Spice it Up

On my most recent Tuesday TTS, I took the advice of my friend Katy and checked out some fancy spice houses that are located up in the right bank. Since I don't spend enough time up there, I checked out the blog Katy found and worked out an itinerary to see all the spots that this guy deemed worthy. Fortunately it worked out that a falafel lunch would have to start the day, so I met my friends Kirsten and Julie up at L'As du Falafel in the Marie and we began our adventure with a delicious falafel sandwich. I should amend that, the BEST falafel in Paris and beyond. It was and always is so so yummy!

Since I have become quite the Moroccan chef, my goal for the day was to not only enjoy the adventure of spice shops but also purchase some saffron to help put my already awesome Tagine chicken over the TOP! Thus after our lunch, our first stop was to the Goumanyat & Son Royaume, where they specialize in none other than saffron! So I am not only starting off with one of the cooler, older shops, it's also the place where I'm going to knock out the goal of the day.

Too bad we caught them on a day of fermeture exceptionnelle! Awesome! This is my favorite! If something comes up and a store has to close suddenly, the shop owner will throw up a classic homemade sign stating, "fermeture exceptionnelle". Rarely there will be an explanation and even rarer the shop owner will tell you when s/he is going to once again open but those two statements only occur if you're having a really lucky day. (What's really awesome about this is that less than a month ago when Pamela was here we missed out on my favorite hot chocolate place because of an F.E....oh, and don't even get me started on the Post Office here at the Cite...they're always F.E.-ing and they are a government office! That's just not right!)

The F.E. can happen for various reasons. And sure, I could be considered a huge jerk for talking badly about these F.E. because there could have been a family emergency or something horrible, however I have also heard of times when stores just F.E. for the heck of it: slow day, nap time, just not in the mood. It's just such an odd concept for me to accept: most places in the States have hours posted on their doors and hold to them like religiously. There are multiple people that can handle opening and closing the location and there is rarely a reason to shut down the store if one person can't make it. Someone else can always be called in to pick up the slack. But here that's just not the case. Small families own their stores and have few employees, if any, that are outside of the family. So if something does happen to the family, there is no one left to man the store. It's gotta be difficult. But still, Tuesday is my TTS. An F.E. is just not cool for the first stop!

Anyway, my magical saffron store was closed and we were bummed for all of one minute. We still had a nice agenda planned and plenty of time to make it to the next spice shop before they closed at 14:30. (they other best thing about owning a store in Paris, the afternoon closing for the classic sieste before the evening hours!) So we headed off and roamed the streets of the 2nd and 3rd arrondissements and enjoyed browsing in some fancy boutiques as we made our way to spice houses two and three.

L'Epicerie de Bruno was really cool and a good store to keep in mind when we really need a Mexican fix. They served some nice looking salsas and Cholula!!!! This store specializes in all different kids of combination spices for curries, risottos, and other creations. Plus, they had vanilla bean sticks that looked super awesome! I had to resist purchasing some of the vanilla but wrote it down as a goal to first learn what to do with those sticks before buying a bunch! It's good to miss out on one goal of the day but find another one during the adventure! I somehow see this as a healthy balance....

In between L'Epicerie de Bruno and Epices Roellinger we stumbled upon a really neat candy/wine/spice shop off the fabulous Galerie Vivienne, where I almost bought a bag of blueberry candy at 750 euros a kilo!!! Oh yeah, that was totally awesome! I not only had to return the four tiny pieces of candy that I thought was going to cost 2.50 euros, I had to do it in french and cause an embarrassing moment for me, in front of my friends. Fabulous! And yeah, I hear you out there, 7.50 for a bag of candy sounds intriguing and maybe you should of kept it Sara, when else are you going to buy candy from the deepest caves of the earth where people lost their lives in order to bring it to this fancy shop in Paris? (okay, I'm exaggerating the lose of life, but this guy just went on and on justifying his 750 euro/kilo price!) And here's my reasoning: that one bag of four tiny pieces could have bought me two delicious Lebanese sandwiches. Two lebanese sandwiches versus 4 tiny pieces of candy! I'm sorry, I went Lebanese!

So, TTS was pretty great last week. Despite an embarrassing return and an F.E., I did manage to buy some saffron from Olivier Roellinger, who by the way is a pretty cool guy. Check out his wiki when you get a chance. He also has a pretty awesome spice house that is worth a visit next time you're in town!

Thus, mission accomplished! Stay tuned for next week....

