Chercher du Pain - The Other French Paradox
Making our way back to Septeuil on an overcast Sunday afternoon, ma belle-mère, Lorraine, goes over in her mind the menu for dinner that she will prepare that night. Suddenly...quelle catastrophe! Il n'y a pas du pain! How did this happen? She being the consummate home chef with every savory morsel carefully planned somehow forgot the bread.
Rapid fire instructions to mon beau-père were dispatched. "Hurry, we must make it to Thoiry before the boulangerie closes." Jacques, being the ever dutiful husband and not wanting to risk a meal without his baguette, puts sa voiture into high gear and gets a move on as we all keep our eyes peeled for any open boulangerie sur la route.
No such luck...tout ferme! Thoiry, Houdan, Béhoust all conspired to make our meal incomplete without our baguette dorée. Plans were quickly made for an alternate plan. Jacques will drop us off at the house so that she can get dinner started and then he will proceed on to Mantes-la-Jolie, the local city, in his quest to make our meal complete.
All was well one hour later as he drove sa voiture through le portail (here is where we imagine the sun, or a golden brioche, breaking through the clouds) producing what can be thought of as the last available baguette on a late Sunday afternoon in France.
One hates to imagine what would have happened if poor Jacques came back empty-handed! But we won't think of that.
Rapid fire instructions to mon beau-père were dispatched. "Hurry, we must make it to Thoiry before the boulangerie closes." Jacques, being the ever dutiful husband and not wanting to risk a meal without his baguette, puts sa voiture into high gear and gets a move on as we all keep our eyes peeled for any open boulangerie sur la route.
No such luck...tout ferme! Thoiry, Houdan, Béhoust all conspired to make our meal incomplete without our baguette dorée. Plans were quickly made for an alternate plan. Jacques will drop us off at the house so that she can get dinner started and then he will proceed on to Mantes-la-Jolie, the local city, in his quest to make our meal complete.
All was well one hour later as he drove sa voiture through le portail (here is where we imagine the sun, or a golden brioche, breaking through the clouds) producing what can be thought of as the last available baguette on a late Sunday afternoon in France.
One hates to imagine what would have happened if poor Jacques came back empty-handed! But we won't think of that.
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