Gotta love being a foodie ...

Food, glorious food ... another Sunday in Paris and I'm off on a gastronomic adventure today! One of the things La Cuisine (the place I'm having cooking classes) gives you is a map of some cool places in the Marais area to go visit for great food. So what better day to do something like this than a Sunday!? First stop and not very far from home, the very chic, the very classy La Chocolaterie de Jacques Genin  (133 Rue Vieille du Temple) ... ahhh ... yum. The store itself opened in 2008, but Jacques Genin has been creating his delectable delights for decades and providing solely to high-end restaurants and hotels. In 2010 he was in the Top 10 French chocolatiers. But for me today, it was the scrumptious lemon tart, sublime espresso, and three little chocolates that come as a little surprise-with-purchase. How delightful! What a lovely way to start my journey.

So now I need to walk a little... not to make room for lunch so much as to try and burn off at least one or two of the four thousand calories I just consumed!!!! Man, they were good though.One thing I discovered, for those who find themselves in Paris on a Sunday and have a desire to part with well-earned cash ... Shops in the Marais open on Sunday. Not all, but many. Just enough to get me into trouble, as we'll soon learn ... but first, lunch. Robert & Louise (64 Rue Vieille du Temple). This little restaurant, which you would easily walk straight past if you didn't know it was there, was a real find! It was started back in 1960 by, funnily enough, Robert & his wife Louise. (Louise still drops into the restaurant occasionally, but it's now run by her daughter and family). Anyway, this place is so unique, especially for the uber-chic Marais - it only seats about 20 people at a pinch, and they cook on the open fireplace at the rear, so you can watch your meat being prepared! Let's just say that it's not somewhere I'd recommend you visit on a hot summer's day ... it was warm in there! I had the confit duck, and to my great joy discovered that I make an excellent confit duck!!! And I leave their potatoes for dead ... woo hoo! It was really very good tho, I thoroughly enjoyed every bite. I sat at the bar, next to a lovely couple from upstate New York. They were in town for 4 days, and we got to talking about how disappointing the food in Paris was. It seems to be a common sentiment among everyone I meet. We all seem to have such high expectations; but I think it's just that the world has come to so many cities now that it's not just specialised to the place of origin anymore.

 Now to walk off lunch - and that took some walking ... I'm slowly developing what I call Croissant Belly (as opposed to a muffin top!!!!), so I'm glad to be going home soon to regular food, if nothing else! And this is where I found myself standing outside a Repetto store, open, in the heart of Marais. Suffice to say, I am now the proud owner of my second pair of Repetto shoes. Yay for me! Hehe. Now it was definitely time for another sugar hit, so I went in search of this little chocolate shop that I always seem to find when it's closed. Well of all days to find it open, today was that day. Meert started life in 1761, in Lille (France's fourth largest city, to the north of Paris) and became famous for its ice cream. Today, there are a few stores around Paris, all selling the beautiful chocolates, caramels, fruit jubes and cakes that they are now famous for.

 Some serious walking was now required, so first stop was home to stow my new purchase, change into jeans & sneakers, and head off to the Luxembourg Gardens to see the colours of a Paris Autumn in full flight. I wasn't left disappointed!!! But on the way, I saw something both amusing and practical. I post a quandary for you ... Paris apartments are not known for their sweeping staircases. And given the price-tag that accompanies a Paris apartment, most inhabitants are proud owners of some pretty impressive furniture. Even if it's just the regular Ikea stuff that's oh so popular over here; my question to you is - how do you get it up the stairs?!?! Well, the answer is, you don't. You use a conveyor belt instead!!!! Love it.

But now for a little Autumnal views for your ocular cavities ...

And because I couldn't get enough Croissants from the Boulangeries around town, today (Monday) I spent my morning learning how to make Croissants!!! Regular, chocolate and almond. Hence my Croissant Belly!!!!! I have well & truly reached my limit of consuming such things - delectably delicious as they might be ... I can't take any more!!!!!

And just to even things out, this afternoon I learnt how to make Macarons!! Both the French (my Macaron buddy & I made a purple batch - and these are the nice, smooth, glossy ones you get in shops) and Italian styles (again, my buddy & I made little pink macarons this time, and they have a coarser surface - but we also mixed 50/50 almond & hazelnut meal, so it had a bit more visual texture too), with a couple of different fillings ... I WAS SO HAPPY!!!! MINE WERE THE NICEST!!!!!!! Ha Ha! My oven sucks.