Third time's the charm

Last Friday morning, I took a train to Bruges for the third time., for a good cause. My friend Katy was looking for a friend to join her on her first time and I graciously volunteered to leave my children for the day and be her guide. Not an easy task but I felt up for the challenge. Thus, on Friday morning we met at Gare du Nord for our adventure to Belgium.

And the third time was in deed the charm. Although I've been to Bruges before, the city had an entirely different feel sans enfants. I slowly strolled the streets without worrying about horse drawn carriages running over my ladies. We dined and actually chewed the delicious flemish stew and french fries. And, here's the most special treat of all, we went to a BAR and drank beer! I got to go into an adult area, sit, and slowly enjoy the most delicious Belgium Beers. I even found a new favorite! It was grand!

The Belgian take their beer seriously. Every one has its own glass in order to bring out its true flavor. They come in all different sizes and shapes. It's pretty incredible and so much fun to watch the bartenders!

Katy and I did a great job of seeing the entire city. It's not huge so it wasn't hard and it was great fun to enjoy the sites and take it all in. There is beautiful architecture throughout the entire city and with it's wonderful canals it really is the "Venice of the North". We had a beautiful sun filled afternoon on Friday and climbed to the top of The Belfry. Although our panoramic view was cut in half, it was fun to climb all 366 steps to the top and see Bruges for the FIRST time from the top!

Saturday was a great day of wondering. Despite having a very unhelpful map, we managed to spill upon an awesome restaurant for a soup break, found a really weird thrift store, and topped off the day with moules frites for lunch. You just can't beat it! Then we grabbed some fabulous cookie treats and beers before heading to the train station.

Katy in front of the City Hall in the Burg square

So I can now proudly claim that I have been to Bruges three times in 11 months! It's a proud statistic that I will brag about for years to come and probably obtain jealous admirers from all over the world. And you want to know one of the best parts of number 3? I slept the whole way home on the train! What a treat!!! (Okay, so maybe going into a Belgium Bar was pretty awesome too!)

Come along way!

The other day Brian accompanied his friend to the grocery store and roamed the aisles while his friend picked up a few things. Since Brian had the time, he strolled and checked out the items for sale and recalled our first time we were all at a similar grocery store on the day of our arrival in Paris.

It was so hard to grocery shop! We were confused and tired and had no idea what was going on. Everything was different and foreign and we were in no state to make decisions. We ended up buying overpriced orange juice, a carton of milk, and a frozen pizza. Only to make it home and discover that we'd have to come up with a plan B for dinner: we don't have an oven!

My, how things have changed! This morning, I shopped and cooked for a group of 16 kids and 4 adults at Celia's school! Last night, I whipped up an awesome Tagine Chicken dinner. I can race around this city with ease and even communicate a bit with the locals. This kid has come a long way!

Our Paris adventure has lasted about 18 months so far and through all the change and challenges, I must say that it really, really, truly has been the experience of a lifetime. Although I wish I could speak more and better French, I feel like I have maximized every moment of these past 18 months and am very excited to see what happens during the next 5 or 6! We are wrapping up our time here and although half a year seems like a long time, I see our Paris adventure ending too quickly.

The end feels near because we are now in the middle of figuring out the future our lives as Brian interviews for a new job. And as we narrow down our future to three geographic areas of the States, I am both longing to return "home" and dreading it. I've had a great life here and have learned so much about the world and of myself. And I wonder how this change will translate into my old/new world of the States. I'm the same old lady, but so different. I have so many questions about what life will be like, yet I also know that there is going to be so much of the same.

I'm curious to see how we all fit in back in America. Elise talks about how she is very french and does not want to leave. She loves her school and wants to attend the up up stairs school, (she was on the bottom floor last year, first floor this year, and is dying to see what life is like up one more floor...), and wants to continue learning french. She has come such a long way and I am so very proud of that lady! She is so amazing!

Celia is blissfully living this life and is content to move and be wherever we all go, I think. She is in love with Elise and they play really well together, (98.5% of the time!). She is doing well at school and starting to interact with the other kids. And she even speaks a little French already! Compared to where she was 18 months ago, that lady has come a LONG way!

So here we are, the Fischer Ladies, waiting to see where the big man takes us. We can't complain, he's done a pretty awesome job so far! We hope to have our future wrapped up in the next four or five weeks, so stay tuned for all the excitement! Then the Fischer's Adventures will move onto the fast track of adventure: we have so many places to explore before we head back: London, Italy, Eastern Europe, a little more of France! So many places, so little time! We've got a long way to go!

A quick week in review

I am starting off the New Year with a Bang!!! What a week! And it's still only Friday night....

