Spirits: The French Eau-de-Vie Game Created by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Spirits: The French Eau-de-Vie Game Created by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

France is famous for its musketeers, imbibing spirits, eau-de-vie, in novels such as The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas, Gil Blas by Alain-René Lesage, and Cyrano de Bergerac by Edmond Rostand.

When I worked in Chicago and Paris, many visiting businessmen did want to take French brandy home as gifts, because it was hard to export it to Japan in the 1990s.  Now it is easier to export brandy, but people do not know what all the different products are.  I have listed some different French brandies below that might interest people besides cognac.

Also, if I do not have vanilla for cakes, I will use cognac or other brandies in its place, since most liquid vanilla has alcohol in it.

If you are just going to visit Paris, there are two main stores that you can visit that have a selection of food products.  These stores can package the eau-de-vie, insure it, fill out customs papers, and ship it, so you do not have pack bottles of liquid in your suitcase.

The stores that are set up in Paris for food and alcohol sales to foreign tourists are Fauchon and Hédiard.  Film festival venues might consider setting boutiques for these stores and souvenir pick-up points during film festivals to increase sales tax.

Eau-de-Vie Suggestions follow:

-Calvados – apple brandy from Normandy

-Mirabelle – yellow plum brandy from the Lorraine

-Poire William – pear brandy from Alsace

-Cognac – grape-based brandy from the Charente region

-Armagnac – grape-based brandy from the Gers, Landes, and Lot-et-Garonne Regions

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Power Shopper Paris: The French Luxury Products Game for Limousine-Escorted Shoppers Created by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Power Shopper Paris: The French Luxury Products Game for Limousine-Escorted Shoppers Created by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Introduction

Once you have all your Maslow Pyramid Needs shopping done in the Bienvenue Subway Game, you can buy luxury goods that your family can sell in times of depression or war to protect your food and beverage supplies. 

People laugh about the Florentine Italians being bean eaters, but if you look cookbooks written by Italians, there are many bean recipes using dry beans.  All of the places I list below also have online stores.

Level 1 – Fancy Snacks and Shopping Bags

Fauchon – various locations around Paris and online

Level 2 – Jewelry

Place Vendôme by the Ritz Hôtel for dragon and tiger gem bracelets.

Level 3 – Sur Measure Designer Fitting Rooms

Faubourg St. Honoré

Level 4 – Copper Cooking Equipment

E. Dehillerin

Level 5 – Sèvres Porcelain Entryway Vases

5-feet-high vases that are always decorated with real gold.

Level 6 – Aubusson Tapestries

This tapestry manufacturing house has been in existence since the time of Louis XIV and is a “Finance Minister Colbert” industry.

Level 7 – Porcelain Dishes from Limoges

The Rue de Paradis display rooms in Paris have all the brands for sale.

For every day, use dishes from Haviland.

For special occasions, use dishes from Bernardaud.

Level 8 – Guerlain Perfumes

The Champs-Elysées store offers all the main scents.

Level 9 – Christofle Tableware and Jewelry

Level 10 – Mariage Frères Teas

The French had an Indian trading center at Pondichery for cloth and food products like the British East India Company. 

(See the novel series Jewel in the Crown about this period in English history.  This book series was also made into a PBS televisions series. 

Comparing the cultures portrayed in the Jewel in the Crown with the Shogun series is a fun introduction to similarities and differences between the two cultures.

You can then watch Indochine with Catherine Daneuve and the Lover by Marguerite Duras as a third contrast to India and Japan in French Indochina.)

Level 11 – Hôtel Crillon for Lunch

This hotel is located on the Place de la Concorde next to the US Embassy right before the rue de Rivoli and the Danton Entrance to the Louvre Art Museum and the antiques dealers of Paris.

Interior Designers know that this is a good game for them!!!

I think Concordes might still leave SF, LA, Chicago, and NY to make the flight a short one.

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Flaubert: The Normandy Resort Town Game Created by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Gustave Flaubert: The Normandy Resort Town Game Created by Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Introduction

I named this touring game Gustave Flaubert, because he, Proust, and Monet all loved the town of Trouville on the other side of the River Touques from Deauville as a place to relax, write, eat iodine-rich seafood, and walk in windy sea air full of salt.  

Flaubert’s books have been made into films, especially Madame Bovary, who might have been the example for the modern date-and-ditch ploy of “ghosting.”  I told my daughter when she was growing up that if this happened to her to write a screenplay and take her sorrow to the bank.

