La poursuite de pain

Yes, the french know their food, but they don’t understand bread, real bread that is, not the baguette. I’m constantly searching good bread, the dark version, but it’s not easy to find. I’ve been substituting with crisp bread (internationally known as swedish) from Ikea or compromised on not-so-good-but-ok bread. But today I found the best one until now. ‘Le capnord’ (Northcape/Nordkapp) is the name (of course this kind of bread always has names like these, f.ex ‘le viking’ which I’ve also been buying a lot). It’s really dark and grainy, it’s almost like I wanna have bread for dinner (and no, we acctually don’t in Norway, believe it or not)

a little peace of heaven! Dedicated to my aunt Grete

Italie

Super winter vacation week in Italy and of course accompanied by lots of italian food. Top 3: 1) pasta (no kidding!) 2) artichokes 3) gelato (ice cream)

drunkard spaghetti: soaked in red wine!

 

the lucky eaters of this dish; Kaye and me

fresh and delicious, in Rome

gelatooo!

Rattrapage ;) (skippertak)

Sorry, I’m no good at this blogging routine. Cold cold cold in Lyon (we even had snow for some days) so now I’m really looking forward to my winter vacation the coming week, which I will be spending in Italy! First Paris for a couple of days (flights from Paris is always a good excuse to stay there for a bit), then I’m flying to Bologna to vist two american friends I got to know here in Lyon. In the end of the week me and Claire (and maybe Kaye too?) are going to Rome. Acctually it’s been snowing in Rome too, for the first time in over 20 years! But I’ll trust yr.no and hope for the 16 degrees it predicts for the 20th of february

fish dinner I made, with white wine sauce and capers

terrine de legumes. Thibaud of course

birthday dinner. Bouchon lyonnais, I've never before appreciated meat that much!

Anni & Petja came over last night and we made burgers, so big we could't bite over them and so good. And yes, in France you make burgers with baguettes

L’epicerie!!!

My favorite spot in Lyon, at least for budget lunching. and cakes! I think I’ve tried out almost every tartine on their menu (that’s their concept, tartines, big toasts with loads of delicious ‘pålegg’)

Last time I was there they had a new one, so Claire, this one’s for you. Tartine du jour, with eggplant, chevre and smoked ham – mmmm

Lundi soir, epuisée

When you’ve missed the bus and then looked in two velo station to find a velo and three stations to put it back, it’s almost 21 and you’re hungry and tired it’s good to have roomies who prepare food for you. In this case, as you may have figured out, I was that unfortunate person, and Thibaud, my salvation

tomato with balsamico and herbs, the classic. and some serrano ham

as usual we almost finished before I though of taking a picture… gratinated cauliflower, mmm (blomkål altså)

London!

the chips. and some calamari

Just came back from a couple of great days in London with Viviana. We walked A LOT. And went to the theatre (‘six degrees of separation’ at Old Vic), a temporary exhibit (‘from Bowie to Beatles’ at National Portrait Gallery), Tate Modern,Brick Lane, of course the january sales ++ On the food side: I actually didn’t eat fish & chips! But I ate chips at least. And a couple of other good things, like:

delicious libanese food in Brick Lane. forgot the name of the place :/

Wangamama. Noodles that made me want go to Asia again!

Quand on n’a pas beaucoup de temps…tapas!

Everyone (except me) still got exams, but we wanted to do a dinner together, so the solution? Tapas! Everyone brings something, we’ve got a lot of food and voila – everyone’s happy

deep consentration

Les desserts…

OK, food blog starting not so good. I keep forgetting to take pictures of the food before we get to the dessert! So here I’ve got two desserts to start with. Btw I keep fascinating the french by telling them of the rigid norwegian diet with desserts reserved for sundays (mostly) – they feel sorry for us…

Galette de roi

Linked to the catholic Epiphanie the 6th of january (don’t ask me what it’s about…) the french do a strange cake thing. It’s called galette de roi (kings cake) and it’s basically a too sweet almond cake (som fyrstekake på norsk, og jf navnet!) and there’s a plastic figure inside (normally of a king). The youngest person has to climb under the table while another person cuts the cake and the person under the table has to say the names of the persons precent to distribute the cake pieces. And the person who gets the king in his/hers cake piece gets the crown and is king (or queen) for the night and also has to chose a queen (or king).  It’s funny to see links between the traditions in our diffrent countries, this reminds me a bit of ‘mandel i grøten’ or what?

