckwheat, honey, sardines, oysters, fleur de sel, seaweed, and sparkling apple cider. Oh yes, and butter. The…
I can’t believe that after all these years, I’ve never made white bean dip. I’ve made dips with eggplant, chickpeas, eggplant again, and even weeds, if you can believe it. I don’t know, it always seemed like it would be too plain, or ho-hum. A mound of puréed beans? No thanks. But boy, was I wrong. First up, of course, are the beans. There are…
Join me on my Spring 2026 book tour for my latest book, The Great Book of Chocolate
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