Tiny Town may feel like home, but I can hardly get everything my little heart desires here. In the four years and change I've been here now, I'm surprised by how many foreign foodstuffs have made it to our corner of France, even if I have to go to Troyes to find them. When I moved here, I asked the lady at the cheese counter in one of the grande surface stores if she had cheddar and she laughed and said I'd never find that here! It finally showed up in the other grande surface last year and you can guess who's getting my business! Ok, the other one is actually closer to Tiny Town, but I like to pretend I'm voting with my euros...
The point is, there are fewer and fewer things I pine for to the point that I'll ask someone in the States to send me something. Today I bought a nice big chunk (about a pound and a half) of cheddar, which I immediately shredded and put half in the freezer when I got home, and a couple of containers of fried onions, which aren't a perfect facsimile of French's fried onions, but I can still make a green bean casserole now and again (also thanks to the Campbell's condensed soups I bought at a grocery near Doc's house!). I was also very excited to find a source for dry pinto beans in Les Halles, an "open air" market (now enclosed) in Troyes, at a stall called Epicerie du monde. You can be sure that I'll be attempting to make some refried beans this weekend.
Of course the downside to all this (that is, if you're Stéph) is that I get to inflict my foreign tastes on my husband, who then tells me if he can be bothered to eat them again. Refried beans were not a big hit the first time around when they showed up at my door in cans, so I'll be making a nice lentil and sausage stew for Stéph, to eat while I eat my bean burritos. That suits me fine, since I'm not a fan of lentils and sausage anyway!
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