Foodie Adventures in Lovely Paris

Hi! I spent three amazing, whirling weeks in Paris in July 2015. The focus of my program was cooking and learning French. We made all sort of food at our culinary school, everything from chorizo stuffed chicken to seared duck breast in honey wine sauce and won ton wrapped fried prawns with mango. Of course desserts were not neglected either! We hand whipped vanilla cream filling for our pastry, were handed blow tourches to lovingly kiss the tops of our meringue, and made lime Madelines, the official cookie of France! The staff were all really great. One time the culinary instructer, Remy, (yes like from Ratatouille)tested whipped cream doneness by turning the bowls upside down over our heads! If it fell out, well you had to keep whipping by hand. If not, it was time to dollop on apple tarts! The only thing I wish was different would have been our housing arrangements. We stayed in a youth hostel which was cool since we got to meet lots of different people our age from not only france but England, Germany, and Spain, but due to cost had to stay six to a room. Fortunately I loved all my new friends, in fact I just received a Christmas card from one of them! Seeing the sights was not neglected, we had tons of free time and were allowed to go where ever we wanted as long as we had a buddy or after dark, two buddies. We had tours of a few places such as the Louvre, but most places we explored on our own. Our favorite place to be was on the banks of the Seine river, near Notre Dame. We would buy pain de chocolat, (chocolate filled croissants) or crepes avec Nutella and sit or walk for hours there, admiring sights or artwork or writing in our journals. Nothing was more beautiful than Norte Dame at sunset, when it looked as if it has been gilded in golden splendor, the magnificant towers and face, painstakingly carved, with the fading blue sky behind it, only serving to make the contrast between the golden church and its surroundings more apparent. Every moment was perfection in itself, three weeks was not enough time, I hope someday to return for good, teaching languages abroad.