French Vienoisseries

 One thing that people love about France are the pastries. As Americans, we probably use that word to cover everything from croissants to Napoleons to little fruit tarts. 

Here in France, those breakfast staples like croissants or pain au chocolat are called vienoisseries. It's made using yeast or puff pastry. When we first arrived, we were so grateful for any croissant or pain au raisin, but our tastes have gotten more refined. 

The bakery up the hill has a pain au chocolat (called a chocolatine in this part of France) made in the ancient tradition -- à la ancienne -- and the chocolate is wrapped inside layers and layers of flaky puff pastry. I have a favorite bakery for pain au raisin when I go to the Esperaza market on Sundays. 

But luckily, our local bakery has some vienoisseries that you don't find everywhere. I'm sure I've written about the chausson framboises, a kind of raspberry turnover, that the baker's wife reminds me should be chausson à la framboise. I've never seen them anywhere else. 

Recently, the bakery has started making croissant chocolat. You might think this is the same as a pain au chocolat, but it isn't.

Instead, it is shaped like a croissant. It has chocolate drizzled over the top, and it has melty chocolate in the middle -- totally different from a pain au chocolat. 

Un croissant chocolat for breakfast

I stopped this morning to get a sandwich that Earl and I would share for lunch, and I saw a tray full of croissant chocolat. What could I do? I had to order one. 

The inside has creamy chocolate, unlike the pain au chocolat. 

The woman waiting on me said, "Il n'y en a plus," there aren't any more. I waved my hand toward the tray, and she realized that the baker had refilled the case with a dozen chocolate croissants. 

My lucky day.

Do you have a favorite vienosserie? 

Breakfast Obsession

I am obsessed with breakfast food lately. And not just at breakfast.
In the past two weeks, I've made blueberry yogurt muffins -- twice. I prepared croissants and pineapple for breakfast before Spencer returned to school.

Last Sunday, I fixed pancakes and sausage for lunch when we got home from mass.
On Tuesday, as I worked out at the YMCA, someone on TV was talking about French toast. I made French toast when I returned home, just for myself because everyone else was asleep or at work.
On Wednesday, I prepared Belgian waffles and bacon for dinner.
This morning, I cooked scrambled eggs with sauteed tomatoes.
I'm not sure why I've been fixated on breakfast food.
When I was a kid, I refused to eat breakfast food. My mom or I would fix half of a peanut butter sandwich, and I would go to school after eating the folded over sandwich and drinking a cup of milk.
Hopefully, I'm just getting all of these delicious breakfast foods out of my system.
I think my family would agree that the yummiest are the blueberry yogurt muffins.
Here's the recipe from Taste of Home website.

Ingredients

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 6 tablespoons sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup vanilla yogurt
• 3 tablespoons canola oil
• 2 tablespoons 2% milk
• 1/2 cup fresh or frozen blueberries

But I make these even more caloric by adding a streusel topping from the Southern Living cookbook.
1/2 cup sugar
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 cup butter softened
Mix the streusel and sprinkle on top of the muffins.
Hope I didn't make you all hungry.

Dreaming of France -- Good Meals, Bad Meals

Please join this weekly meme. Grab a copy of the photo above and link back to An Accidental Blog. Share with the rest of us your passion for France. Did you read a good book set in France? See a movie? Take a photo in France? Have an adventure? Eat a fabulous meal or even just a pastry? Or if you're in France now, go ahead and lord it over the rest of us. We can take it.
Food is always a big draw for visitors to France. I'm not a foodie. I don't plan specific meals that I will eat or arrange tours at chocolateries or take cooking classes -- not that I wouldn't love to do all of those things.
I can't think of many meals that I haven't enjoyed in France.
Well, one does come to mind.
Earl and I enjoyed the book Luncheon of the Boating Party by Susan Vreeland, and last time we went to France together we decided to eat at the restaurant which inspired the painting by Renoir.
The setting did not disappoint us, but the food was not as tasty as I'd expected from a French restaurant, even a mundane French restaurant.
The restaurant is located along the Seine outside of Paris. We took a train then muddled our way along the streets in search of the river and the restaurant.
We were there in April, so it was asparagus season.

The markets in Paris were full of thick stalks of white asparagus. So we both ordered asparagus for a starter but were disappointed by the limpness (make your own sexual joke here).

Even the dessert, although pretty, was a little bland. 

 
My favorite meal in France is usually breakfast, and I like to eat it at the hotel.
The pitcher of coffee and the pitcher of steamed milk alongside the basket of croissants and mini jars of jam. Yum.

Do you have a favorite meal in France?

I hope you'll visit each others' blogs to see more posts on Dreaming of France. 

