La fin a presque arrivé!

This entry isn’t about food, but I’m sure you’ll allow me this one.

A year abroad is one of the most rewarding experiences you can hope to have, and when employers say that they value someone who’s had experience of living in a foreign country, they’re talking about how a year abroad helps you learn truly invaluable skills. The most important skill you learn is, without much doubt, patience in the face of petty and ultimately useless bureaucracy.

My time down in Montpellier is winding down, and this is constantly reinforced through Facebook by friends who have started their countdowns to leaving; attempting to sell the things they don’t need anymore and making plans with their friends from home or university upon their return. Most, in fact, are already enjoying England’s green and pleasant lands – well, they’re putting up with the rain, more like. The number of us Erasmus students left here is dwindling as people pack up and head home. I think everyone’s feeling the same: a mixture of sadness to be leaving; a sudden need to do everything they haven’t managed in the past eight months; a desperate hurry to get a tan; and the sudden realisation that this year, the year that we all were probably the most nervous and the most excited about, the year that made a lot of us choose to do a language at university, is almost over. All the anticipation; the endless forms we filled out (both before we got here and for probably a good six months after we arrived); the rubbish landlords/colocataires/floormates we somehow managed to put up with; the unfeasibly early lectures – everything that is part and parcel of a year abroad is drawing to a close. And I think everyone is left looking around them, confused, wondering where on earth did the time go?

I certainly am.

Given that I’ve only got slightly under a week left here, part of me feels like admitting that in some ways I’m actually looking forward to going home is akin to admitting that I’m quite keen on kicking puppies. There’s enormous pressure surrounding a year abroad as people tell you that it’s going to be the best year of your university career – no, your entire life – that can often mean that your experience can feel somewhat lacking as you hold it up to the expectations you had when you first arrived.

The French YouTube star Norman of “Norman fait des vidéos” fame has one video where he talks about the eight rélous (which essentially means ‘pain in the bum’) you always find at parties, including the “râââh ça va” guy, who responds to anything from spilling his drink over someone to the neighbours complaining about the noise with “râââh, ça va” (“aaah, it’s fine”). If I had to describe my experience of life down here and the ethos of the Montpelliérain; from the way my halls dealt with increasing the security of the buildings after someone was shot at a corner shop just across the street; to the university’s attitude to letting you know pretty much anything, it would definitely be “râââh, ça va”. Montpellier is the “râââh, ça va” guy at the party – and that is something that we’ve all struggled to deal with at some point or another in the time we’ve spent down here.

Yes, a year abroad is without a doubt one of the most incredible years you will ever experience – but this isn’t always in a good way. It’s incredibly stressful and can be incredibly frustrating, and you will have moments where, despite the fact that it’s 30 degrees and it’s only May; what you really, really want is to be home, watching Jeremy Kyle and complaining about the constant rain.

I’m going to be heartbroken to leave. I’m going to miss the cafés, the buzz that surrounds the town at night, the proximity to the beach, the bread, the cheap yet still drinkable wine, and the friends I’ve made who, it feels like I’ve only just realised, won’t be at university with me next year. But being reluctant to leave doesn’t mean that I’m not allowed to look forward to being home, too. I cannot wait to see my family – some of whom I haven’t seen for two years – again. I’m simultaneously excited and scared about what fourth year is going to be like, and I cannot wait to move back into a house with an oven. I have no shame in saying that I am excited about going to seminars where you’re encouraged to actually talk about what you’re working on, rather than just being lectured at by a prof for an hour and then by another student for the other hour. I’m looking forward to being at a university where they seem to have some idea of what you and they are meant to be doing.

I think that all too often, our lecturers, friends, family, and we ourselves put too much hope into the year – which is why admitting you’re really missing home or that you’re actually quite looking forward to being back can feel like you’ve cheated on your year abroad experience. You’re not meant to be excited about being back home, you’re meant to be dragged, kicking and screaming, onto the plane and are supposed to be in a sulk from the minute you get back. But actually, I think all of us have something about England that makes the idea of being back that little bit easier to deal with – and we should be honest about this. Not just amongst each other, but when we talk to the people who are about to go on their year abroad.

A few months ago, I met up with a couple of friends who had been in Montpellier a few years earlier for their Erasmus year. We got to chatting about our individual experiences and I took the opportunity to have a good-natured whinge about the university here. The two looked at each other and looked at me. “Speaking to you made me realise just how much we've filtered of that year,” one of them said. “It’s only when you mention them that we remember the really annoying parts of the year.”