There is much to see in Normandy.  Most hotel concierges can arrange for bus tours to Giverny, Rouen, Mont St. Michel and World War II sites, but there are many more places to visit in Normandy that are important to French and New World history that are not on all tour bus routes.

Normandy is named after the Norsemen or Vikings, who sailed down the mouth of the Seine River in longboats like those described in Nancy Farmer’s young adult book series The Sea of Trolls to pillage Paris and the British Isles alike.

The Vikings finally settled in fertile Normandy and intermarried with the “Gaulois.”  Their modern-day descendants still have blonde hair and blue eyes like the Swedish, the Norwegians, the Finns, and the Danish.

You can go to the Norman towns I describe in this touring game by car on the Autoroute de Normandie, which is well-paved with pruned trees on either side of the highway to look like rectangles – which is reminiscent of the Loire Valley châteaux (Valois Royalty) not Versailles (Bourbon Royalty).

On our drives out to Deauville for lunches, when we lived in Paris I liked to listen to Jean-Michel Jarre’s albums Revolutions, Equinoxe, and Oxygène.  I also liked Daniel Balavoine, Vanessa Paradis, and the Greek singer Nana Mouskouri, who also sang in French.

Norman Resort Towns

The 3 towns that I have suggested for a week’s vacation in this game, which includes time for shopping, include:

-Deauville – famous for its American Film Festival, yacht club, beach boardwalk, and casino

-Trouville – famous for its villas in the hills, covered fish market, and restaurants

-Honfleur – famous for its port, wood-stave Saint-Catherine Church, and port where French New World explorers such as de Champlain and settlers of Québec departed from

Norman Souvenirs

If you reserve-and-pick-up souvenirs, you have more time to frequent restaurants and visit museums.

-Calvados – apple brandy – the best one is from the Pays d’Auge.  The Calvados carries an AOC designation, which means it is made with high standards of sanitation and quality control.

-Poire Wlliam Eau-de-Vie – their bottles have a pear in them, which means you have to replenish the Poire William frequently, but it is a nice after-dinner drink.

-Apple Cider – almost all French ciders have alcohol in them and are mild laxatives.  French cider goes well with crêpes and some mussel dishes are made with it.

Any liquid you buy in France, especially alcoholic ones, will probably have to be shipped home.  You might want to buy in stores that know about customs, shipping, and insurance.  These stores are more expensive usually, but you get what you pay for in most instances.

-Copper cooking vessels

-restaurant-quality cooking pots and pans for poaching fish and grilling fish and seafood platter trays with 3-tiered shelves

-French porcelain, crystal, silverware, and household linens – these items are not made in Normandy, but are shipped to England through Rouen.  You can find outlets for most of these items in Deauville.

Level 1 – Deauville

Americans going to Deauville are often delighted to find out that there is an American film festival there like the one in Cannes, but devoted to American films. 

Deauville is a hidden resort town for Parisians that is not too far away from the Capital.  There is a yacht club in town and a casino.  The beach rents parasols, lounging chairs, and changing cabins. 

The beachfront restaurants have clear windbreaks, so you can eat seafood platters with raw oysters, shrimp, langoustines, mussels, and snails or roast pheasant with cabbage if you prefer.

Wine suggestions for the seafood platter and pheasant with cabbage:

-Chablis (from Burgundy – varietal: Chardonnay)

-Pouilly-Fuissé (from Burgundy – varietal: Chardonnay)

-Pouilly-Fumé (from Nivernais – varietal: Sauvignon Blanc.  Note: a town in the Nivernais is the setting for the French flashbacks in the film Hiroshima Mon Amour.)

Level 2 – Trouville

After visiting Deauville, you can drive over the River Touques Bridge to Trouville.

Deauville is a very wealthy resort whereas Trouville-sur-Mer is a less expensive one for locals, who cook.

Trouville is famous for the literary artists who have lived and “summered” there – Flaubert and Proust.  The Impressionist painter Monet also created Trouville scenes for his clients, who built the villas that line the hills above the sea.

The villas of yesteryear’s landed-elite are now owned by corporations, who use them for conferences and vacation homes for employees.  Some of the villas may even be foundations now and do sabbatical training for executives.

There is a casino in Trouville (great-food-at-cheap prices destination), but it is most famous for its covered fish market.

The fishmongers at the fish market do very good placement marketing.  Next to the day’s catch they place bottles of white wine of varying price levels and recipe cards.  I learned how to match and pair fish dishes with wine by shopping here on the weekend.