This is going to be a quick review. I had a heck of a day, which you will read about soon, and I am off to bed! It's been a great week though and I want to take this opportunity to document it so that this time next year I can remember what I did! And I need to document it literally because I'm a goof and forgot my freaking camera on each outing! Nice move, eh? It's Berlin all over again...you'd think I'd learn.

Okay, here we go....

Sunday was a fabulous First Sunday of the Month so most of the museums in the city are free. And since it's January and dead of winter, there are extra special museums/churches that are free: Sainte-Chapelle and The Conciergerie! I even woke up early to check out these guys.

Sainte-Chapelle is INCREDIBLE! The chapel is four walls of stain glass windows and it's one of the most amazing rooms I have ever seen. It is a small chapel so limited space really emphasizes the magic of the windows and really blew me away. You can check out the pictures in the link and appreciate it's beauty!

Then I was off to The Conciergerie, "a prison during the reign of terror"! It was spooky and crazy to think that over 300 prisoners were held in that small space at one time. A truly amazing historical place to see and check out. I loved experiencing the history and exploring the prison, as morbid and freaky as it was.

Monday was a work day and not very exciting...Celia and I went to "school" and then came home.

Tuesday, Sara's TTS part one, was a fun day of shopping for Brian. As a late Christmas present, I went and explored the grand magasin near the Opera for a leather messenger bag. After coming up empty at the first few stores and feeling my stomach rumble, I made my way north for the 2010 Best Baguette in Paris. And the gods told me to get back to shopping because the boulangerie was CLOSED! So, no lunch break for Sara...

However, I was basically knocking on the doors of Sacre Coeur so I decided to take a vertical walk up to the most amazing view in Paris, (might as well, I'm right there....), and check out the artist quarter for some lunch. And wouldn't you know, there were oyster and french onion soup specials at every restaurant just begging me to stop! Ugh this life....Brian's bag will have to wait!

No worries though! I ate up those fabulous oysters, (I love how coming to France has made me appreciate so much more food...not that I need more food, but....tonight we ate beets for dinner and the other day I had brussels sprouts! I used to hate those guys, along with the oysters! Just look at me now!), and got back to my mission. I headed to Le Bon Marche, not expecting to find anything under 8000 euros and hit the jackpot! And I didn't even have to break the bank. Plus I had a glorious time perusing their kitchen store!

Okay, before this turns into a novel, Wednesday was normal lady day: playing with Johna and Ella, lunch, me and Kirsten chatting. It was great!

Thursday was a great Elise and mommy day! And then Friday....

Friday: TTS Part Deux! I had glorious plans for this day and I did not disappoint. Especially since at this very moment Elise is falling asleep and Celia has no partner in crime. Soon they will both be down because Celia tires quickly when she has no one telling her to get out of bed and cause trouble. A glorious ending to this fine day! (I wrote this too soon...I had to walk away from the blog and regulate...and now it's 11:00 PM and the ladies are still up! Why do I jinx myself....)

Anyway...

So, the day! It started with drop offs and a run through the park. Then after a wonderfully slow un-rushed breakfast and coffee, I went to the Paris Catacombes. I'm going to leave the link for you all to investigate, but basically the story is that as the population in Paris grew exponentially near the end of the 18th century, so did it's number of dead bodies and skeletons. They were running out of room for their dead so a decision was made to move all the bodies to the old quarries. What we have now is a series of underground tunnels lined with skulls and bones. It sounds freaky but is very cool!

After the Catacombes I squeezed in a haircut, a delicious Lebanese sandwich, and shopping at my favorite Asian grocery store. I came home and prepared a chicken for dinner before heading off for my ladies! We walked home under beautifully clear skies and warm air. It was wonderful!

Somewhere in the middle of all this, I managed to put together a vegetable stock for my Mung Bean Soup. Yeah, I thought I was buying split peas today at my favorite Asian store but after getting home and further inspection, they are Split Mung Beans! Nice. The stock turned out nicely, (BTW, did I mention I made an AWESOME potato leek soup! Stock from our Christmas Canard Confit! It was a winner!), so I'm hoping the soup is good and flavorful! We'll see...I've never heard of Mung Beans much less know anything about their flavor. But for future reference, there are a ton of recipes online! :)

Tomorrow the week o' Sara continues with a trip to Comme a la Maison with the ladies and Katy for some of the World's Best Hot Chocolate EVER! This lady takes the most wonderful milk chocolate bar and melts it into golden goodness and serves it in these wonderful white mugs sent down for heaven. It is the best treat in the world! And who knows, maybe I'll remember the camera and take pictures!

Good Night!