La Cuisine

I guess it's no surprise that moving from Japan to France can give quite a culture shock!

You know the state of mind just minutes before falling asleep, where you think you are dreaming and don't realize that you are actually awake? A few nights ago in that stage of pre-sleep, I realized that I was "dreaming" about Japanese food: cold soba, instant sticky rice and salmon and seaweed, big hot oily restaurant portions of miso ramen with bamboo shoots and hard-boiled eggs, chewy rice cakes and sweet red bean paste...I am still going through Japanese food withdrawal. I want it every day.

Which is ironic, since I am in The Land of Good Food. Maybe I should qualify that with "In the West." My cheese and red wine intake have both increased by about 200%. I am certainly not complaining. I've had fun preparing various dishes I couldn't make in Japan: whole wheat garlic pasta, grilled cheese with brie, goat cheese and fresh strawberries, portobello mushrooms with (what else) big slabs of camembert. And did I mention the coffee ice cream? (Noel heaven, Bill!) Yum.

Antonio, on the other hand, prefers Spanish sausage with his bread, instead of cheese. Last night he made me eat a piece insisting it was the "secret of Spain." (Whatever that can mean for a tubular hunk of pig.) The sausage was bloody and looked raw, but considering my diet last year, I can't use "raw" as an excuse to say no. I ate it, and it tasted good. Kind of spicy.

I never guessed that moving to France would teach me more about Spain...but it just goes to remind me that no matter how much globe-trotting I do, I will always know less than there actually is to know out there. It may be a small world, but it's cram-packed full of stuff.