I cooked!

Like everything in France, it seems, cooking dinner is a little more difficult than it should be. The main problem (aside from the inadequacy of the kitchen in my apartment) is the closing hours of food shops.

I don't generally get out of work until sometime between 7p and 8p, and then have a half-hour commute home. At that point the basic grocery stores and the bread bakeries (boulangeries, they're called here) are still open, but the butchers, fishmongers, vegetable stands etc. have long since closed.

So you have to stock up on the weekend. And this weekend I was able to get chanterelles at $7 a pound (between 1/3 and 1/4 the normal price in New York, since they're in season), which I cooked up with a veal chop, frisee salad, bread from the nearby bakery and a bottle of Savigny-les-Beaune (a mid-level red Burgundy).

All I needed was someone to share it with ...