Zanksgeeving

American holidays, especially ones of the family-recipe-fueled-gastronomical-goodness varieties, are always tough when you’re yanked out of the traditional comfort zone and dropped in a foreign country. This year, in an effort to preemptively ease the holiday homesickness, the group of us ex-pats was invited to a tiny restaurant in the first arrondissement, Oh Mon Cake, for a “Thanksgiving cocktail.” (And yes, we all realized the words “Thanksgiving” and “cocktail” presented a bit of an oxymoronic situation.)

Whether or not we were aware of it, many of us woke up yesterday morning dreaming of stuffing and slow-cooked turkeys with gravy and homemade cranberry sauce simmering on the stovetop. Instead of sleeping in, shimmying into a pair of yoga pants and a sweatshirt and rolling up to Grandma’s house in undeniable I’m-ready-to-gain-15-pounds style, I took the Metro to work with the rest of the blurry-eyed commuters, and spent my morning explaining this picture to my coworkers:

"But...why?" was the most frequently asked question. "That, I know nothing," my sage French self replied solemnly.

“Zanksgeeving,” is a subject of simultaneous fascination and confusion for the French, as I soon discovered, which is perhaps why we ended up at a place serving Thanksgiving-type fare in the form of cakey breads and shot glasses of soup. Not quite American, not quite French.

Though I’m sure we were for the most part expecting the worst, the homage to our turkey slaughtering ancestors from across the pond was surprisingly edible and not as comical as expected. What was comical was cramming about 35 of us in a small upstairs room and watching everyone try to determine if this was a French cocktail party, where guzzling your drink first thing and hunting around for a napkin to fill up with a stash of peanuts or chips or something is a faux-pas, or an American one, where toting around a bottle of champagne for yourself is acceptable after a few rounds.

The confusion lasted for a respectable five minutes, and then disintegrated into a free for all. Five minutes after that, the conversations had ratcheted back to a standard American 8.9 on the Richter scale. Slices of the turkey cake-bread, corn bread with lardons, fromage blanc with cucumbers and tomatoes and small shooters of chocolate mousse were snatched off platters (Snatched! Who knew?), the whole thing passed quickly and the holiday was over before I knew it.

Even though there’s a small hole in my heart today where a leftover turkey sandwich usually goes, here’s to the French Thanksgiving. And to Apple and Cider, the pardoned turkeys, Paris is just bursting with semi-confused happiness for you.

Bring on the hot wine, roasted chestnuts and Mariah Carey singles—Paris doesn't mess around for Christmas.

Pretty lights, big rats and an anniversary

Well, well, well, boys and girls, would you look at that? Balls In Your Coffee turns one year old today.

It’s been quite the long haul; for those of you who have been here since the beginning, I thank you from the bottom of my heart, and for those who have jumped on board during the past year, it is for you I keep writing these shenanigans down.

We’ve escaped The Martini, entered the world of organic groceries, and skipped off to another continent together, and I can’t wait to see what happens next. Here’s to many happy returns for this little blog with big dreams and a dubious name.

As this Monday finds me slumped at my work desk, sharing YouTube clips with my coworkers and counting down the minutes until lunch, here’s a tidbit from last weekend.

Saturday night we were huddled along the Champ de Mars, the Eiffel Tower in the foreground casting a subtle golden glow over the grass, the temperature dropping to a wintery chill. We had stuffed our purses with the basics; a bottle of Bordeaux, a mammoth bunch of grapes the size of a two-month old child, 99 centime brie, baguettes and a packet of Milanos, intent on picnicking à la française for the last time before the snow arrives.

During the winter months, the grass in Paris is legally in “hibernation,” which means that our picnic was relegated to the cold benches lining the lawns as we watched the rats romp and frolic on the tourist-free green pastures to their rodent hearts content. I know endearing scenes from Ratatouille are currently replaying in your heads, and I hesitate before stomping on those fantasies, but I’m positive that none of these rats could make little rat-sized omelets or render a horrendous sweetbread recipe edible.

Like the real rebels we are, we passed the wine back and forth, despite the so-called police disapproval of open bottles in public spaces. We even put on nonchalant, very French faces as we were approached by three flics making their nightly rounds. The open Bordeaux sat on the ground in between us, and as the three cops sauntered by, we nodded, chimed “Bonsoir!” and smiled, my leg slowly moving to cover the wine.

As we sat together, sharing the brie and the Milanos, my hands going numb from the cold, the clock struck 8 p.m. and the Eiffel Tower burst into life, glittering as it does every hour of every night. Despite the regularity of this routine, it never fails to evoke a reaction from the milling crowd beneath the pillars or the starry-eyed tourists strolling along the paths of the Champ de Mars; it’s almost a shock every time the sparkling begins, as if you weren’t really sure it was going to happen after all. Everyone claps and whistles and screams like it’s a sign that yes, the world will indeed continue to turn and yes, Santa Claus DOES exist and that yes, this contraption of metal and lights and hauteur will continue to blow minds for years to come.

