My French-Mexican food attempt

You know those days when you have a craving for some good American style Mexican food? Ever since I was pregnant with Luke I haven’t been able to get enough cheese, salsa and chips! We’ve been here for a few weeks now and I’m starting to need my refill of beans and cheese. If there is one thing France is known for, it is certainly the food, but Mexican… not so much. Luckily we easily found a few of the basic staples, salsa and tortillas. Strangely enough, the other ingredients were a little more difficult to come by.

Tortilla chips for instance were very different; I could either buy the small bag of round “nacho chips” or the larger bag of “chili chips”. I opted for the more economical chili chips that were vaguely reminiscent of Doritos.

I couldn’t find black beans anywhere… perhaps I just didn’t look hard enough. But I did find a can of Carne con chili with beans; it looked like it might be promising.

Surprisingly enough, the hardest item to find was cheese. In the country that basically invented cheese and has isles and isles of it in the grocery store, I couldn’t find any shredded cheese (or non shredded for that matter) that even vaguely resembled Mexican cheese. Mike and I wandered up and down the “fromage” section yesterday trying to find something that was in the same family as Mexican cheese. We found something (one of the few shredded cheese packets) that was either something like Mexican cheese, or Parmesan. We couldn’t quite be sure. We were growing tired and just thought we would chance it.

Everything turned out surprisingly well. Imagine Doritos with a strange chili mush, poor flavored rice, and extremely sweet salsa and you have our dinner. Definitely not the “Mexican” that I’m use to, but it will hold me over until we can make it home. In the mean time I will enjoy the menagerie of ethnic food around us: Moroccan, Cambodian, Lebanese, African, Vietnamese, Peruvian and Indonesian to name a few.

The Stunning Sites of Annecy

Imagine taking a Disney village, adding a bit of Venetian charm, incorporating delectable French food and the Swiss mountain feel and voila, you have Annecy. This perfectly picturesque French village nestled near the mountains and lovely Lac d’Annecy has been one of the highlights of our trip. Parts of the village date back to the 13^th century, and was even capital of the region in the 14oo’s.

We had the great fortune of travelling here via train on Saturday. (Luke was quite excited to ride the “CHOO CHOO”). I don’t think my words will adequately illustrate our outing, a picture is worth a thousand words right? So here is a pictorial sketch of our charming voyage through one of the most stunning cities in the world.

Luke and Daddy all ready for a trip 

Luke aptly studying train riding via
the expert Curious George 

Eating our way through Annecy, starting with a
quiche then a chocolate eclair 

Luke has a deep appreciation for fountains

I love my boys exploring the Vieille Ville (Old Town)

With the advancement of Calvinism in Geneva,
Annecy became the center for the Counter-
Reformation. Here is one of the beautiful
Catholic Cathedrals. 

"Please sir, no more funny business"
How could I not get a picture of the clown
getting a stern talking to from the local Police?

"Why Not Leather" 

  

The beautiful river that runs through the city

This is one of the most beautiful sites in the world!  

Chateau d'Annecy

Lac d'Annecy is one of the cleanest
lakes in all of Europe

The stunning hill top view

 

Honestly, can you get a more beautiful view?

This is very reminiscent of Venice

One of my favorite views in the city!

Of course we had to find a park and run around for a while. Luke had
quite a fun time charming all of the people around us

Everyone was out and about
enjoying the park

Mike and I have learned when there is
Nutella ice cream, you just say "YES!"

Our final view of the city

Geneva has Welcomed Me

We had a beautiful adventure yesterday. It started with some toast with Nutella and bananas... you know it will be a good day when you start with Nutella! 

Once we escaped the house and its ever beaconing chores (Laundry, sweeping, grocery shopping etc), we made our way to the bus stop and jumped on a random us that led to a random train and a random stop somewhere in Geneva. Despite my subpar navigation skills, I have found an internal sense of direction that is led by the water. Geneva is a beautiful city built upon an even more beautiful lake. I know wherever I am in the city, if I can simply find the water I have found my sense of direction. (it also helps that the GPS on my phone still works on airplane mode... who knew)

After perusing a few shops, Luke and I made our way to a park listed on the map as "Parc La Grange". It housed the greenery so familiar in this beautiful country and play equipment for Luke. He is such a sport, if I let him out for 10 minutes every hour or 2, he will allow me to drag him anywhere with little complaint. We then came upon a most beautiful estate within the park. I've noticed many of the parks here have a stunning home within and I'm assuming before they were parks they were estates and the property was then donated to the community.