So my advice, to people coming home or preparing to go away is this: it’s perfectly okay to not have the amazing, fantastic, best time of your life that you’ve been told you will. It’s okay to really miss home. It’s okay to be actually quite ready to come home by the end of it. And all the little irritations of the year? Give it time, you’ll forget about them and just remember the positives – and then you’ll be the person telling the next generation of Year Abroaders that it’ll be the best year of their lives.

An ode to Desperados

As the summer kicks in and the temperature rises, it's hard to really have much enthusiasm for food. The idea of standing over anything hot is incredibly unappealing, particularly when it's about 27 degrees at 8pm. Today was the first 'cold' day we've had this week, and even then the temperature barely dipped below 25.

With weather such as this - not that I'm complaining! - there's little incentive to cook anything that involves standing in a hot kitchen for too long. Salad has become the basis of pretty much every meal I've eaten this past week, including today's dinner.

But I'm not here to talk about my salad which was good, but nothing particularly special. No, what I'm writing about is the beer that has become my new best friend/worst enemy (delete as appropriate) and is standing just behind it.

Anybody who knows me will know that I've always preferred wine to beer, but there's something about Desperados that really, really appeals. Despite its Spanish name and obvious Mexican influence (flavoured with tequila and most often served with a wedge of lime), it's brewed in the Alsace region of France. I've always preferred Mexican-style beers, but usually I'd pick a Belgian wheat beer like Hoegaarden over a Corona if I absolutely had to have beer. However, when the weather is hot and you're looking for something that really refreshes you, I don't think you can beat Desperados. The lime that you really have to have with it stops it from tasting too bitter and makes it dangerously drinkable. It's something of a staple of the student fridge down here, and at the FISE (Festival International de Sport Extreme), I'm told there was a Desperados tent. That makes me regret not popping down to see what the buzz was about now that I've become a convert and have joined the ranks of Desperados fans.

I'd definitely recommend checking it out because it really is perfect in the summer. In the absence of Pimms - I'm devastated that it's going to be July before I get my first glass of that! - I think I've found my new summertime drink. Cheers to that.

Fruit salad

I have, as my parents will doubtlessly testify, always been a bit of a magpie. This is particularly true for food. And now that it is moving towards summer and the fruit section of my local supermarket is full of beautiful, fresh, local produce, the only logical thing to do seems to be to make fruit salad - and lots of it.

Kiwi, strawberries, mango and apple - all, apart from the mango, from France. It's the perfect thing to have in your fridge in the summer, and is gorgeous either as it is or with a dollop of Greek yoghurt on top as breakfast or even as a virtuous pudding. This was also my first attempt at preparing - or, as my friend's family calls it, "hedgehog-ing"- a mango. I had a quick look online to see what was the best and easiest method of getting the fruit out, and it turned out that hedgehog-ing it was the most popular and simplest way. Delia told me to slice down around the stone, then to score into the flesh, being careful not to cut through the skin, then push it and cut the cubes of mango off the skin and into a bowl, making sure you have something to hand to catch all the juice. 

It seemed simple.

It isn't. 

When Delia said "stone", what I didn't realise she meant was "massive flat thing that's as big as the mango itself and impossible to locate when you're cutting down through the fruit". After butchering the poor mango trying to find where the stone finished so I could have as much fruit for my fruit as possible, I then failed to avoid cutting through the skin, forgot to put a bowl underneath to catch the juice, and generally made a bit of a hash of it.

Word to the wise - mango juice stings if it gets into cuts. I found this out the hard way.

Despite my apparent inability to do something that should've been pretty simple, I did eventually succeed in getting the mango from the fruit into a bowl and then added my strawberries, kiwi and apple - all of which were much easier to prepare, poured in some orange juice, and gave it a stir.

Et voilà! Pudding/breakfast/part-of-your-five-a-day all in one very pink bowl. It is officially summer.

"Qu'ils mangent de la brioche"

If I’m totally honest, I wasn’t particularly fussed about what living in France with French bread on my doorstep every day meant when I first moved here. To my utter shame, I spent most of my first term buying sliced bread; walking past the beautiful “Pavé Nature”, baguettes and similarly delicious bread on offer that had just been taken from the oven, heading instead for Harry’s American Sandwich Pain de Mie (wholewheat, I’m not an animal). That surely is grounds to chuck me out of the country. Like all sorts of things about life down here – beautiful weather, going for dinner at 10pm, sitting at a café that’s spilling out onto the streets – I’ve only really started appreciating French bread in the past few months. For a mere 29 cents, you can buy a demi baguette; and okay, if you leave it overnight it’ll be rock-solid and will cover your floor with breadcrumbs if you try to slice it – but surely that’s just further incentive to make sure you eat all of that baguette in one day. Challenge accepted. It is more expensive to buy a demi-baguette every day or a fresh loaf every week than it is to buy sliced bread – but there is a massive difference, and you know what? I’m willing to pay that little bit more every day for the two months I’ve got here.

