Very hungry, accustomed to English post-war food, Grace thought the meal which followed the most delicious she had ever eaten. The food, the wine, the heat, and the babel of French talk, most of which was quite incomprehensible to her untuned ear, induced a half-drunk, entirely happy state of haziness.
The Blessing, Nancy Mitford
I had been in England only a couple of months when my flatmates and I decided to go to Paris for the weekend. I had been before, but in the company of grown-ups, and so this trip felt like the first time. We booked tickets on the overnight coach, dozing on and off as we travelled underneath the Channel, and arrived in the western suburbs of the city just as the sun was coming up. We spent the next couple of days wandering up and down the Seine, exploring museums and parks and bars. We jumped on the train and visited the gardens at Versailles, an almost lurid shade of green in the rainy spring afternoon.
Paris had a lot to live up to. In my head, it was a city of mythic proportions; the place that could transform Sabrina thanks to an enviable haircut and a newly developed sense of independence, that could provide a home and a refuge (in a very fancy apartment) for Linda in The Pursuit of Love, that made Julia Child fall in love with food, that saw Céline and Jesse knit their lives back together in Before Sunset, that twinkled and glistened so invitingly in the drawings in Madeline. I couldn’t believe how easily it lived up to expectation; how immediately I fell in love with it.
When I travel there now, I’m not leaving behind the post-war English food the Mitfords complained about. But I do still always look forward to eating in Paris: the early-morning pastries, eaten hot from paper bags; oysters from the markets, served on a half shell; the olives and crisps that come alongside a glass of wine; delicious butter, spread thickly onto a fresh baguette. When I’m in Paris, I eat out as much as possible – there are always far too many things to try – but back home in England I cook like a Parisian, leaving the croissants and fine patisserie to the professionals and making only the simplest of dishes: meltingly soft omelettes, toasted cheese sandwiches, and classic, simple salads.