We then saw the Caribbean blue water in the distance of Lake Geneva. The beautiful park was filled with well manicured grounds and gardens. Quite a little spot of heaven that deceivingly looks like a lushes Mediterranean resort... but the weather would beg to differ.

We left the park and began walking along the waters edge near the boat yard. The wind blew fiercely and created a most beautiful orchestra of bells and clicks from the hundreds of boats and their ropes moving. I have never heard anything like it, it was enchanting. It was very cold with the wind blowing, but the nearly clear shy and the beauty of the sun sparkling off the water made the weather manageable.

I haven't quite felt the heart of the city reach out to me, until today. I am not an international professional, nor a native French speaker and consequently I've felt shut out. But seeing the water and hearing the music of the boats, I felt welcomed into the city. I will enjoy these next 2 months!

I read a book a few years back that describes each person having a word written on their heart, and when they find a city/town with that same word, you are home. Perhaps Geneva and I don't have the same word written on our hearts, but we can appreciate one another... and I fully intend to do just that! 

Cooking Conversion Confusion and Exploring the City

I realized that in my last post I didn't clarify... I DO HAVE A TOILET! My apartment is certainly equipped with a beautiful toilet. I assure you I would be a lot more vocal about having to do my business squatting everyday! The toilet-less bathroom I made reference to was actually located in a public bathroom in a park, not my apartment. I apologize for the miscommunication and appreciate all of the concern! In fact here is a picture of my toilet. 

The latest challenge I encountered took place yesterday. It was truly a battle of wits and I am happy to say I came out the victor! I succeeded in my first stint of baking in France. Now, baking is nothing new to me, I have been happily creating and eating sweets for much of my life. Last night I had the desire to make some stove top rice pudding. Easy enough right? Rice, sugar, milk, vanilla and cinnamon... no problem, or so I thought. Baking is really simple, you follow a recipe and it generally works out well... but what happens when a simple recipe turns into a complex mathematical equation? I'm talking measurement conversions, you know those silly things you learned in 5rd grade and never thought to remember. After googling the conversion rate of 2 1/2 cups to ML we realized our one huge measuring utensil in the house only measures Grams or Litre (Liters). Mike kept spouting off mathmatical nonsense like 584 ML, and grams and ML being roughly equal and the square root of pi to the 3rd power, all while I kept looking at our huge measuring cup and trying to see the number 584 anywhere.

Eventually, we figured out the conversion rates (mostly by guestimating) and enjoyed really tastey rice pudding. Perhaps even better than normal as we had to put so much effort into the process. 

Saturday, I also had the chance to make fabulous French toast, on French bread... in France! So good. Although, we didn't have syrup... something else to add to the list of hard to come by in Europe... right next to peanut butter.

Today we had quite a fun day. Luke and I decided to make the trek to Geneva on our own while Mike was at work. As long as Luke had a snack and we sang "the wheels on the bus" he enjoyed the trip. Not sure about all the other passengers, but we enjoyed ourselves. It was quite a long bus ride so "The wheels on the bus" morphed into some kind of zoo extravaganza "the Monkeys on the bus say ohh ah ah ohh ah ah... the driver on the bus says 'this aint no zoo, ain't no zoo, aint no zoo" (I pictured him with a New York accent ). 

Upon arriving in Geneva (about a 20 minute bus ride with no traffic) we enjoyed un petit dejeuner (breakfast) of a crescent. We ventured out to explore the old city set on the hill... which meant stairs. Now stairs, a diaper bag, a toddler, and a stroller don't quite mix for a mother, but we were on an adventure and determined to make the climb. I unloaded Luke and lugged the stroller up those stairs. Luke didn't mind one bit, stairs are his favorite source of entertainment currently. The old city was well worth the climb. It is so picturesque, and Luke was thrilled when we found a park with swings. 

This city is beautiful and I am relieved to know that I can navigate through with my curious little boy.

My little navigator

One of the treasures the old city holds

Bobby Fisher has nothing on Luke

Luke is all tuckered out after a long day of exploring.