Maybe it’s because it’s because we non-French have this stereotypical image of a French person in a striped Breton top with a silly moustache carrying a baguette under their arm – but bread seems to be as much a part of the way of life here as passive smoking and striking. Coming back from the supermarket on the tram, I heard two ladies grumbling about how the price of a baguette had gone up three cents since last week, whilst a guy in his twenties ripped massive chunks of bread from the baguette in his shopping bag and ate, head nodding in time to the music he was listening to. Any given shopping trolley will contain at least one baguette, and even the cheapest restaurant will bring you a basket of bread that will be refilled whenever it looks like it’s running low absolutely free of charge. The idea that you might have to ask for bread in a restaurant– and then pay for it – is utterly horrifying to a French person. For added shock, I suggest you also add that very few places will bring a bottle of water to your table, and only reluctantly after trying to sell you a very expensive bottle of mineral water.

No matter how you slice it (oh I’m so funny), bread is incredibly important to the French, and why on earth shouldn’t it be? Got some sauce left on your plate? Mop it up with your bread. Can’t be bothered to wash your only knife? Use your bread to push it onto your fork. Fingers a bit greasy from the olive oil on your salad dressing? Bread napkin. Need to soak up some of your Merlot? Bread. Just want to eat bread? Bread. Good luck being gluten-intolerant down here, folks.

What I’m really trying to say is – the bread in France is amazing in a way that I cannot fully explain; and the way it is entrenched in French culture only serves to ensure that it stays that way. And thank goodness for that. Forget Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité – the French motto should be Vive les boulangères et vive le pain.

Ratatouille

I'm about as good at eating my vegetables as I am at updating this blog: sometimes, I'm all about making sure I get my 5 a day, and sometimes I sort of... forget.

It's a lot easier now it's heading towards summer and the idea of salad is particularly appealing, but last week my friend Ellen cooked for me in a bid to get shot of her vegetables before she went off for her weekend in Paris (lucky thing). It was based off a Turkish dish, but essentially what it amounted to was ratatouille with chorizo and couscous, and it was delicious. As I was doing my food shop this week, I thought to myself, why not make that? It's quick, it's simple, it's cheap, and it's delicious. Basically, it's everything I want when I'm cooking. Plus, it's easy to make extra so you have another meal or two already made!

So make it I did. There are probably as many different recipes for ratatouille as there are people who eat it, but this is how I made it.

1. Chop up a red pepper, an aubergine, a courgette, half a large onion and two cloves of garlic, and add to a big saucepan (a casserole-style pot would be perfect).
2. Heat this for about five minutes on the hob - this helps to soften the aubergine and courgette, and makes space for the next step!
3. Add a tin of chopped tomatoes, a little bit of water and bring to the boil, then put a lid over it and let simmer for another 5-10 minutes.
4. For the meat-eaters, whilst the ratatouille is simmering away, chop up some chorizo into rounds (the ready-cooked type), and heat in a frying pan. Once it's golden and slightly softened, tip into the pan and stir through - try to get as much of the oil that comes out of the sausages into the ratatouille for an added paprika kick.

And that's it! I'd reckon that will make between 3 and 4 portions' worth (not including the chorizo), depending on how hungry you are. The last thing to do is to make the couscous, which is perhaps the easiest thing ever, particularly when you do it my way. I know you can make it on the hob but this is much easier.

1. Take a mug.
2. Boil the kettle.
3. Fill your mug with as much or as little couscous as you want.
4. Pour boiling water over the couscous - the optimum amount is so that the water level is just a fraction over the couscous. Too much and it'll be watery, too little and it'll be dry.
5. Put a lid over the mug to trap the steam.
6. Take the lid off after about 2 minutes and fluff up with a fork.
7. Add butter if wanted.

Couscous added to ratatouille is perfect as it soaks up all that yummy liquid, and some salad because... well because why not?

Possibly the healthiest meal I've eaten since I got here - the only 'naughty' bits would be the sausages, the tiny bit of butter I added to the couscous and the dressing on the salad. And, I've got leftovers that will do for later in the week.

Bon appetit!

Wining and dining.