I have a cookbook listed at the end of this game for the dishes suggested here, but the following are some of the fish dishes you might want to try in a hotel with cooking facilities.  The wines I listed for the Deauville restaurant foods go with these dishes, too,  with the exception of champagne to go with the stuffed turbot:

-Stuffed turbot with champagne sauce

-Hake with forest mushrooms

-Oysters cooked with brut cider

Level 3 – Honfleur

If you turn right at the ocean, you can drive along the seacoast to reach Honfleur.  Honfleur is located where the Seine River meets the English Channel.  Monet and Courbet both painted scenes of Honfleur.

The town is a shipping port with no beach.  Ships from Honfleur took French settlers to Québec (Canada – Samuel de Champlain was the explorer).

Nice dinners for Honfleur include:

-Sole Meunière – sole dredged in a thin coating of flour and sautéed in butter with lemon squeezed on top of it.  This dish is served with steamed potatoes with chopped parsley.  The British like this dish, too.

-Mussels steamed with white wine, shallots, and a tablespoon or two of crème fraîche to make moules poulardes

I would drink a slightly sweet white wine with both of the dishes above such as:

-Vouvray (from the Loire Valley – varietal: Chenin Blanc)

-Montlouis (from the Loire Valley – varietal: Chenin Blanc)

Trip Preparation Reference Books

-The Cuisine of Normandy: French Regional Cooking with Princess Marie-Blanche de Broglie

(The recipes I have mentioned are listed in this book’s index.  She writes her cookbook using menus by season.)

-Calvados: The Spirit of Normandy by Charles Neal

-Gustave Flaubert’s novels

-Marguerite Duras’s novels – she spent vacations in the region as well

By Ruth Pennington Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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Visiting the National French Renaissance Museum at Ecouen with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget

Visiting the National French Renaissance Museum at Ecouen with Savvy Mom Ruth Paget – Ruth Pennington Paget

On a cold wintry weekend, Laurent and I drove out to the French National Renaissance Museum at Ecouen, which is located by the Charles de Gaulle Airport in Roissy.  There might be a bus that goes there now, but when we went you had to drive.

In the courtyard of the château are marble copies of Michelangelo’s torso-turning Dying Slave statues.  The statues remind you that a lot of backbreaking, work went into creating these beautiful French castles.

Ecouen is the National Renaissance Museum, because it was the home of its celebrated Seigneur, Anne de Montmorency.  Anne was a  “prince du sang” (prince sharing royal blood with the king), who could hold the throne, if the king became incapacitated or if he so desired to take it; Anne was a general and well-liked by the troops.

Anne worked as the name for a man or woman during the Renaissance in France.  If you look at the story of Anne in the Bible, you can still see that as the mother of Mary, Anne still holds an aura of dignity and ethics for being the grandmother of the founder of the Christian religion – Jesus Christ.  Anne de Montmorency played this role in France, too, as an advisor to kings and protector of the realm as a general.

However, Anne used his early retirement by a Valois king who did not like him to direct and complete the work at Ecouen.

When Francis the First died and Henri II became king, Anne de Montmorency was reinstated as a general to support the Catholic Cause against Protestants in France.

Anne de Montmorency died fighting Protestants on November 10, 1567.  Despite being a soldier, he lived to be 75 years old.

I liked Anne de Montmorency, because he could combine the work of being a general with that of reading and the arts as a true Renaissance man.  I always liked working with management consultants for the same reason. 

Anne de Montmorency’s library was my favorite part of the château.  He read books from antiquity as well as those from his era.  He also reminded me of many people in my family, who have home libraries: a ladies’ library for the women with cookbooks and gardening books, and a gentlemen’s library with farming, boat navigation, and irrigation books. 

The Ecouen Château had furniture whereas many other French châteaux do not, because the furniture was sold during the French Revolution.

Ecouen had some interesting pieces of furniture, though, including a Spanish vargueño, which was a Spanish military desk from the Renaissance period.  It folded up and could be transported from battlefield to battlefield.

They were many wooden chests called “coffres” that the military elite and royals used to transport lifestyle goods around the countryside, too.  The royals did progressions around the countryside from one loyal noble’s home to another in the Middle Ages before Louis XIV stayed at Versailles and ran the kingdom and much of Europe from that palace.

I liked the cassoni (wedding chests) and marveled at the luster of the dishes from Iznik (Turkey) that Anne de Montmorency probably bought, but considered to be war booty.

The National Renaissance Museum at Ecouen clearly shows with its items on display that at least French royals and aristocrats knew all about acquiring high-quality, luxury products on the international market long before globalization became a business buzzword.

By Ruth Paget, author of Eating Soup with Chopsticks and Marrying France

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