A taste of America

We were really craving some American food. Paul was on a business trip this week to Paris and then to Turin in Italy and I was "on my own" for food. There is a McDonalds not too far from our apartment and I decided to break down and have a Big Mac. After my French class on Thursday I stopped into McDo (pronounced Mic-Doe) and splurged 5.80 euro for the Big Mac (no fries, no Coke... just the burger). Well, other than it tasting familiar, it was pretty bad... the lettuce was wilted and old... and well... just not up to the McDonalds standard.

So on Saturday morning, still craving something American... we went on a quest to find more American-tasting food. There is a restaurant that serves bagels and also sells American products like Oreos and CoCo-Puffs. We ate there and it was SO good. Funny though, the bagel "meal" comes with a bagel, a beverage, and a 'side'. The side is either.... tortilla chips with a blob of queso... a pickle... or cole slaw...

Ugggght.... What is wrong with simply a bagel, cream cheese and a cup of coffee????

It was a pretty interesting place. On the speakers was not music, but a tape of old American commericals... like for Alka-Seltzer, Alpha-Bits, etc. etc. And the shelves in the place were stocked with American products. It was comforting to know that I could indeed find Crisco in France. I didn't look at the price though. They also sold POP TARTS. I love those things ... but they only had the frosted ones. I like them plain. They had a wide assortment of Campbell soups too. Paul asked why they would sell Campbells soup, but I know from trying to cook American recipes that many American dishes use Campbells soup... and I've had to eliminate them from my repetoire because you just can't find them in the stores. They also sold Tabasco sauce, Paul Prudhomme products, Old Bay Seasoning, BEN AND JERRY"S ICE CREAM, and many other products that I guessed were wanted by Yankees... cape cod stuff... I didn't recognize any of it.