As we lapsed into silence and watched the shimmering Tower for a minute or two, I turned my head and caught a rat crouched a few feet behind our bench. Maybe he was waiting for us to drop some baguette, or waiting to pounce and infect all of us with a 28 Days Later-esque strain of rabies, but for a second, it almost seemed like he was watching the twinkling lights like the rest of the crowd.

So, alright, perhaps mini-gourmet chef rats exist. It is Paris after all.

Puttin' on the Ritz

As many of you know, the French Lunch, clearly deserving of two capital letters and internationally famous for its leisurely pace, is nothing to sneeze at. It is something that is at once beautiful to withhold, precariously difficult to execute correctly, and entirely worth working all day long for.

On most days, Jess (of the aforementioned Spacecake experience) and I take an hour and a half or so and pick a petit bistro, eat like sloths—whilst dreading the return to the American “oh, no thanks I’ll just eat this granola bar at my desk” lunch break—and then waddle contentedly back down the street to the office. However, every once in awhile, the evil twin of the French Lunch, the French Franprix Run, rears its ugly head with mixed results.

Franprix, a Safeway or Shaws-esque type grocery chain, is home to a sad and convenient array of culinary mockeries. Comté cheese that squishes between your fingers (wrong, I tell you!) and prepacked cold chicken salad dare desperate lunchers to waste a few euros rather than die of starvation from the shelves. At most, one expects fluorescent lighting, antsy checkers, and cheap wine from any Franprix worth its salt.

I’ve never been exceptionally skilled at packing a lunch and toting it to work, so when Jess had some work to finish up at the office a few days ago and our midday date was canceled, I made a French Franprix Run (poor decisions are always influenced by lack of breakfast) to avoid eating my keyboard at my desk.

Twenty minutes later, I emerged with a small box of Ritz crackers, an overpriced carton of raspberries, and a bunch of bananas. Clearly the Nutrition Fairy didn’t make an influential stop at my childhood.

Despite this haggard sounding meal, my growling stomach had decided to settle for it. I trotted back to the office, and was immediately faced with my two colleagues, back from their lunches, sitting at their desks across from mine, silently working away in that determined French way of theirs. It was this moment that I realized just how loud the Ritz crackers in my hand were about to become.

After attempting to open the package as quickly and soundlessly as I could (obviously failing), I bit down on a Ritz. I think I can say, in good faith, that I have never eaten anything louder in my life. So, doing what many people faced with a deathly quiet room and particularly crunchy food items do, I stopped chewing and self-consciously let the cracker get soggy and silent and chewed as noiselessly as I could. Compounded with my overwhelming hunger, I had no choice.

Now, of course, we all think we are being incredibly sly when we do this. The reality is, unfortunately, that it is very obvious to everyone around you that you are trying to avoid an uncomfortable chewing situation by holding your food in your mouth like a squirrel stopped in the middle of the road, hoping not to be seen.

This means it took me about 3 hours to eat approximately 5.5 standard-sized Ritz crackers. Not only that, the overpriced raspberries were covered in mold and the bananas, upon reaching my desk, inhaled deeply and ripened suddenly to a depressing brown and spotty state. My lovely coworkers managed not to comment on my seemingly bizarre eating habits, and most likely created a pool to see how many I got down before I bolted out the door at six o’clock and stood outside, eating whole crackers and crunching like a maniac.

I have learned my lesson. In the afternoons since then, Jess and I have taken refuge under the downy wing of the French Lunch, and I hereby promise to reserve the French Franprix Run for the apocalypse. And maybe cheap wine.

No never means yes, except in France

Well, that was quick.

Crisp, smoky Paris with all its red and yellow leaves artistically scattered on the sidewalks has given way to rainy, chilly Paris, with the aforementioned leaves now acting as sludgy, hazardous land-mines waiting to clump on the bottom of your shoe and send you, flailing and awkwardly trying to right yourself, skidding to the ground in a very un-French manner.

This all means that flopping out of bed on any given morning to join the cramped Metro commuters journey into the real world is doubly as difficult, that lunch breaks are longer and cozier and that piping hot café crèmes are numerous throughout the day.

My umbrella—a flimsy, three euro contraption that would probably constantly break down in asthma attacks if it could breathe and backs down from a fight with a big bad rainstorm quicker than a schoolyard wimp faced with the 160 pound bully looking for lunch money—is not helping.

After powering through the first week of November in the Parisian workforce, I’ve learned two important things: First and most useful, the three no’s, one yes rule. Second, smoking can improve your life. Also, always say yes to coffee. So, three important things.

Really, the only thing you need to know about the smoking thing is that it buys you a break every 10 minutes, approximately. Take a phone call, take a smoke break. Write a paragraph, take a smoke break. I can’t help but be envious as I watch them effortlessly roll their cigs with one hand and stand outside, quietly pondering their next move.

