Macarons and Macarongs.

Ever since I first tried one in Lyon in 2008 I have had a bit of a thing for Macarons. My use of the French spelling is not to be poncey but to distinguish it from the English macaroon (A single layered plain almond or coconut biscuit). The macarons I am talking about are the Parisian style pastel coloured biscuits sandwiched together with ganache or butter cream fillings.

This year when I was living in France I tried a fair few macarons and at Christmas bought a big box to bring back to England with me to share with the family which went down very well indeed. When I visited Paris I went to Ladurée and sampled some of their delights although I have since read that Pierre hermé actually has the best macarons in Paris and not ladurée but my rose and ginger macaron was divine and so until I try Hermé’s I am satisfied.

Macarons are becoming more popular in the UK, and with recipes in food magazines and on cooking programmes, making them is (or should be) easier than ever.

Talking over a cup of tea one afternoon my mother and I decided we would try making macarons for ourselves and set to work. We found a recipe online which seemed to be one of the simpler ones we had read and followed it to create macarons. They were a complete success! They had a smooth crisp outer shell, were moist on the inside and had the all important foot. We sandwiched them with a dark chocolate ganache and raspberry jam and they were delicious. News of our success had been spread to my boyfriend in Cheshire, my boss down the road and my dad who at the time was in China! We couldn’t wait to make another batch to show off our newly acquired baking skill. We could make the perfect macarons... Or so we thought.

Almost 10 batches later and we have not been able to make another successful batch! No matter how hard we try. I have made them by myself, we have made them as a team. We have used different almonds, then the same almonds, different food colouring, different recipes, the same recipe NOTHING WORKS they just come out as lumpy undercooked blobs. We just can’t seem to get it right. To say we had beginners luck is an understatement.

Reading online we are not the only people to encounter problems but some of the recipes for “perfect macarons” make my heart sink, they involve doubling up on trays, spinning the trays mid cook, leaving the oven open, removing a tray, and then finishing the cooking with the oven off. I can’t bring myself to try this because they were so perfect t the first time and all we did was leave them to do their thing no faffing about at all.

By my own admission, despite my love of cooking and trying new things, when a new recipe doesn’t work or things go very wrong I do tend to sulk a bit. I think it is important for my own sanity to give up on macarons once and for all. Anyone for a trip to Paris?

Happiness is a bowl of Norfolk strawberries

A market at last

Before moving to France, I was convinced I would make weekly trips to a local food market and relish in the delightful produce that France had to offer and make weekly trips to buy my fruit and vegetables from a bustling market among locals. I had experienced something similar on a trip to Lyon where a Saturday food market lined the river bank and it was the most spectacular place to be. Unfortunately my experience in Nancy was to be very different. There is an indoor fruit and vegetable market in Nancy but I have struggled to suss out who had the best produce and found some of it quite tired and on the odd occasion I have bought something from them the stall holders often struggled with my accent which made me immediately clam up and run for the nearest supermarket where I was safe in the knowledge I could choose my own fruit and vegetables without having to speak to anyone. My past experiences of French supermarkets had demonstrated a wide variety of good quality fresh fruit and vegetables and even better, the majority of it local to France. The experience I have had here has not been so good, the supermarket in the centre of town which I use has very poor quality produce, often mouldy and covered in fruit flies which really saddened me. Not having a kitchen here, my need for lots fresh produce is reduced, and often a rummage around would find some okay apples and clementines, a passable cucumber and a bag of rocket but deep down I yearned for a local market full of good quality local produce sold by people that knew what they were selling me and had a passion for it. Luckily for me, everything changed last week, and although it is now just 2 weeks until I leave France, in my opinion it is better late than never.

