Eating & Drinking Part II
When we arrived in our hotel in Lyon, it was late. We had eaten sandwiches on the train, so we were not entirely hungry. We stopped in the Lobby bar to get everyone something to drink. A woman behind the bar approached us, asking if we were ready to order. I launched into my usual French speech, "Je suis désolé. Je ne parle pas français."
"That's okay, I can speak English. What y'all want?" she replied in an unmistakable Texas drawl.
I knew she knew she surprised us. After talking for a few minutes, we learned that she was also American, and, in fact, Texan. Her parents sent her to France to live with and work for her grandparents after her high school graduation. Without speaking "a lick of French," she started in the family wine cork factory. Over the years, she learned French, started her own company supplying wine producers, married a local man, had a few children, became a certified sommelier.
She offered us a wine to try, a rosé from Provence, because Americans tend to like pink wines, she added. I was afraid her assumption would lead us to an unreasonably sweet wine as my tastes run more to dry. At my probably hesitant, "okay," she clarified her use of the words "rosé."
"It's really closer to what we call 'vin gris,' a gray wine, which isn't really gray."
I called it my new favorite.
More after the jump
There really was no bad eating in France, I am sure. Even when we knew we were hitting very tourist-oriented places, and not anywhere super-authentic Michelin-Star-bearing, we trusted that we would enjoy our food.
The first day in Lyon, we had a late-ish start. It was Sunday, and we were not planning on going to Mass until that evening, so we ate breakfast in mid-morning. This place wasn't opened for lunch when we were touring this part of Lyon, but I really wished we could have eaten there. I was so charmed by the Guignol puppets on the façade.
We finally stopped to eat near the Cathedral. There was a crêperie near the Cathedral. Randy, who doesn't eat wheat, figured he would just have a salad or the filling of a crêpe until he read the English text on the menu that noted that their savory crepes were all made with buckwheat. He was happy that he got to enjoy a rare treat of real crêpes. And they served cidre!
Not all of us wanted gluten-free savory crêpes, but that was okay.
Lyon is known for having a special type of restaurant called a bouchon. At a real bouchon, the meals would be traditional Lyon cuisine, mostly fish and meat and especially offal. We were fortunate to find a few in a heavy tourist area that had more variety than that since Randy and I are vegetarians and Brigid is still not yet terribly adventurous when it comes to food.
Myles liked his Saucisson Brioché.
He steered away from the plates of intestines and even quenelle. I myself was curious about this fish dumpling that would have kept our dumpling streak alive, but not enough to order it for myself. I didn't want to get sick eating fish for the first time in twenty years. Instead, I had this lovely gratin.
In San Sebastian we really lived up to the kids' wish just to "eat and go to the beach."
Our first night, we walked around the streets of the Old Town, looking for a Pintxos bar with room for us. We were back at Bar Aralar, which we remembered from the previous year as having a decent selection of vegetarian pintxos and the ham that Myles really liked.
The next day we made a beeline for The Loaf at lunchtime. Our 2014 trip was the first time we had tried their bread, but we arrived so late in the evening we could only buy a loaf of bread to go. It was one of the best loaves of bread we had ever eaten. I was really excited about trying lunch, and I wasn't the only one.
We had bread, of course, as an appetizer.
Before we ate even more bread.
What was it Liz Lemon said? "All of human kind has one thing in common: The Sandwich. I believe that all anyone really wants in this life is to sit in peace and eat a sandwich."
Submitted as evidence from San Sebastian, this vegetarian beauty.
As Randy looked at our Bread-fest with great longing, he consoled himself with this seriously good patatas bravas. It didn't look or photograph as flavorful as it was.
That night, I was really in the mood for something much less rich for supper. We had been feasting on breads and cheeses for weeks at this point, and I was craving vegetables with as little adornment as possible. We returned to Kafe Botanika, a wonderful quiet restaurant that was quite the opposite of going to a pintxos bar.
Okay, maybe we still wanted a little more cheese in phylo. But I did have a salad, too!
The following morning, before we went to the beach for the last time, Myles and Brigid and I had to make one more pilgrimage to The Loaf for bread, croissants, and brownies.
Online I had found a listing for a Cider House in Old Town. Neither Randy or I knew what to expect since we had never had Basque sidra before. We figured it was worth trying once, at least the sidra if the pintxos served there were unappealing.
I learned a new word in Spanish that I never heard before. Sidreria, which is Sagardotegia in Euskara.
It was gorgeous inside.
The pintxos were some of the best we had yet. Manchego cheese served with quince jelly. These incredible toast-things with roasted peppers and fried quail eggs. Croquetas. And a tortilla de patatas that was unforgettable.
Of course Randy and I drank sidra.
Watching the bartender meter out our sidra was part of the fun. Apparently it has to be shot out of the barrel at arm's distance. I googled and saw this was absolutely the way it had to be done. It wasn't for show. I asked him if it were permissible to take his picture while he poured our next round. He had no problem with it and that people take his picture an uncountable number of times a day doing this. He also said that usually, only the women guests want to photograph this. Seldom the men.
A few days later, we were in Frankfurt for our last night before returning to Beijing. The restaurant in our hotel served mostly Italian dishes. I use the word mostly, because there was something of a German twist to some of them. I admit I did enjoy the rather odd sounding Focaccia-Knödelscheiben. It was my beloved German bread dumpling, made with rosemary focaccia bread and dressed in a Gorgonzola sauce. Absolutely it tasted better than it sounded and looked (I did not even bother to take a picture of it). Sometimes it is worth it to eat the dumplings.