Firstly, please accept my deepest apologies for such a long break between posts! The past month has been somewhat of a whirlwind: between trains from Reading to Exeter, Exeter to Cheltenham, and a plane from Gatwick to Montpellier (all in the name of doing justice to my 21st celebrations!) it's been a bit overwhelming and I've barely had time to think of a post to write - especially as I have done virtually no cooking over the past month or so! It's mostly been meals out which, I hasten to add, I am not complaining about! Far from it, in fact. So, in light of this (and also because I'm unlikely to have such a run of meals out for quite some time now!), here is a little summary of lovely restaurants I have had the joy of going to in the past month.

First meal out was to Bill's Café in Reading with my former housemate Georgia (of Great Cupcake Trail fame). It's a chain, but not one with branches all over the country so it still manages to retain a fairly individual appeal. The food was beautiful - Georgia had a chicken and chorizo burger and I eventually decided on a normal burger, mostly because their skin-on chips came so highly recommended! It was absolutely delicious and very filling, but I just about managed to make room for their vanilla pannacotta (and I was very glad I did too). It was a fairly reasonable meal, coming to about £20 a head for drinks, bread, main and pudding. The appeal of Bill's is that as well as being a café, they also sell some really lovely produce - perfect for the foodie in your life. Georgia went for a veritable brick of chocolate that's designed to be melted to be hot chocolate. Unsurprisingly, I didn't get a look in! I bought my mum a jar of sloe gin and gooseberry jam, partially because as a family we are partial to a good G&T, partially because my mother is a long-time fan of gooseberries, but mostly because it was such an unusual combination that I'd never seen before.

The next meal out was to a lovely vegetarian place called The Plant Café in Exeter when I went to visit an old schoolfriend who's studying down there. I had an absolutely gorgeous tomato, pesto and goat's cheese tart which seemed a bit pricey at just over £7 - but then the waitress brought it out and I saw the mix of salads they'd piled alongside and suddenly £7 didn't seem too unreasonable! Lentil salad, couscous, lettuce leaves - if someone had told me that eating vegetables could mean this, it wouldn't have taken me so long to warm up to the idea of them! The café is in a prime spot, just along the Cathedral Green, and I'm sure it'd be lovely to sit outside when the weather is warmer, but our napkins and bits of salad were flying away with the February breeze so we retreated to the warmth of the café pretty sharpish!

Once I got back to Cheltenham and took my friend out for her first Nando's (and she calls herself a student...), I was determined that I'd make it to my favourite restaurant in town, Storyteller. It's sort of become a tradition for my parents and I to go there every year for my birthday, and while that could be a bit tedious, they change the menu often enough that, while theoretically you could have the same thing every time, there's always something new on offer. I was brave and went for a rabbit casserole, which was really delicious but a bit of faff to make sure all the little bones were removed, followed by a zingy lemon tart. There's a reason I ask to go back there every year.

After a few days at home, it was time for the parents and I to head down to Montpellier again, and you couldn't have asked for more of a difference in the weather. The first meal we had was at Hippo, which is a fairly popular 'steakhouse' chain in France - but don't be fooled, the number of locations in no way means that the quality is anything other than superb. Even better (in my father's eyes, anyway), sides and sauces are 'à volonté', so you can just keep ordering chips, ratatouille, green beans, baked potatoes and sauces until you explode! Sometimes it's nice to know that there's a failsafe place you can go for when you can't be bothered or don't have the time to explore the independent restaurants. We went back there on the Sunday afternoon before my parents flew back home.

We seemed to accidentally return to the places we'd been to in August, but such is the joy of the French restaurant - they rarely keep the menu the same over the seasons. After being slightly disappointed that so few restaurants in Antigone, the area where my parents' hotel was situated, were open due to the school winter holidays, we ventured into the town and returned to 'Andromaque', a restaurant we'd enjoyed back in August. It was lovely then to sit outside, and it was lovely in February to sit inside! As it's in the old town, the dining room was underground, and the vaulted ceilings were lit beautifully. Far from being cold and harsh, the soft armchairs made it feel welcoming and the three of us felt like it would be far too easy to just fall asleep after dinner! I had a goat's cheese salad to start, followed by a lovely fillet of salmon with a gorgeous risotto. Pudding was absolutely heaven - a salted caramel 'moelleux' that just oozed caramel when you touched a fork to it and tasted like a melted Daim bar.