Breakfast Test

Last night when I got home from work after 9, I found my 17-year-old sitting on the couch in the dark watching college football. I plopped down beside him for a few minutes to chat. Before he went to bed, I asked whether he'd like pancakes for breakfast.
"Yes," he replied.
"Scrambled eggs too?" I asked.
"Sure."
So he went to bed and when I woke up Friday morning, I realized I'd have to cut short my run in order to get back in time to cook breakfast for Tucker. That was fine.
I just ran a couple of miles and headed to the kitchen.
Pancake batter at the ready, eggs beaten, blueberry sauce simmering in the pot, I listened for the shower to turn off so I could cook the eggs and pancakes.
I scrambled the eggs, making sure to get them dry the way he liked. I carefully cooked the pancakes to be sure they were done, but not brown.
By the time Tucker moved to hang up his towel in the bathroom, dressed for the day, I called to him that his breakfast was ready.
I set the plate on a place mat and poured an oversized glass of milk, which is what he drinks most mornings.

As he walked into the dining room, he looked at the plate and said, "I don't have time to eat that. I need to leave."

I shrugged and didn't make eye contact. 

"What am I supposed to do? I can't possibly start eating now."

"Do what you have to do," I said. 

So he slipped his shoes on and approached me as I stood over the sink washing the skillet I used to cook the eggs. He bent down for me to kiss him on his bearded cheek.

"Thanks for the breakfast, Mom," he said.

Then he paused at the wooden cabinet and pulled out a pack of Pop Tarts before he closed the door behind him.

I stared at the plate. I hadn't been home from my run long enough to be hungry yet and I thought about being angry at my selfish teenager. But I think selfish teenager is redundant. 

Tucker spends a lot of evenings at home alone while I teach. Many evenings dinner is just pizza or something we pick up at Subway. 

I spend a lot of time juggling classes, talking to Grace or Spencer at college, spending time with my husband. Tucker may feel the need to test me, to see if I'll change my schedule to kowtow to his needs.

And this morning, I did. I passed his test. 

But because I didn't throw a fit about him skipping the breakfast I lovingly cooked, I'm pretty sure that guilt is nibbling at him somewhere. 

Something to Wake Up For

During spring break, I received a letter from the school that said both boys have two tardies for the quarter. If they get three tardies, they'll have detention.
It was pretty early in the quarter to already have chalked up two tardies.
Mostly, I blame Spencer, who drives the boys to school.
School starts at 8; he rolls out of bed about 7:40, sticks his head under the shower, throws on clothes and grabs breakfast as he walks out the door at 7:54. Luckily, he has a parking spot this year so he doesn't have to search for a spot. But apparently this schedule was not working for the boys this quarter.
I told Spencer he needed to start getting up at 7:15 -- that's about when Tucker gets out of the shower. Tucker likes to take his time in the morning.
"Okay, but if I'm getting up that early, there better be something good for breakfast," Spencer warned.

Here are the boys at the Columbus Clippers games on Easter.

Usually, I teach early classes, sometimes leaving before the boys get up. This quarter, for some reason, I'm teaching all afternoons. So for the end of Spencer's senior year, I can make sure there's something for breakfast.
I'm not creating anything too elaborate. It might just be a toasted bagel with cream cheese, or I slice a grapefruit in half and then cut around each individual segment so they'll slide out of the rind. Spencer sprinkles it with sugar and devours it. I might cut up a canteloupe, put some in Spencer's lunch and put a bowl full on the table. I have made French toast and this morning I baked sweet rolls.
One of my friends said it was ridiculous that Spencer expected a reward for doing what he was supposed to do -- getting out of bed and going to school. I'm not sure that breakfast is a reward, and it is kind of nice that I get a chance to spend my mornings sitting at the table with the boys before they leave for school.
Tucker, who usually skips breakfast, has even started to eat if I put something on the table.
I don't think I'm raising my boys to expect a woman to wait on them. I think they're just typical teenagers who are hungry constantly, and sometimes they'll skip a meal or grab something easy but not healthy, rather than fix something for themselves. In less than a month, Spencer will be finished with high school classes, so this seems like a good way to end the school year.
Any breakfast suggestions?

French Breakfast

The snow, the cold, the gray days, all make me reminisce about those beautiful 10 days Earl and I spent in Paris last April.

The temperature hovered in the 70s. We walked, we ate, we drank. Aaah.
We visited all the popular tourist sites and found some that were off the beaten track.

Sometimes, it just makes me feel warm and happy to look at those pictures. Thanks for letting me share them with you.
Plus, I'm writing this in the morning and I'm hungry, so here's a picture of a French hotel breakfast.

Funny,I'm still hungry.