I am now sitting in Sandwich, MA on Cape Cod. The weather is so awesome this week and this vacation from my vacation is just what I needed.

I love the Cape. It is a perfectly lovely place.

Since we’re pretty much completely burned out from racing around Europe, I’m taking it EEEEAAASSSYYYY this week. Which means not a lot of eating out. But I have had some seafood. Fried, of course.

Seafood Sam’s is an annual Cape tradition for our family. If you want good fried seafood, you will not be disappointed. Their “chicken snacks” are awesome, too.

Like the “unstaged” photo? So natural and candid. Uh, yeah.

I’m putting the menu post up a little early this week…Saturday instead of Sunday…because I’m headed to Cape Cod in about 10 minutes! Make sure to check in this week and see what yummy edibles I find on the Cape!

Post your menus for the week, please!!! Any kind of menu, big, small, short, tall. See you on the Cape!

We are back in the states. SO SAD. Paris was fabulous! There is no other word for it, and everyone should go at least once in their lifetime. The food was fantastic and I took more pictures than you could shake a stick at. Make sure you keep scrolling and scrolling…I just posted a zillion pictures, which was only about half of what I have to share…but I just had to draw a line! ENJOY!

How perfectly French is this Crèmerie?

I mean, just look at that mold!

This cheese shop was on Ile de St. Louis, which is a MUST if you visit Paris…a wonderful part of town to explore. The cheese shop was awesome. If someone opened the door you could smell the cheese out on the street. We purchased a small slice of the famous Brie de Meaux, which we enjoyed with some baguette later that evening.

We actually didn’t eat much cheese. Just the brie de meaux and some camembert, which was pretty mild. Next time we go to France we’ll explore the cheeses more for sure.

Nate walked this restaurant one afternoon and noticed that everyone seemed to be ordering the same thing: steak and fries with a green sauce. Since it always had a line and this dish was apparently a favorite, we thought we should give it a try.

We walked over one night, hopped in line and eventually were seated (they were even nice about the stroller). As we were looking around, we realized EVERYONE had the same food. The waitress came over, asked us how we wanted our meat cooked and that was it. You get a salad, two servings of steak and fries and that’s the menu.

Nate asked what was in the green sauce and we were told it’s a family secret.

We topped the meal of with some profiteroles, which were awesome. These little pastries were filled with vanilla ice cream. And the chocolate sauce tasted a LOT like our own secret family recipe for hot fudge.

It was such a fun night. The food was delicious, the patrons and waitresses alike loved Anna (one waitress literally almost kidnapped her…kinda scary), and it was just a great memory. Thank you Relais de L’Entrecôte!

We visited many patisseries & boulangeries in Paris, but Eric Kayser on Rue du Bac on the Left Bank was our most visited boulangerie. It was right by our apartment and everything we had there was amazing (including that pain au chocolat which melted in my mouth…). Anyway, just took some pretty shots there and wanted to share them with you! I will surely miss Eric Kayser.

This little guy right here was my favorite…chocolate, almond paste, croissant…perfection.

We ate lunch at this traditional French restaurant one afternoon. Have I mentioned how much I love prix fixe menus? They RULE. Oh, and I love having tip included in my check, too. Anyway, back to the food.

You just have to love this front window, vegetarian or not.

Nate ordered chicken, thinking it would be rotisserie. It wasn’t and it actually wasn’t that great. But I loved the haricots verts (green beans) that came with it.

And we finally had boeuf bourguignon, which was AWESOME.

I also insisted that we order crème brûlée since we were in France. I’m so glad we did. I don’t ever really like crème brûlée, but I would eat it every chance I could if I lived in France. It kicked custard butt.

(quick note because I hate it when my pictures don’t look the way I want them to…this restaurant was DARK…I’m lucky I could get any shots of the food. sorry the pictures are kind of yellow)

French like food in little cups. I’m not exaggerating. When I would watch people walk out of the market, everyone had yogurt or pudding or something similar in their shopping bags. It was pretty funny.

Look at the yogurt section at the supermarket.

And the pudding section. Insane!

