Believe it or not, I did eat a few things other than Ladurée pastry/macarons while in France. While I’ll admit that sweets did make up the majority of my trip, there were a few non-sugary gems that must be highlighted.

The first, is the semi-fancy, semi-traditional (I’m big on the fusion, as you can see) French meal that I had with my new friend Kaitlynne from the US. It was the last night in Paris for both of us, so we decided to wander over to the St-Michel/Notre Dame area and find a cute place for dinner. We settled on Bistro 30, a cute little French restaurant that thankfully had a very affordable, three-course menu.

To start, Kaitlynne and I both went with salads. I think hers was a traditional garden salad with walnuts and some other flourishes. Mine was a salad with baked goat cheese rounds. As you can imagine, I was sold the second the ingredient “goat cheese” was included in the dish. It was awesome.

Delicious as it was, I felt like I really psyched myself out of trying some real French cuisine… ahem…

I was so close (I swear I’m not lying) to getting escargot, but in the end I chickened out. This photo was courtesy of our kind restaurant neighbours, a Russian couple who were also taking photographs of their food. You can find kindred spirits everywhere, apparently.

For my main course, I decided to try duck for the first time. Also having chickened (ducked?) out of trying foie gras, I went for something a little more safe and just got duck confit, which was absolutely incredible. They served it with some sort of amazing sauce that just made it so moist and salty.

OH NO, being kicked off the computer in the hostel. No more details for you…

I went to a cafe in Luxembourg Gardens (it replaced the one that Ernest Hemingway used to go to!) and got the house quiche with chicken, mushrooms and mesclun. Obviously I got more Fanta.

My visit in France ended with a short trip north to Arras to visit Natalie at Vimy Ridge. The night I arrived we had delicious pizza and I was in good company.

And because it’s so pretty, here! Have a picture of the Eiffel Tower. Until next time. Gotta run!

I will never be able to eat a Canadian dessert ever again. Not after stuffing my face with the amazingly decorated, gourmet pastries from Paris. I guess I can try to scarf down the occasional half a dozen cupcakes here and there, but it just won’t be the same. Not after two trips to Ladurée, arguably Paris’ most famous bakery chain.

This wasn’t just any old bakery, so don’t even start shaking your head at me. Ladurée invented the macaron, those tiny, round double-decker desserts you see, with a cookie top/bottom and a creamy ganache filling in the middle. They are like nothing you’ve ever had before – delicate (the cookie shell can be broken with the least bit of effort), yet somehow satisfyingly filling. Could be the ground almonds baked into them. Who knows. Anyways, since I like the Canadian version of these desserts, I knew I was bound to simply adore the Parisian version.

Sidenote: please do not confused macarons with macaroons. I too once confused these two desserts (before Brittany set me straight). The latter often contains coconut, which I am not a fan of one bit.

But back to Ladurée. When I spoke with my Parisian baker friend, he recommended that I go to the original Ladurée location, found at 16 rue Royale, just a short walk from the Place de la Concorde in front of the Tuileries (Louvre gardens).

My first, overly-excited trip to the café took place last Saturday when my old roommate Natalie came to visit me in Paris. You can see details of that trip as well as pictures of the pastries that we ate in this post.

Yesterday, I took my second trip to my new favourite place. Even though I had eaten five out of the six macarons that Natalie and I had bought (chocolate, vanilla, raspberry, salted caramel and lemon), I wanted more. There are more than a dozen different flavours of macarons, some seasonal and some permanent. I bought four more: a strawberry mint, orange blossom, rose and chuao chocolate. They were just as delicious as my five other ones.

Since it was not enough for me to just get (seriously) overpriced macarons, I also needed to buy another pastry. I chose one that I saw someone eating when Natalie and I were in the Ladurée tea salon. It was a rose Ladurée Religieuse, which in English, non-fancy talk, is basically a decadently iced pastry with a rose whipped cream and fresh raspberry centre. It was delicious and messy, but probably the best thing I’ve ever eaten in my life.

Before my pastry picnic occurred I, of course, needed to have a mini photo shoot with all my dessert. I sat myself down on a shaded park bench across from the Concorde’s obelisk and snapped away.

After dessert, I wandered about the city, Ladurée bag in hand. I couldn’t just throw it out anywhere, after all. I felt like it was a sacred token of my time spent in Paris. Instead, it was disposed of just a few steps away from Napoleon’s grave. An appropriate burial for such gourmet wrappings.

There’s a Ladurée shop in the Charles de Gaulle airport, where I’m heading tonight. Oh god.

PS: non-edited pictures courtesy of my actual camera. Thank you to Natalie’s computer and its uploading abilities.
PPS: gotta run and catch my train! Don’t mind of zero edited grammar/spelling. Yikes.

Dear readers, I am typing this message to you from a different continent (unless you happen to be reading from Europe, in which case I am super honoured and semi-speechless).

For the next month, I will be touring around this beautiful continent with my dear friend Gord. We plan on hitting up all the sights and cities, from Santorini to Copenhagen, Dublin to Vienna.

This being said, I obviously won’t have much time or ability to cook. And so, as an alternative to not blogging at all, I’ve decided to turn Hilary Makes into a partial food diary.

Posting pictures is a tad difficult, since I’m doing it all from my phone, but so long as you are willing to bear with my my semi-blurry iPhone photos and occasionally poor, auto-corrected grammar. You have been warned.

For the next few days, I am solo-exploring Paris before meeting up with Gord in Santorini next week. Today was my first real day in the city, and I had some delicious food.

Below, you can see my delicious ham sandwich on a baguette, the innards drizzled with olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Holy hell it was good.

Next, the strawberry mascarpone pastry I ate at, get this, LADUREE. THE ORIGINAL LADUREE by the Louvre. I went with my old roommate Nat who joined me in the city for a day. We had a little (expensive) tea party, and it was absolutely glorious. Natalie got a decadent pastry (the most expensive dessert on the menu!) that tasted exactly like roses. Delightful.

Finally, no trip to Laduree (or Paris, I daresay) is complete without the purchase and prompt consumption of several macarons. Nat and I got a box of six (she ate one, I ate five). The last picture does not do the gorgeous-ness of them justice, as it was taken by the light of my lamp in my hostel room. Better pictures on my real camera, if only I could access them…

Alright, so that’s all for today’s note-worthy food. I also bought freshly made marshmallows, but forgot to take a photo of those. Will try harder to remember these things.

Want to see what non-food things I’m up to? Check out Gord and I’s travel blog at www.ghabroad.wordpress.com

Until tomorrow.