The next day we set off to explore Nimes, a Roman town just half an hour's train ride from Montpellier. After trying to remember my way around from my whistlestop tour earlier this year, we ended up picking a fairly innocuous-looking café-patisserie purely out of hunger and relative proximity to where we were. What a fantastic choice we made. The confit du canard I had just fell off the bone, but what was more delicious was the pudding. As part of the lunchtime 'prix fixe' menu, one of the options was a 'patisserie du choix'. Looking through the list of what they could potentially offer, I immediately set my heart on something called 'cacaoyer'. It sounded divine - standard patisserie sponge base, chocolate mousse, salted caramel ganache (can you tell I'm on a salted caramel kick?), more chocolate nom - I don't remember what it was called exactly - and then dusted with cocoa. In case you didn't have enough chocolate. As we went to order, the waitress suggested we take a look at what patisseries they had on offer, so my father and I did as we were told. Mum had been fixed on a café gourmand - something of a phenomenon in French restaurants, where they give you an espresso and a selection of mini-puddings that can range from miniatures of the puddings they have on offer to teeny tiny little macaroons and madeleines. The inside was something to behold - it looked like they'd kept the interior pretty much as it was when it was first opened in 1850, with gold moldings and an beautiful mirror from wall-to-wall that reflected the most incredble selection of patisseries I'd ever seen - and yes, my 'cacaoyer' was there, and it was indeed the amazing-looking thing (there are no words to describe it) that had been brought to the gentleman at the table next to me. If I thought there were no words to describe it, that's nothing compared to my attempts to describe how it tasted. As if my parents were going to get so much as a crumb - that baby was all mine and my goodness was it good.

On the last night my parents had down with me, we were all a bit undecided as to where we wanted to go. We looked at a seafood restaurant nearby, but it was quite expensive and nothing really grabbed any of us; the creperie was full; the other creperie (one we'd been to in August and thoroughly enjoyed) was also full - so we went back to another restaurant we'd tried in August - Les Orchis, which is for some odd reason both a restaurant and florist. As you do. Despite not seeing anything that I liked the sound of in the seafood restaurant, I ended up having a very fishy dinner. Smoked salmon with a coconut pannacotta-ish thing to start, followed by whole sea bream. I was so sure I'd have beef, or lamb - until the waiter came around and I heard myself ordering 'le dorade'. It was a brave choice for me, as it involved removing the bones which I'd never attempted before, but it was definitely worth the effort. Pudding was a café gourmand, which I remembered as being fantastic the previous time we'd been there and definitely fell into the 'mini-puddings' category. A tiny tiramisu, a mini-mousse and an amazingly chocolately chocolate pot, rounded off by an espresso.

Which brings us to a few Tuesday nights ago, and the (civilised) celebration of my 21st birthday. Myself and three friends went to 'Bistrot de l'Ancien Courier', which I'd enjoyed back in August, quelle surprise, and which offers a reasonable prix fixe menu - any starter, main and pudding for €18.80. It being my 21st, I had a kir imperial (which was cava instead of champagne but let's not split hairs), as an aperitif. For the food, I had a lovely saumon mariné which was served with a honey and ginger dressing, a wonderful combination. Ellen had chevre chaud on gingerbread and pears, which was delicious from what I tried. For the main, it was the classic cuisse de canard, another beautiful duck which just slid off the bone and finally, pain perdu with salted caramel (my old favourite) and ice cream made from almond milk. After devouring the meal, faffing about with the bill (I'd like to apologise to the poor waitress who had to scoop up three euros' worth of 10 and 20 cent coins) and eventually rolling out of the door, we headed to our old favourite bar, Rebuffy, to grab a coffee and talk about the plans for the second, less sophisticated part of my 21st birthday without feeling like we were bringing down the tone of the location too much. It was a lovely way to spend my birthday, made even sweeter by the fact that the three of them had bought me a beautiful bouquet of carnations - and a single red rose. Say what you like about them, they're not so bad when it comes to it.

Bill's Cafe | www.bills-website.co.uk
Storyteller | www.storyteller.co.uk
Hippo | www.hippopotamus.fr/
Andromaque | www.restaurant-andromaque.fr
Orchis | www.restaurant-placestroch.com

The Great Cupcake Trail of 2012

Some months ago, whilst I was in France and my former housemate Georgia was in Reading, we were sharing our mutual appreciation for those things cake, iced and delicious - the (not so humble) cupcake. Jokingly, we suggested a tour of the cupcakeries in London once we were back in the same country.

Well yesterday, we did just that.

After much research (Googling 'Best cupcakes in London' and drawing up a list), planning (Picking which bakeries and in what order), and organisation ('Thursday good?' 'Yep'), the day of The Great Cupcake Trail of 2012 dawned.