So, in a warped, slightly manipulative sense of politeness, the French have an unspoken rule regarding the acceptance of small things; a coffee, a cookie, anything that in a normal red-blooded American setting would be wolfed down without a second thought. In following with this custom, the French usually refuse about three times, before giving in and accepting whatever it is you’re offering.

I’ve heard it said that the American willingness to say yes upon the first round of this game is often shocking to our baguette-wielding allies. This has been in the back of my head for quite some time now, and naturally, my first week of interaction with my coworkers proved that even if I’m prepared for these rules, I will still trip over my feet and metaphorically make an ass of myself, wet-leaves-on-shoe style.

Case file #1: I return from my lunch break with a packet of Fig Newton-style cookies. Looking to be friendly and non-piggish, I cheerily offer them to my colleagues. Translated accurately, of course, with my language barriers intact.

Me: “Anyone want fig cookie?”

Coworker1: “Oh no, no, that’s okay, thanks.”

Coworker2: “I’m good, thanks though!”

(Here I remember the rule and think with a Yoda-style intuition, “Aaaahh yes, lying they are. Cookies they want…”)

Me: “You sure? (shake of the cookie package) Big deal it’s not. I can’t eat all!”

Coworker1: “No, no, I couldn’t.”

Coworker2: “I just ate, really.”

Me: "It's not serious. I have lots."

Coworker1: (hesitant) "Well....no, no."

Me: (third time’s the charm) “Have cookie…”

Coworkers1 and 2: “We’d love one!!”

Honestly. Same situation, in an American office:

“Anyone want a cookie?”

“Cookies? Oh hell yes.”

End of story.

This one takes the Spacecake

I am now about mid-way through my stay in the City of Lights, and while everything has of course been magnificent and enchanting and eye opening, it has also been…expensive. So, in lieu of dining out every few nights or attempting to be creatively gourmet in my small dorm room with its shabby communal kitchen, there’s been a lot of yogurt with muesli. And pasta. Loads of pasta. So much pasta that I might have to abstain from it for a few months upon my return.

This means that I’m pathetically short on any entertaining dining-with-the-Frenchies stories. All I’ve got is me, often in sweats, standing over the stove watching a) my water boil, or b) my instant falafel mix slowly cook. This one is usually followed by me packing up the falafel to take back the room and mindlessly dumping hot oil into the sink, scaring the crap out of anyone in the kitchen and guaranteeing tiny oil burns on my hands.

Part of the reason my wallet is currently feuding with me however, is a very good reason. Its name is Amsterdam. And we recently spent four lovely, lovely days and three hazy nights together.

Yes, yes, Amsterdam. Land of weed and hookers and waffles and happy Dutch people with clogs and bikes. We’d all be fooling ourselves if I said we paid good money for a three hour train ride with no intention of sampling the famous local ganja. Consider it our out-of-country way of supporting the legalization of Mary Jane in good ol’ California.

Now, being a recent college grad, I may have had a few magical brownies in my time. So when the five of us waltzed up to a tiny coffee shop near the Red Light District, where we had been sent by a friendly waitress for the best edibles in the city, I was feeling confident of my ability to handle myself.

Fast forward a few hours, and I am face down in my hot chocolate. Whipped cream has just spurted out of my nose and I can’t move I’m laughing so hard.

Let’s back up.

We landed ourselves a table at The Speakeasy, tucked in between a restaurant and a sex shop, right alongside the canal. One of the girls, Jess, approached the guy behind the bar, intent on buying us four slices of this so-called Spacecake business we'd heard so much about, wolfing it, and heading back out into the rain-slicked streets for some sight-seeing.

After asking for four slices, a look of pure incredulity set into this guys face.

“Four??” he asked, holding up four fingers and looking past Jess to make sure he had understood these crazy-eyed Americans correctly.

“Yes?” Jess replied, confused.

“Four.”

“Yes.”

“No. Three.”

This lovely man soon explained that we were nuts for thinking we could handle that much Spacecake. Because there were five of us, he sold us three slices of something that looked like my mother’s zucchini bread and a little slip of paper with instructions. We were only to take a fifth at a time, separated by 45 minutes, then 2 hours and then 3 hours.

We nonchalantly accepted his instructions and divided the first little slice into fifths with my i.d. card. No biggie. It tasted like a dry piece of cake, nothing very sweet or weed-y. We hopped off our stools and sailed off into the streets.

The first 45 minutes passed pretty innocuously. None of us felt particularly stoned, and the hour of the second piece came quickly. The second little fifth tasted like I had just bit into a marijuana plant. During this period of a few hours, we proceeded to take a large handful of pictures (that none of us really recall taking) and bought obscene amounts of waffles—frosted and otherwise.

Here's a picture I don't remember taking. That guy knows what we've been into.

We also saw a double rainbow. I am near positive that we were the picture of non-smoothness, as all five of us stood in the middle of the sidewalk, eyes skyward, gasping and smiling like the glassy-eyed idiots we were.

After the hot chocolate incident that soon followed, the day of the Spacecake ends. All I know is we finished those suckers, for better or worse. And that next time, I will only order one.