"That's okay, I can speak English. What y'all want?" she replied in an unmistakable Texas drawl.
I knew she knew she surprised us. After talking for a few minutes, we learned that she was also American, and, in fact, Texan. Her parents sent her to France to live with and work for her grandparents after her high school graduation. Without speaking "a lick of French," she started in the family wine cork factory. Over the years, she learned French, started her own company supplying wine producers, married a local man, had a few children, became a certified sommelier.
She offered us a wine to try, a rosé from Provence, because Americans tend to like pink wines, she added. I was afraid her assumption would lead us to an unreasonably sweet wine as my tastes run more to dry. At my probably hesitant, "okay," she clarified her use of the words "rosé."
"It's really closer to what we call 'vin gris,' a gray wine, which isn't really gray."
I called it my new favorite.
More after the jump
There really was no bad eating in France, I am sure. Even when we knew we were hitting very tourist-oriented places, and not anywhere super-authentic Michelin-Star-bearing, we trusted that we would enjoy our food.
The first day in Lyon, we had a late-ish start. It was Sunday, and we were not planning on going to Mass until that evening, so we ate breakfast in mid-morning. This place wasn't opened for lunch when we were touring this part of Lyon, but I really wished we could have eaten there. I was so charmed by the Guignol puppets on the façade.
We finally stopped to eat near the Cathedral. There was a crêperie near the Cathedral. Randy, who doesn't eat wheat, figured he would just have a salad or the filling of a crêpe until he read the English text on the menu that noted that their savory crepes were all made with buckwheat. He was happy that he got to enjoy a rare treat of real crêpes. And they served cidre!
Not all of us wanted gluten-free savory crêpes, but that was okay.
Lyon is known for having a special type of restaurant called a bouchon. At a real bouchon, the meals would be traditional Lyon cuisine, mostly fish and meat and especially offal. We were fortunate to find a few in a heavy tourist area that had more variety than that since Randy and I are vegetarians and Brigid is still not yet terribly adventurous when it comes to food.
Myles liked his Saucisson Brioché.
He steered away from the plates of intestines and even quenelle. I myself was curious about this fish dumpling that would have kept our dumpling streak alive, but not enough to order it for myself. I didn't want to get sick eating fish for the first time in twenty years. Instead, I had this lovely gratin.
In San Sebastian we really lived up to the kids' wish just to "eat and go to the beach."
Our first night, we walked around the streets of the Old Town, looking for a Pintxos bar with room for us. We were back at Bar Aralar, which we remembered from the previous year as having a decent selection of vegetarian pintxos and the ham that Myles really liked.
The next day we made a beeline for The Loaf at lunchtime. Our 2014 trip was the first time we had tried their bread, but we arrived so late in the evening we could only buy a loaf of bread to go. It was one of the best loaves of bread we had ever eaten. I was really excited about trying lunch, and I wasn't the only one.
We had bread, of course, as an appetizer.
Before we ate even more bread.
What was it Liz Lemon said? "All of human kind has one thing in common: The Sandwich. I believe that all anyone really wants in this life is to sit in peace and eat a sandwich."
Submitted as evidence from San Sebastian, this vegetarian beauty.
As Randy looked at our Bread-fest with great longing, he consoled himself with this seriously good patatas bravas. It didn't look or photograph as flavorful as it was.
That night, I was really in the mood for something much less rich for supper. We had been feasting on breads and cheeses for weeks at this point, and I was craving vegetables with as little adornment as possible. We returned to Kafe Botanika, a wonderful quiet restaurant that was quite the opposite of going to a pintxos bar.
Okay, maybe we still wanted a little more cheese in phylo. But I did have a salad, too!
The following morning, before we went to the beach for the last time, Myles and Brigid and I had to make one more pilgrimage to The Loaf for bread, croissants, and brownies.
Online I had found a listing for a Cider House in Old Town. Neither Randy or I knew what to expect since we had never had Basque sidra before. We figured it was worth trying once, at least the sidra if the pintxos served there were unappealing.
I learned a new word in Spanish that I never heard before. Sidreria, which is Sagardotegia in Euskara.
It was gorgeous inside.
The pintxos were some of the best we had yet. Manchego cheese served with quince jelly. These incredible toast-things with roasted peppers and fried quail eggs. Croquetas. And a tortilla de patatas that was unforgettable.
Of course Randy and I drank sidra.
Watching the bartender meter out our sidra was part of the fun. Apparently it has to be shot out of the barrel at arm's distance. I googled and saw this was absolutely the way it had to be done. It wasn't for show. I asked him if it were permissible to take his picture while he poured our next round. He had no problem with it and that people take his picture an uncountable number of times a day doing this. He also said that usually, only the women guests want to photograph this. Seldom the men.
A few days later, we were in Frankfurt for our last night before returning to Beijing. The restaurant in our hotel served mostly Italian dishes. I use the word mostly, because there was something of a German twist to some of them. I admit I did enjoy the rather odd sounding Focaccia-Knödelscheiben. It was my beloved German bread dumpling, made with rosemary focaccia bread and dressed in a Gorgonzola sauce. Absolutely it tasted better than it sounded and looked (I did not even bother to take a picture of it). Sometimes it is worth it to eat the dumplings.
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