Archive for September, 2009
HandyCanadian.com: Find Qualified Local Home Improvement Contractors
Good news, fellow Canadians! We finally have access to a reliable online source to find reliable contractors (and I’m sure you know how hard it is). The website allows you to place job postings, rate contractors, see their profiles (company history, licensing information, references, etc.) and so on. But don’t take my word for it; check it out for yourselves: handycanadian.com.
Do spread the word. The more we use the website, the more power we’ll have as customers.
Life is a beach
I’m currently going through my vacation pictures for a future post, and came across this:
Basically, Alphonse Karr (French writer) said “Some people grumble because roses have thorns; I am thankful that the thorns have roses.”
I’ll try to remember that when things go awry with our house renovation.
Facelift
Hi everyone! As we’re slowly moving into Autumn, I felt like my blog needed a facelift to keep things fresh and interesting. Nothing drastic. I just wanted something cheery. I hope you’ll like the new design. Have a great day!
❤❤❤
I love colour…
(This is my dream reading room — with the controversial colour-coded arrangement).
Colour co-ordinated library via Apartment Therapy, originally uploaded by Lyndar T. Merciless.
… And the absence of colour…
I heart French food
It’s about time I talked about my vacation in France for you guys who would like to know a little bit more about French culture. Let’s start with the food, shall we?
French food is one of the reasons why I love France so much (with the exception of butter escargots and the likes eeew). I guess this post could fall under the category “this is why I’ll never be a size 2″ haha.
Unfortunately, I didn’t manage to get a seat in Business Class this time (note to self: don’t wait until the last minute to contact your network) and had to content myself with the food they served in coach class. I think the photo speaks for itself:
The first thing we did when we got to Paris-Charles de Gaulle was buy a parisien aka jambon-beurre (ham and butter sandwich – best sandwich ever). I was starving and super tired, and needed to refuel with food before hopping on the plane to Basel (my parents live near the Swiss and the German borders).
During our stay, we ate plenty of sandwiches and other “semi-meals”:
… Like bretzel with lots of cheese (yum)
… Croque-monsieur (topped with béchamel sauce and shredded cheese)
… And moricette (a tiny sandwich made with bretzel dough)
I tried to take a picture at every meal, but forgot to take some when the food was really too mouthwatering – like when we had Flammekueche or tarte flambée in French (“Alsatian dish composed of thin bread dough rolled out in a circle or a rectangle, which is covered by crème fraîche, onions and bacon”, according to Wikipedia) and tourte au riesling. Oh well…
Here’s a picture of an actual Flammekueche:
Source : tourisme-alsace.info
You can see a twist on the Flammekueche/tarte flambée in the following picture. They call it baguette flambée, which is simply a baguette topped with crème fraîche, onions and bacon.
Our first meal at my parents’ house was simple and delicious, just the way I like it. Barbecued Weisswurst (literally “white sausage” in German), fresh veggies and fruits, can’t get any better than that.
Then it was time to visit my younger brother and his wife (and my nephew – hi Maxence!) in Besançon (near Dijon, mostly famous for its mustard). My sister-in-law took us to a renowned local pâtisserie-chocolaterie called Baud. Let’s just say I’m not safe around chocolate – especially dark chocolate.
She got us individual cakes and macarons, and if you read my old French blog, you know how much I love me some macarons.
One of the big differences between French and North American barbecue meals is that in North America, people mostly eat steaks and ribs and chicken drumsticks whereas in France, they mostly eat sausages and whatever the thing in the second picture below is called (it’s like a thick slice of bacon).
While in Besançon, my younger brother also treated us to dinner at a small restaurant called L’Annexe and owned by one of his friends. They serve mostly seafood dishes. The food was amazing, but I especially loved their tarte aux pommes (topped with vanilla icecream yum), which was much tastier than Le Paris-Beurre’s.
We also visited my youngest brother and his wife (and my nephew – hi Anthony!), and they made an excellent fondue bourguignonne (served with a watercress salad, rice, potatoes and tabouleh) :
The following dish is called Fleischnacka. It’s a traditional Alsatian dish “consisting of minced beef (or sometimes other meats) rolled in fresh noodle dough and cut into slices which are then cooked in stock” (according to Wikipedia). It’s really good with just a salad.
The day before we left, we had a big family meal and my mom made a choucroute by popular demand. If I ever get sentenced to death, I think I will request a choucroute as my last meal. Choucroute and lots of chocolate haha.
Of course, we ate a lot of cheese too…
… And I drank way too much wine… I’ll talk about that in a future post. For now, suffice it to say that I miss France already.
I’m going to leave you with this picture of a famous Alsatian restaurant in Mulhouse called Zum Saüwadala, which literally means “The little pig’s tail” in Alsatian. The sign makes me smile every time I see it. It shows 2 happy pigs wearing folk/traditional Alsatian costumes.
