French phrase of the day: j’ai une pêche

Def: I have a peach, literally. Colloquially, it means I have a really great thing.

This weekend, while not entirely conforming to the proper usage of the phrase, has been a really great thing.

After Friday night, I got up a little late and pushed myself out of the treehouse by noon. The destination: le Marché Batignolles. While Sunday morning’s Boulevard Raspail organic market gets all the buzz, I found this Saturday morning, in the 17th arrondisement organic market, which I’ve been wanting to check out for some times now, a little lovelier. Fewer baby strollers, fewer bottlenecks, plus most of the same stands as Raspail, and then some.

I was on a quest for lunch goodies to bring to Square de Batignolles for a solo picnic. When I finally chose my produce stand after making a couple leisurely rounds, and decided on a peach for my piece of fruit, a really cute girl served me —and then decided to give me the peach for free. I don’t know why, but needless to say, the gesture made my day.

I had also noticed a strand with dried pineapple—sauvage, even: no added sugar—which is something I can’t easily resist. Thank god I didn’t. I tasted it before I left the market and think I gasped out loud. It was perhaps the best dried pineapple I’ve ever eaten. Unlike the gummy texture of most—which, don’t get me wrong, I love—this was caramelized at the edges, so it tasted like pineapple upside down cake, without the cake. Heaven.

The peach, I finally ate in the park, after my onion tart. I gasped again. Perhaps the bloody best peach I’ve ever eaten in my life! Ah, the food in France…

The rest of the day was equally wonderful. I lounged in the park for a bit, before strolling around Montmartre. I did a bit of shopping and I took my time. At the end of the day I spontaneously called Sarah for a movie date as we’d been talking about seeing L’Illustionniste.

I love my Triplets of Belleville, but this movie was a peach as well. So bittersweet! Quel charm! It made me and Sarah grin and gush. A must see.

After the movies, it was still light out, and we found a terrace for a light dinner. Again, totally pleased with my food—a multicolored, perfectly composed salad of greens, potatoes, cauliflower, broccoli, beets, cucumbers, peas, yellow peppers. It was almost too pretty to eat. But I did and guess what? It was delicious.

Finally, in that long beautiful blue hour here in Paris, I Velib'ed home. I took left turns and right turns through the Marias, sometimes going in circles, just so I could prolong the ride in the quiet streets. Starlings screeched overhead, there were few people walking, and it was just the most serene and lovely ride home.