Saturday June 1, 2019

Vlaminck Painting c. 1900

Avignon is getting us a bit used to sleeping in. Another nice breakfast by Carol and we are out the door earlier than yesterday at 0950. We were not planning on doing much but taking a morning walk. Instead, we end up doing the other two museums that are free. As this was not planned, I do not have my camera with me. We arrive at the natural history museum right at opening. It has the usual array of natural history objects, fossils, bugs, butterflies, mammals, etc. we are not in there too long before we go next door to the Calvet Musee which is a history and art museum.

The Mummy Awakens

We like this one much better and are in there a bit longer. From there, we walk to the market hall and arrive for the free Saturday morning at 1100 cooking demonstration. They make a berry and cream pastry and a small glass of local beer. One of the demonstration ladies is probably one of the first snooty French person I have met. She keeps passing me by giving beers to every obviously French person around me and ignoring me until one lady calls her on it and I get my beer. While having the dessert, Chris and April show up, the couple we met at lunch the other day. We chat a bit more while eating the freebie before going our separate ways again. Carol and I have decided to stroll the market and see if we can put together a happy hour snack plate and a dinner to cook for tonight. We are already carrying some pastries we picked up in a patisserie on the way here. We wander around the market which has way too many choices. Do we want fish, shellfish, chicken, pre made or cook ourselves. What about snacks, cheese, pate, quiche, so much to look at. We taste a few spreads and items as we look around. Then we start making some decisions which is not often easy for the two of us. We get some spicy olives that we had tried and some sun dried tomato tapenade spread. We go for the French different food by getting a large slice of duck foie gras mousse. Then a spicy hard sausage. For dinner, we buy some fresh trout fillets. We feel that we have a successful harvest of local goodness and head toward the apartment. We stop in the store for some Tabouleh to go with the fish and a loaf of bread for our tapenade and mousse.

That’s All I Need

We think we are just going to enjoy not doing anything else today and return to the apartment with all our goodies. A nice mellow afternoon ensues until happy hour. I fix us a nice platter and pour us an ice cold Leffe Belgian Beer. Everything is really good, even the duck foie gras mousse. It is amazing how buttery and melts in your mouth good it is. The yellow skin that we thought was some kind of rind, turns out to be duck fat soft and delicious to me, but Carol is not enthralled with it.

Trout and Tabouleh

Later on, I cook the trout for dinner, simply sautéed with a nice late crust of some of the sun dried tomato tapenade. We have we with our dinner much to no ones surprise. Dessert is the usual French tasty delight we have come to expect here. One could get use to this life but then one could gain 100 pounds pretty easily too. We also realized that we have made it to June and that our adventure will end this month. We just have to keep on enjoying the time we have left here. Tomorrow a different kind of France.

Expenses
Sunset Design Touristic Center Apartment 55.31E
Pastries from 6E Cash
Olives and tapenade from Market 8.53E Cash
Duck Mousse from Market 2.87E Cash
Sausage from Market 3E Cash
Trout from Market 5.87E Cash
Bread and Tabouleh from grocery store 1.76E Cash
Walked 2 Miles