Charly so happy to have to go under the table

the king is found!

The king. I chose Charly for a QUEEN

 Ile flottante

After cinema (tried to see Avatar but ended up with a french movie instead) Cecilia and I tried to go to a syrian restaurant I got recommended, but as it was closed we ended up with heavy lyonnaise food (always) and a yet heavier dessert, ‘Ile flottante’ (floating island). It’s a mountain of meringue in a sea of crème anglaise. It is made by whipping egg whites, then poach (? posjere) them and put in vanilla-flavored cream.

Cecilia bravely trying to finish (we could barely finish half of it)

Noël? et la norriture

I desember har eg plutseleg sakna Noreg litt, meir bestemt adventstida i Noreg. Dei driv ikkje med sånt i Frankrike! Første år uten kalender, det er nesten ikkje julelys i gatene (med unntak av lysfesten då sjølvsagt), ingen har noko i vindauga (sjølv om ein kan finne mykje jalla i Noreg då, ikkje minst dei amerikanskinspirerte blinkande husa!), ingen kakebaking/juleverksted! Så, eg måtte ta saken i eigne hender. Første stopp: Ikea!

kan informere om at pepperkaker med appelsinsmak ikkje var ein suksess...

Og denne søndagen, St.Lucia, inviterte eg alle fransk/norske til julefeiring. Alle dei franske her har vore på utveksling i Noreg og fleire av dei snakkar t.o.m norsk!

Thibaud trylla også fram fransk julemiddag søndag kveld!

foie gras!

og sneglar. "slik gjer du" demonstrerer le francais

Og for dokke som synes det blir litt mange matbilder, hold dokke fast: Amerikanske matmums Claire har overtalt meg til å gjere to ting med blogen etter nyttår: 1) gjere mat til den raude tråden 2) skrive på engelsk (så ho kan lese den) - eg trur eg vil klare å poste oftare då og, så matblog it is! (tar uansett nesten alltid bilde av maten, sidan det stadig er nye fancy ting – slik blir det med middagsordning mellom fire nasjonaliteter)

matmumsane

Claire og Kaye seier sjølv at planlegger sine reiser delvis utifrå kulinariske perspektiv, dei snakka i veker både før og etter om dei belgiske pommes frites’a dei skulle ete på helgetur til Brussel. Claire kan sperre opp augene og sei “Kva hadde dokke til middag i går? Kva var ingrediensane? Fortell!” og Kaye har uttalt følgande på pastabaren vi går til ein gong i veka “Fusili is soooo good, it’s probably one of my top 5 pasta shapes” Kor mange pastaformer finnes det eigentleg? Det er alltid ein glede å ha dei på middag ettersom dei er over seg av begeistring “did you make this from scratch? this is sooo delish, Claire, how much is this just what you wanted most in the world right now?”

Fête des lumières!

Den største årlege begivenheten i Lyon er lysfestivalen i starten av desember, og dette var verkeleg over all forventning! Bakgrunnen for feiringa, ifølge min bestevenn Wikipedia: “The origins of the festival date to 1643 when Lyon was struck by plague.^[1] The municipal councillors (échevins) promised to pay tribute to Mary if the town was spared. Ever since, a solemn procession makes its way to the Basilica of Fourvière on this day to light candles and give offerings in the name of Mary. The event thus commemorates the day Lyon was consecrated to the Virgin Mary.”

Heile 4 millionar menneske inntek sentrum av Lyon denne helga, i motsetning til dei 600 000 som bur der på dagleg basis. Crowded! Vi starta med tapas hos finske Petja og Anni og deretter gjekk vi rundt i byen i to-tre timar og såg på show og folkeliv, sippande til vin chaud (gløgg-ish). Dei flottaste bygningane og kirkene i byen vart brukt som lerret for fancy lysinstallasjonar, det var typ gapande munnar på oss. skulle ønske eg kunne få med musikken her også, menmen. Here we go, amatørfotoversjonen:

dette var nesten litt skummelt!

her såg det ut som om heile museet skulle kollapse!

"wow!"

typisk Erasmusmiks; tysk, norsk, norsk, amerikansk, finsk, finsk, tysk...

Musée des beaux-arts hadde "lysbildevisning" på pariserhjulet

før...

Dei siste bileta her er St.Jean-katedralen, og dette showet var ein ‘hommage’ til arbeidarane som oppførte katedralen.

søndag var det fyrverkeri

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