Every second Sunday in Nancy there is a brocante market which is an antiques and junk market. On a side street attached to the market, I walked along a path lined with stalls, chickens roasting on a spit, cheese of every shape and size, local honey and of course, the Holy Grail that is a proper French fruit and vegetable stall. I spied the pile of deep red glistening cherries with a sign sticking out that proudly noted their place of origin as France and before I knew it I had queued up and purchased 200 grams of them. I realised how silly I had been to be scared, I know the vocabulary for ordering food, and the result meant a happy afternoon in the sun eating gorgeous cherries, I was thrilled. This week I went down again, whilst there was no brocante I was pleased to see the food market had returned. I queued up among the Sunday shoppers listening to people ordering and being advised on the best produce whilst being handed samples of torn apart fresh apricots. Luckily I was served by the younger calmer grocer and not the exuberant older gentleman who would shout at the crowd enthusiastically about his special deals for the weekend. I ordered 300 grams of cherries as the smaller purchase a week disappeared rather too quickly, a punnet of small sweet strawberries, six apricots and some rhubarb. Everything I bought is French produce, everything was ordered by me, and best of all from a Market like the ones I had been dreaming of before I even arrived.

What do French students actually eat?

Having lived as a student in France for over a month now I am still confused as to what students in halls of residence actually eat?

My kitchen here consists of just a double sink and a pair of electric hobs (One of which doesn't actually work!). As far as I can work out this is meant to service a whole floor which has to be well over 50 students!

Before I arrived, some UEA students who lived in this very building two years ago prepared me for how bad the kitchens would be and that they never really cooked at all. In France the "CROUS" who run student residences also run university residences called Resto-U. The food at these restos is actually quite nice for institution food, for 3 Euros you can get the following:

A starter which is a kind of salad often there are at least 3 to choose from. The main course there are normally two on offer, chicken/fish type deal although I have eaten my favourite Merguez about 5 times since being here which I won’t complain about. These mains come with two different veggies often haricots verts. You can then choose two cold dishes from a selection of yogurts, fruits and compotes, and finally there is the cheese and bread...pretty self explanatory. This food is good food (there are of course occasional bad days it is all about preference) and for 3 Euros one often goes home a full tummy with a yogurt and bread for tomorrow’s breakfast. However there is a flaw in the Resto U. I am fortunate enough to have one on site which is just a short walk from my room, however being so close to the university it is only open presumably through lack of demand on the weekend, Monday-Thursday night and Monday-Friday lunch time which which leaves 5 whole meal times for us to fend for ourselves, and of course in the middle of all these strikes it is often not open when it should be anyway!

On these nights off your choice is limited to queuing for the one working hob in the massive empty room that is the kitchen. I assume many students have microwaves but at 50 Euros they are not a decision to be taken lightly on a student budget and even then you might not actually have a fridge. There are three buildings here, A, B and C. The rooms in building B are the most basic and there are no fridges, so this is where you encounter a problem. You live a good 20 minutes from the nearest supermarket, you have no fridge and only two hobs WHAT DO YOU COOK?

As food and anything to do with food are my main passions in life, and making a meal out of nothing my main skill (inherited from my mother) I am slowly adjusting to making salads in my room and quickly heating up soup when the kitchen is free but I only have to live here for under a year. For many French students this will be their home for the next 3 years, and yes it is true that many students in France go to Uni near to home and as is evident by the mass exodus on a Friday, many go home for the weekend but I do know students who live a long way away or are doing a 3 year course but live in China. I can’t help but feel a little bit guilty and very spoiled coming from a country where university kitchens are catered for the number of people sharing, have a microwave and kettle and grill and oven (Not at UEA admittedly, it was a combi microwave and oven). Kitchens at home have a dining space where you meet people or share a meal having just cooked it together. Maybe it is the slight homesickness induced by watching endless episodes of Nigella programmes online but I am just curious as to whether the students here are happy queuing for the use of the kitchen and then scuttling away to eat in their rooms and if maybe in a country where food is so important they could take a leaf out of the UK's book and help make a university residence a home from home, after all as any student will know, it is home cooking you most the most when away at university.