The yogurt was so good. The fruit tasted unbelievably fresh in the yogurt. This pink grapefruit yogurt was pretty tasty…but every flavor was awesome.

I love chocolate mousse (and have since I can remember). So, I love a country where you can buy it in little cups at the grocery store. Oh, and it tastes GOOD.

These little custard cups were delish as well. And the little glass jars…so cute!

My most favorite food in Paris was pastry.

The white chocolate brioche in this picture was so delicious (how many times have I said that word the last week?!)…and this pain au chocolate literally melted in our mouths. I’m not exaggerating. I think it may have been the best thing we ate all week.

So many places where we picked up food would wrap it up in the prettiest paper. I hated throwing it away! Seriously, how cute are these?

We picked up some grapes at the market. The green grapes were sweet and delicious. The red grapes were not as sweet but so full of flavor. And look at that color. They were just so beautiful.

I don’t think I need to say anything. The picture speaks for itself.

You can’t go to France and not have a croque-monsieur. The sandwich shown here was cooked with béchamel sauce. AAAAHHHH-mazing.

Nate picked these little cookies up at the market. They were so good.

Honestly, food in France is just better. For example, where you would get a hot dog in the US, in France you get a baguette with great butter and ham. In the US, a donut. France, a pastry. These little store-bought cookies are just another example of the yumminess of French food.

Don’t you love the world close-up?

How about some lovely tarts today? Chocolate and rhubarb sounds good to me.

P.S. They just don’t make ‘em like this in the States. How I wish you all could taste this crust. Amazing.

Our trip to Paris has been especially fun because we happened to be here on our annivesary. Parfait! For our anniversary dinner we decided to go to La Petite Chaise, the oldest restaurant in Paris. It was great for so many reasons. The restaurant happily accommodated the stroller, everyone who worked there was so friendly, the meal was very relaxed and the traditional French food was delicious.

Pour les entrées, soupe à l’oignon gratinée…(this soup was SUPERBE)…

…et six escargots de Bourgogne au beurre d’ail anisé. (That’s right, folks, I ordered escargots. Nate is unfortunately allergic to shellfish, and escargots, interestingly enough, fall under that category. Too bad for him, they were splendid. Although, I’m a little sad I didn’t get to dig them out of shells.)

Pour les plats, duisse de canard à l’orange, gratin de légumes…(that’s orange duck with gratin potatoes…this was our favorite…the meat just fell off the bone, amazing)…

…et filet de bœuf grillé sauce bordelaise. (This was good too, but unfortunately we ordered it medium instead of medium rare…it came out a medium well and could have been AMAZING if it had been much “less cooked.” So goes. Still an excellent meal. The sauce, ah, the sauce.)

Finalement, dessert! Délice de La Petite Chaise (sorbet mangue et cerise, griottes, chantilly…) et mousse au chocolat blanc avec sauce chocolat. The délice was a cherry & mango sorbet with a bunch of other yumminess. The white chocolate mousse was PERFECTION.

After spending the morning in the Louvre, we stopped at a small cafe for lunch. We ordered a baguette avec poulet and some traditional veggies. This was honestly one of my favorite meals so far.

The vegetable bowl had traditional shredded carrots, beats & lentils. All three were great, but I think the lentils were my favorite.

The chicken in this simple sandwich was roasted and packed full of flavor. And of course the baguette was amazing.

See that pastry on the top left? That was breakfast the other morning. Almond & chocolate yumminess.

And the baguettes on the left and in the middle. Yea, we ate those too. With camembert & brie…more on the cheese later.

Right now I am sitting in my Paris apartment munching on French cookies…

…and gazing at the Eiffel Tower. Is this really my life? I don’t believe it.

Paris is unbelievable. I honestly think it is safe to call it the most beautiful city in the world, with more to do than one can imagine. 1 week is simply not enough time. Our apartment is literally steps from the Louvre, Musée D’Orsay & the Seine. I could live here forever, well except that I might end up with brain damage from multiple concussions due to the mansard roof. I have much to report on and oodles of deliciously French food to share with you. Until then, help yourself to some baguette, viennoise and pain au chocolat.