March 2007 archives

1. One espresso has 2 calories.

2. The word ‘coffee’ is pronounced almost the same in every language around the world.

3. After water, coffee is the second most widely-consumed beverage in the world. (Tea is a close third.)

4. When you drink coffee, your brain shrinks a little, which is why some advise drinking coffee if you have a headache.

5. When making an espresso, 65% of the caffeine is extracted from the beans, whereas the French-press method of making coffee extracts 98% of the caffeine.

6. There are two hundred flavors components present in raw (green) coffee beans, but roasted beans have over two thousand present.

7. The first steam-pressured espresso machine was invented by a Frenchman in 1901.

8. In Italy, 80% of the coffee consumed is espresso while the other 20% are milk-based coffee drinks like cappucino.

Outside of Italy, those numbers are reversed.

9. The espresso-pod of coffee was invented in 1973 by Illy coffee.

10. 52% of all coffee imported into Italy comes through Trieste, whose harbor is almost entirely dedicated to coffee importation.

Speaking of coffee, I just returned from a visit to Illy where I was their guest at their Università del Caffè where I learned the art of making espresso. I had hands-on lessons from their expert barista, Michele Pauletic and delved into the craft of extracting the perfect little cup of true Italian espresso. Excuse the little bit of hyperbole, but it was truly a life-changing experience. And although I merely scratched the surface of understanding this complex drink, I have a much better understanding of what coffee is and how to get the best cup possible.

As soon as I come down from the buzz I got from all that coffee (one day I counted I had 9 cups of espresso), I’ll be focusing more on what I saw and learned…and I invite you to come along in the next few installments here, from my trip to Trieste.

Real, live French women on why French women don’t get fat.

(via The Food Section)

The problem around here is that I buy chocolate in 5 kilo, about 11#, boxes and every afternoon, and sometimes (ok…make that ‘often’…) first thing in the morning, I dig my hand deep in the box and pull out a few pistols every time I walk by. People have the impression that I eat chocolate all the time, every day. And although I usually deny it, I would have to admit it’s definitely true.

Except last night when I was flossing, part of one of my teeth flew out and plinked onto the floor. So today it’s like eating and talking with a thumb tack in my mouth, and I’m having a rare, chocolate-free day.

Who knew it was possible to floss to hard? Does that make me a ‘power-flosser’?

(When I called my dentist, I was stumped trying to figure out the verb ‘to floss’ in French. Ça existe?)

Anyhow, in addition to the little palets of dark chocolate I’m always dipping into, I also have tons of unusual chocolate bars around here I’ve been amassing over the past few months.

Many I pick up when traveling, and some I get sent by companies wanting me to try them out. I happily sample them all and love to find something new or especially unusual. Often I taste them systematically by sitting down, snapping off a corner and savoring the flavors. As I roll and chew the chocolate around in my mouth, I ponder the different characteristics, noting origin and the various flavors: Sweet, fruity, acidic, roasty, bitter, citrusy, woodsy—all the various tastes we find in chocolate.

And other times, I’m not so good and I rip off the covering and start gnawing away at the chocolate until it’s nothing but an empty wrapper with a few crumbs of chocolate left. I never did well in science since I’m lacking in patience.

So during the next few weeks, it’s your turn to be patient.

Continue Reading Chocolate Tasting…

1. I love when people on roller-blades fall.

2. I don’t care all that much who wins in 2008, or what party they’re from.

I just want everyone to like and respect us again.

3. Once a woman came into a restaurant where I worked and had dinner all by herself.

At the end of her meal, she asked the waiter to put a birthday candle on her dessert.

Fifteen years later, I still feel really sad about it.

4. I think it should be illegal for men to get their eyebrows arched.

5. I live in Paris and I’ve never gone up the Eiffel Tower.

And I don’t really want to!

With friends like this…

Just $15.95 ?

Dorie Greenspan reveals her secret addresses in Paris…

…and Linda Dannenberg uncovers the best boulangeries &agrave Paris aussi.

I hate voice mail mazes.

Get an earful (ayor)

Three more weeks…

…but the wait’s over for this one!

(Congratulations Heidi…)

Food blogging do’s and don’ts from the experts.

Is this the coolest Flickr page—or what.

C’est possible to go back?

Not links…but did you know some of the top search words for my site this week were:

“Bridget Bardot, cottage cheese, Tucker Carlson (55 people), bunnies, Charo, pickles, choxie bar, Nancy Grace (44 people), curds.”

Rarely do things get marked down in Paris, except twice a year when stores have les soldes during dates specified by the govenment. But they do sometimes reduce the price of something by offering a promotion.

The difference is that during a sale, they mark something down.

A promotion is different: it’s when they reduce the price of something.

Got it?

Commonly, I find, that when something’s on promotion, when you get to the register it never rings up at the sale, um…or I mean, the promotion price.

For you coupon-clippers out there— sorry, there’s no coupons here.
But the supermarkets do send out fliers advertising specials on certain items. But very rarely is the item actually in stock. My beloved Powerball went on sale, or was it on promotion?…this week at Franprix supermarket.

Don’t bother clicking on the link. Their site’s been non-functional depuis 2002. It advises “Patience!!!”

(You think? Anyone who’s willing to wait 5 years for a major business in one of the top cities in the world to put up a web site certainly needs un peu de patience.)

When I went, there my Powerballs sat on the shelf but with no special price was attached. (I’m sure there’s a joke there, but after the last post, I’m not touching it.) The other four items, which were advertised on sale in the flier, which were on my list, weren’t in stock at all. Still, with my odds, it was my lucky day that there was at least one of them.

Continue Reading 15%…

Day #2:

Just in case you live in a top-floor Parisian apartment with feeble water pressure, if you’re testing recipes involving baked meringues, I don’t recommend disposing of them here.

I hope by tomorrow they’ll finally be gone.

UPDATE: March 8 (the next day)—they’re still not gone!

Kig Ha Farz is a homely, but absolutely delicious, Breton specialty that few French people even know about. It’s highly-unlikely that you’ll ever find it served in a restaurant although I’ve heard reports of one Breton crêperie near Montmarte which makes it one day a week, but I haven’t investigated further. But if you travel through Brittany, some old-fashioned stores sell the simple sacks which are used to cook the kig ha farz, which means ‘meat’ and ‘stuffing’ in the Breton language, and you can make it yourself at home, like I do.

When we rented a house by the north coast of France last summer, the retired owners who lived next door offered to make us a stack of galettes au sarrasin, the buckwheat crêpes the region is well-known for, as a nice welcoming gesture.

Continue Reading Kig Ha Farz: Breton buckwheat dumpling recipe…