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Most of our local restaurants produce delicious local food, lots of duck and foie gras, but also more exotic choices such as kangaroo.  Most of them serve wine in a carafe, at not much more than it comes out of the BIB.  I much prefer them all than most restaurants I have eaten in the UK.

As someone else said, its all down to personal taste.[:D]

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[quote user="chessfou"][quote]never met a good NZ wine though)[/quote]

Incredible! Just how many NZ wines have you tried? I have had dozens and dozens of excellent ones (especially Pinot Noir but also Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc and others). For best relation qualité/prix (NZ) I'd go for almost anything from Brajkovich (though there are loads of others) - look for "Kumeu River" - the Mates Vineyard Chardonnay is absolutely fantastic (and only about €25; which may be more than you usually pay for a bottle but is cheap for what's in it).

Although my own "favourite" Chardonnay and Pinot Noir (relation qualité/prix - €17) are both French (the same producer!) from near Burgundy. Quality Bourgogne taste at (comparatively) very low price
[/quote]

 

I'm sure one could drink fabulous wine from almost any country at those prices! Hardly a realistic option for most of us.

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Sorry Frenchie but I prefer English bread - unless you eat French bread within minutes of leaving the shop it takes your fillings with it....  Good door stop material though!

As an aside - one of the nice things about having 'a foot in both camps' is coming back to England and having a lovely mug of tea with a cheese and bacon sandwich - thick smoked bacon, melting cheddar cheese with lashings of HP sauce on lovely warm, soft granary bread....heaven.  Still not worked out why tea never tastes as it should in France - even using good old Yorkshire teabags it tastes odd. Not sure if its the milk, the water or what...  If you have the solution would love to know!

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[quote user="Frenchie"]

I'm French , and read all this  with attention .

Interesting.

All I can say is that when I'm in the UK, I miss our French bread ...

What we find in the UK in most places is not bread to me . More " pain de mie" .

 

 

[/quote]pain de mie and a lot of other french bread has added sugar (yeuk). We have found a french made bread that does not have this problem. it is called toastiligne and is perfect for real toast and english style sandwiches. Of course  certain breads are better for different purposes. I love pain au levain(sp) and certain other breads are super but our local baker only ever has baguette, pain and a local flat round bread that I don't even know the name of. The market in Brive has a staggering variety of bread on offer but we can't/don't go there regularly. I think that I could buy a bigger variety of bread in our local Tesco in the UK actually.

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[quote user="Clair"]I did get granary flour as part of my first ever British food delivery last month!

Granary is a brand of brown flour with malted wheat grains, milled by Rank Hovis.
There are equivalents in the UK, usually called "malthouse" something or other, as they cannot call themselves "granary".

I have not seen a similar flour in France yet (I was out looking today as a matter of fact!), although I know of several mills which produce a similar-sounding flour mix.

[/quote]

I used to get brown with budgie food flour from Casino or Carrefour but recently they have started doing it at my local Leader Price and Intermarche.

 

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[quote user="avinalarf"]I used to get brown with budgie food flour from Casino or Carrefour but recently they have started doing it at my local Leader Price and Intermarche.[/quote]

There are many multigrain flour mixes available in most shops and supermarkets.

They differ from granary, which contains malted grains. That's what gives it a very distinctive taste.

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[quote user="Scooby"]Sorry Frenchie but I prefer English bread - unless you eat French bread within minutes of leaving the shop it takes your fillings with it....  Good door stop material though!

As an aside - one of the nice things about having 'a foot in both camps' is coming back to England and having a lovely mug of tea with a cheese and bacon sandwich - thick smoked bacon, melting cheddar cheese with lashings of HP sauce on lovely warm, soft granary bread....heaven.  Still not worked out why tea never tastes as it should in France - even using good old Yorkshire teabags it tastes odd. Not sure if its the milk, the water or what...  If you have the solution would love to know!
[/quote]

That is true of ordinary baguettes, but not true with regard to the wider range of French bread you can get these days.  Not all boulangeries sell these other types of bread, but when you do find a boulangerie selling a wider range of bread, you can usually find something which will last until the next day.  If you buy bakery bread in England that's no better at staying fresh than a normal baguette.  Pre-packed bread in England has things done to it to make it last for days - but it is tasteless and textureless.  If you make bread yourself, ordinary white bread is stale by the next day, whereas if you make granary or bread with other mixes of dark flour or grains, they will last a day or so longer.  The same applies to proper bread in France.  It's all down to preference, but I'd rather have bread with a firm crust (craquante preferably) and soft in the middle, and not something floppy.  Perhaps this will change when my teeth fall out, but I'd still rather dip a tasty French bread into coffee, soup or sauce than have to revert to white sliced plastic.

With regard to food - there are good recipes in all countries and food is as good as the cook who is cooking it and the ingredients used.  British food can be excellent, but we are limited in flavours and ingredients.  When I stayed with families in Normandy and Savoie in 1976, I'd never previously had food cooked with creme fraiche, never had tomatoes that tasted like tomatoes, never had peppers, aubergines, courgettes, garlic,various cheese dishes, and apart from macaroni cheese and tinned spaghetti, I'd never seen pasta before.  When you travel round France, food-wise it is more like visiting different countries - which of course it used to be.  Italian Food is more varied than it has credit for too - but I must admit that when we went there last year, we were struggling to find ingredients, even for Italian dishes which we had recipes for - but I'm sure that was just due to the small towns we were staying in and not having time to go out and look for other food sources such as markets.  The food we had in restaurants was good.  I'm just considering dishes which are considered to belong to these countries.  Of course, Britain does have a wider range of foreign foods, but that doesn't make British food better, it just makes the choice better.  Whichever country you are in, you are not likely to find something of very high quality in a restaurant, unless you are prepared to pay for it, although lower priced good food can be found.  If anyone is not happy with the food in the country they are living in, they have only to cook what they want to eat, the way they want to cook it. 

