Easter preview

The Easter bunny outdid himself and brought me a care package all the way from France! French Easter candy is definitely one of the things I miss from home (along with socialized medicine, but we won't go there).

Pâtisseries typically sell fancy Easter confections: large, hollow chocolate eggs, chickens, rabbits or bells (more on bells later), wrapped in ribbons and filled with smaller candy: little marzipan vegetables (I've always liked the little cauliflowers best!); "friture" (little chocolates shaped like fish, shrimp, mussels...); pastel-colored fondant eggs; little praliné eggs... They traditionally come in distinctive pastel, illustrated cardboard boxes.

So why the bell motif? In France, Catholic tradition oblige, it is church bells on their way to Rome that bring candy, not the Easter bunny. I've been told many times that flying bells that drop candy don't make sense, but personally I don't see how bunnies carrying little baskets make any more sense ;)

V.F.: Bon ben je traduis pas hein, tout le monde sait ce que c'est les oeufs de Pâques, ce qui va dedans, ce qui va autour... Merci les cloches, qui sauront se reconnaître!

Bonne fête to me

Who cares about February 13 when the big fluffy day is tomorrow, right? Well I kinda do. You see, February 13th is my fête, aka the Feast of Saint Beatrice. That's right, Beatrice has a day named after her, like Patrick and Valentine. Henri, Robert and many others also do, for that matter; they just didn't have the right connections at Hallmark I guess.

The fête is a day that is supposed to honor the memory of a particular saint, whichever gruesome way they got to meet their maker; but like many French traditions, it is largely secular nowadays despite being rooted in religion. I've heard it described as a second birthday; it's a bit like that I guess.

Typically friends, family and coworkers will say "bonne fête!" to you; maybe you'll get a card, or flowers, or a little sumthinsumthin'. Florist web sites often have a fête reminder or let you look up fête dates; and after the evening news, the weather forecast guy typically announces whose fête it is tomorrow. Woe to who forgets!

Interestingly, I've noticed an anti-Valentine trend on French sites recently, and encouragements to boycott Valentine's Day and celebrate Saint Beatrice instead. I say bring it on!

Here's a French site that lists the names to celebrate each day of the year: http://www.saint-dicton.com/mois/fevrier.php . Makes me glad I wasn't named Adeltrude.

Edible idioms

Clotilde from the Chocolate and Zucchini blog has been doing an interesting series of posts on food-related French idiomatic expressions... there are many of these, and they usually designate things that have nothing to do with eating! A few examples from her
"Edible idiom" archive:

• Mi-figue mi-raisin - literally "half-fig, half-grape", figuratively "ambiguous"
• Couper la poire en deux - literally "to cut the pear in two", figuratively "to compromise"
• S'occuper de ses oignons - literally "to look after one's onions", figuratively "to mind one's own business"

Beyond the translation, she's actually explaining the origin of these expressions; it's a fun read. I'm a bit of a language geek and love how idioms reflect a culture, history and way of thinking. Not surprising that food would be ubiquitous in French!

Move over, groundhog

Last night I made crêpes. Yup, yesterday might have been Groundhog Day in the US, but it was Chandeleur in France, aka Candlemas. Shame on me, it had slipped my mind until I read Anne's post (in French), just in the nick of time. Bad French girl, bad.

Cultural interlude:
Like most French holidays, Chandeleur stems from an obscure religious origin and turned along the way into an occasion to eat something with butter in it.

"Chandeleur" comes from the Latin Festa Candelarum, meaning Feast of candles. Meaning that at some point, blessed candles charged with religious symbolism (Christ, light of the world etc) used to be involved.

The origin of crêpes and their association with the holiday is unclear; round and golden like the sun that starts coming back in February everywhere but in Seattle? Given out to pilgrims by a gourmet 5th century pope? Using flour to guarantee a bountiful wheat harvest?

Anyway, the tradition of making crêpes still holds today; when I was in Kindergarten we'd make them at school. Some people (like my great-aunt) still flip their crêpes with a gold coin in their hand, to ensure prosperity in the coming year. Looks like it's been working fine for my great-aunt, maybe I should start doing it.

To make crêpes, you will need:

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3 eggs
• 2 cups milk, or 1 cup milk + 1 cup water
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla sugar (optional)
• 2 tbsp vegetable oil or melted butter
• 2 tbsp rum or Grand Marnier (you can skip it but it tastes much better if you don't)

There's no vegan version that I know of. If there is such a thing, I'd rather not find out, thank you.

Useful rule of thumb:

• proportions work out to be about 3 spoons of flour per egg
• 1 spoon of flour = 1 crêpe

How to:

1. Put the eggs, sugars and flour in a mixing bowl. Whisk them together if you need the exercise, but use a blender if you want to avoid lumps
2. Whisk the milk/water in progressively
3. Stir in the alcohol and the melted butter
4. Lightly grease a crêpe pan with an oiled paper towel. You can use a regular pan, but you'll be greatly increasing your odds of making fugly crêpes, especially if it's not non-stick.
5. Heat the pan on medium-high (it needs to be hotter than for pancakes; crêpes cook fast)
6. When your pan is hot, thinly coat the bottom with a ladle of batter
7. When the edges look cooked and start lifting from the pan, slide a spatula under the crêpe and turn it over. You can also flip it, but this only works if there are no witnesses.
8. Cook for 10-15 seconds
9. Serve warm with an assortment of toppings: preserves, powdered sugar, chestnut cream, Nutella...
   

If there's a French person around, don't talk about Nutella unless you're prepared to spend the next hour listening to how Nutella in the US tastes different from Nutella in Europe, and how Costco hasn't carried it in almost 3 months.