Après le storm

Turns out that is was a record breaking snowfall. A full 11 centimeters. A generous dump of 4.5 inches. And, Paris was totally unprepared.

It was a beautiful sunny day après la neige, so I took another walk. At my own risk, I might add.

While most of the "catastrophic" snow had melted, the rest had compacted down and was icy. No shovels in sight.

But what does a girl from India know about snow? I was just trying hard not to grin and to not break a leg.

Snow in Paris

This is what it looked like outside my window before I decided to take a walk yesterday.

No one was really prepared for that much snow ('that much' by Paris standards).

Not pedestrians,

and certainly not cars. The roads were in a general state of disorder as cars slid around in the dirty snow. I saw a fancy Mercedes being pushed by five or six police officers with it's rear tyres spinning furiously, and I saw a young woman break down in violent sobs in the middle of a busy intersection with sheer exhaustion from pushing her scooter that had stopped working. It wasn't all bad, but that was when I stopped talking pictures.

I heard a couple of girls giggling and singing, "I'm dreaming of a white Christmas..." at the top of their lungs while crossing the street, and I saw several kids and puppies enjoying the wet, heavy snow on their walk back home from school.

I certainly enjoyed the snow. I loved it!

Last week

I celebrated my birthday with a French meal at A La Biche Au Bois, which was authentic, cosy and delicious.

It snowed off and on all of last week. Not much, but just enough to make all of Paris look so pretty.

And, in addition to a rich chocolate gâteau, I had several other petit birthday treats. Yum. Hope you had a good week too.

Thanksgiving in Paris

This year we get to enjoy two Thanksgiving meals. Last night's dinner was a pot luck, to which I had agreed to bring cranberry sauce. I fretted a bit about finding fresh cranberries after having so hastily volunteered, but I easily found some at La Grande Epicerie.

I added some sugar, fresh orange juice, zest, and finely minced ginger to the cranberries, which cooked down to a delicious sauce.

I'm looking forward to our second Thanksgiving dinner this evening. I realise that not everyone who reads this blog celebrates Thanksgiving but for those that do, I hope you have a good one. I, for one, have much to be thankful for.

World Wednesdays: Treats from Tokyo

I know, last night's dinner didn't photograph well, and I haven't been to Japan, but we cooked dinner with a couple of Japanese friends last night, and it was pretty exciting. Ingredients included kimchi, tofu, soya milk, fermented rice paste from making saki (not sure what it's called), a delicately flavoured herb that I didn't recognise (it was like a fennel bulb but much smaller and really quite different), shitake mushrooms, and sea weed. We made the unformed looking tofu in the center of the pan at home using the left over soya milk and a small sachet of nigari (magnesium chloride) that came with the soya milk. I've made paneer several times before but never tofu. I told you, it was pretty exciting!

We also scraped a little of this Japanese orange (mikan? mandarin orange?) into our bowls after serving ourselves. The flavour was exquisite. I'm planning to use the leftover fruit to flavour a simple chocolate sauce to go over vanilla ice-ceam for dessert tonight.

Other goodies that our friends brought along -

Time for a coffee break. Happy Wednesday!

Eats

Some of our meals from the last few days:

Seared salmon (marinated in a basil-balsamic vinaigrette) with pan-fried garlic potatoes and braised leeks with lemon.

Basmati rice with chicken and wild mushrooms in a creamy red wine sauce, and a pear and chevre salad.

Spicy stir-fry with egg fried rice.

Sardines served over lentils, french beans in a creamy mustard sauce, and pan-fried potatoes with chives.

Pain aux céréales smeared with a homemade onion-shallot-ginger-tomato chutney, Comté, and fresh salad leaves.

Couscous with whatever was in the frigo - assorted mushrooms, beans, lemon and parsley.

Poulet roti leftovers with garlicy spinach and curry roasted potatoes.

Caramel and citron macarons from Sadaharu Aoki.

Now I know

Most mornings start with a cup of tea (sometimes a cup of coffee) and a croissant (often times a pain au chocolat). For an entire month, I have been buying croissants and pain au chocolats the previous evening. What a fool! For one whole month!

Last week, I was inspired to take a walk in the morning, and I came back with the most delicious croissants. Buttery and flaky on the outside, soft and light on the inside. So much better than when I had been buying them in the evening.

Yesterday, the air was cold but invigourating as we walked to the boulangerie in the morning. Our reward for getting nicely dressed before our morning tea - a perfect pain au raisin. Never again will I buy in the evenings.