Monday, March 8, 2010

Tarte Normande and French opening hours

The most difficult part of my adaptation to living in France is getting used to the French opening hours. I’m still struggling with these after living in Moscow:
* Pharmacies close for 2 hour lunch
* Food stores close at 1 pm on Sunday
* Hairdressers are closed on Monday
* Coffee shops close at 7 pm
To give you an idea of how patisseries work:
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I thought that it will difficult to surprise me after getting to know all this. However, I went to my favorite patisserie on rue des Sablons yesterday and found the following:
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They are on vacations!?! :)  :(
OK, what do I do now? How am I going to live without palmier till Monday? I’m going to Rue Grande. No great palmier of course. Let’s try ‘tarte normande’. Large round sectored apple cake. After eating it and recognizing how delicious it was I go check wiki and wiki know it J. One of traditional Normandy desserts:  Apple slices baked on buttery custard and tender puff pastry with calvados!
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This is the second apple dessert that has deeply impressed me. The first one was ‘tarte tatin’. Seems that every several regions here in France have their own proud apple cakes!. I can’t decide, which is better! They are both so good.
Which is your favorite one?

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