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[quote user="Frenchie"]I really see no difference between a loaf from Morrisons and a pain de mie  aux céréales, both toasted for breakfast, same taste.[/quote]

 

I do think pain de mie is sweeter but as I have marmite on toast it doesn't really matter!

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[quote]I'm sure one could drink fabulous wine from almost any country at those prices! Hardly a realistic option for most of us.[/quote]

Really? I'm talking occasional drinking. My everyday stuff is in the range €3-4 (note the hyphen!).

Nobody can drink fabulous wine for €20/bottle; excellent, yes but fabulous, no.

Also, there's a distinct limit to the number of countries that produce excellent wine (Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Mexico-maybe, USA, Canada, Portugal, Spain, France, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Italy, Hungary, Slovenia, Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, Lebanon, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and maybe, just maybe the UK with some sparklers) and that's about it - from my experience/knowledge Brazil, Ireland, Wales, Czech Rep, Slovakia, Ukraine, Malta, Cyprus, Georgia, Armenia, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Israel, Turkey, India, China just don't quite cut it and some don't even get close (apologies to and for any I've inadvertently left out).

The worst meals of my life (starting with the absolutely most disgusting) have been: 1 Felixstowe (ca. 2000), 2 York (ca. 1980), 3 Hastings, after that, thank God, they've faded from memory but there were quite a few in the USA, one in Canada, two in Ireland (both "Indian" restaurants), two in France (again both "Indian" restaurants), one in India (in a restaurant that insisted on doing exclusively Western cuisine - not my idea but that of my gracious hosts), one in the Netherlands, one in Turkey, several in Russia ... aargghh I must stop - my brain is hurting and I'm beginning to feel nauseous.

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PS. I recently ate in a small restaurant near here. Not gourmet food but very good and enormous portions. The place was packed - not surprising really - a spinach and chèvre tarte followed by roast quail on a toast and foie gras canapé with delicious veg (mix of potatoes and carrots prepared as a special dish), pear tart, unlimited wine (perfectly drinkable) and coffee ... € 11 (eleven) - il faut en profiter.

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[quote user="chessfou"]PS. I recently ate in a small restaurant near here. Not gourmet food but very good and enormous portions. The place was packed - not surprising really - a spinach and chèvre tarte followed by roast quail on a toast and foie gras canapé with delicious veg (mix of potatoes and carrots prepared as a special dish), pear tart, unlimited wine (perfectly drinkable) and coffee ... € 11 (eleven) - il faut en profiter.

[/quote]

You were lucky, but it's a rare case.

At that price the usual offering is something like  a limp 'salad' perhaps with a couple of bits of goat's cheese on toast, ... tough steak and chips ...( or bought in the bag 'plat de jour' )and a bought-in  tarte or crême caramel ...and pay through the nose ( a coefficient of 3-4)  for a bottle of wine if you can't stomach the battery acid from a 'cubi' that masquerades as wine. Coffee is 1,80-2 euros if you take it in a restaurant, so that bumps up the price too.

"Cheap" French food has become boring often industrial  'malbouffe', at least in the towns...

Of course if you can afford to pay around 25 euros you begin to see a difference, but it's not guaranteed.

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[quote user="odile"]E10 for the 3 course menu with wine + coffee at our local- simple but everything homemade.  And very friendly too.[/quote]

Menu ouvrier last Friday, in one of the village restaurants: fresh soup, fresh salmon and veg, cheese or dessert, coffee and wine. €11.

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[quote]You were lucky, but it's a rare case.[/quote][NormanH]

Not rare in these 'ere parts; there are plenty of other perfectly acceptable places around here at €10-12 and in town (usually €13-15, which is why that place at €11 is really exceptional). In town last week I had an acceptable if unremarkable (forgotten what it was) entrée, superb moules frites, a decent mousse au chocolat, 50cl perfectly acceptable wine & coffee (all homemade except the wine and coffee) - € 15,20 (€11 for the set lunch, €3 for the wine and €1,20 - the going rate round here - for the coffee).

Which part of the country are you in?

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[quote user="chessfou"][quote]You were lucky, but it's a rare case.[/quote][NormanH]

Not rare in these 'ere parts; there are plenty of other perfectly acceptable places around here at €10-12 and in town (usually €13-15, which is why that place at €11 is really exceptional). In town last week I had an acceptable if unremarkable (forgotten what it was) entrée, superb moules frites, a decent mousse au chocolat, 50cl perfectly acceptable wine & coffee (all homemade except the wine and coffee) - € 15,20 (€11 for the set lunch, €3 for the wine and €1,20 - the going rate round here - for the coffee).

Which part of the country are you in?
[/quote]

 

Not rare round where I live either (between Riberac and Bergerac); at least a dozen places within a 5 mile radius offering 3/4 course meals including wine - coffee sometimes- for between 11 and 13 euros. We've probably been perfectly happy with about 70% of them, thrilled by 20% and disappointed by 10%. Not a bad proportion and we're quite fussy about food.

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