Paris and the Eiffel Tower

Well, packing took a lot longer than expected… so, with only 3 hours of sleep in my, I got up at 6:30 for our 7:20 departure. I made my way downstairs into the breakfast room for the last time and received my final cup of coffee. I also had to have a piece of bread with butter and jam, since I knew it was the last time I’d be doing that for a very, very long time (very).

At 7:20, after saying our thanks and farewells to Madame, I trudged through the pouring rain with my too heavy luggage in my completely impractical flats and dress onto the bus. I was a little optimistic about the weather… hoping Paris would be nothing but sunshine. At 8:30 we boarded our TGV train to the Gare de Lyon. When we arrived, we regrouped and parted ways. It was bittersweet and surreal as one by one our group members broke off and disappeared with their luggage among the sea of people crowding the train station.

No more sadness. After all, the glass really is half full:  there was five of us still together and we had a full day in Paris! We went downstairs in the station to purchase metro cards for the day which we took to get to our hotel. As soon as we walked out of the meto station and onto the street, directly in front of us stood the Moulin Rouge! It looks just like in the movie!

That is, except that it stood surrounded by several other buildings in a bustling city, but it was really cool no less. We lugged our bags to our hotel (2 too many flights of stairs for my liking) and arranged for taxis to take us to our respective airports at 4am.

The other girls had visited the Louvre when they’d arrived in Paris two weeks ago, but I still really wanted to go. So we split up and I tried to go. Now, once a month the Louvre has free entry, this day being the first Sunday of the month. I didn’t know this. Today was July 1, and a Sunday. There was an hour and a half line just to get in. I arrived at 3pm, wouldn’t get in until 4:30, and the museum was set to close at 5:30. I accepted my loss and gave up hopes for going to the Louvre.

Instead, I made my way back to Notre Dame, this time to check out the inside which I had not been able to see the week before. When on my way there, I walked through what I thought was a with food or souvenirs, but actually turned out to be a slew of vendors with pet birds. I found this very interesting. As with most old churches, Notre Dame was gorgeous. 

I took a metro back to our previously designated meeting place, so that we could all walk to the Eiffel tower. 

En route, we purchased our final French ice cream cones. 

As we neared the Eiffel tower, I became thoroughly confused. Did you know the Eiffel tower is brown? Like mocha cappuccino brown? 

Not black, or grey, or slate, or silver or even dark brown. Nope. It was light brown. I was amazed.

Anyway, aside from the color-shock, the Eiffel tower is amazing.

We couldn’t believe that we were standing right under it. It’s massive and really just a phenomenal structure overall.

We decided there were three things we needed to do that evening: dinner, boat cruise, and climbing the tower. We started with dinner where we enjoyed escargot for the last time, I had just a bit more goat cheese, and I finally tried Kir, a French aperitif of white wine with crème de cassis.

We then headed a few blocks over for a boat tour which would take us past several sights just as the sun was setting. We popped a bottle of wine on the boat, sat back and took in the beauty of Paris.

Even better, when we were standing on line, an English-speaking woman gave us three tickets for the cruise which she didn’t use. So instead of it costing 9 euros each, it only cost us four.

We headed over to the Eiffel tower around 10pm to begin our ascent. Unfortunately, as we were walking toward the ticket line, they closed the gates for admission to the top. We at least still had the chance to walk to the second level, which was definitely better than nothing.

Somehow, I got lost in the excitement and completely missed the Eurocup final. I saw crowds of people flocking over the bridge away from a jumbotron on the other side of the river. The game had ended between Spain and Italy. Soon enough, the faint “ole ole ole ole” chant of a Spanish victory became audible and I knew that Spain had secured their third cup title. I was ecstatic! People were dancing, singing, and cheering for hours. Cars were honking their horns and passengers were leaning out of the windows, raving. I wish I’d seen it!

Just when we were about to descend from the second level of the Eiffel tower, the whole thing began to glitter and light up. It was a really cool sight to see.

We caught taxis back to the hotel and repacked our luggage. I was able to squeeze in a twenty minute nap before having to wake up again and head down for our taxi.

I’m currently sitting in my terminal in Charles de Gaulle airport watching the bellies of the clouds outside shift from shades of blue to lavender to pink-peach, and gold as the sun is rising over the horizon.

Again, this has been the experience of a lifetime. I will never forget the friends I’ve made on this trip or the perspective which I have gained. I now have a new respect for France, especially having seen it from the small town setting where the meaning of French still reigns true, unaltered by tourism. I’ve been blessed to have this opportunity, see so much, and meet so many wonderful people. But I’ve also learned a tremendous amount and have begun the sow the seeds for a passion for cheese and wine and culture, an integral factor, which I hope to continue to cultivate.

On one hand, I’m sad to leave, but I’m also excited to be home and see my friends and family so that I can share my experience with them and apply everything that I have learned here to my life on New Jersey soil.

Your typical exam day.

Today we had our final exam presentations. I got up super early to work on my presentation and get to the market to purchase some cheese. I got right on line at the cheese distributor, who had both Salers and Cantal cheeses which I was looking to purchase. Salers and Cantal are cheeses produced by the exact same method, but Salers differs because it can only be produced from the milk of cows that graze on mountain pasture in the summer. So, Salers is very yellow in color, whereas Cantal is closer to ivory. 

Left: Cantal
Right: Salers

And, yes, there was already a dozen people on line at 9:30am to purchase cheese from this man, who shakes the hand of and greets each of his customers. I purchased “un petit morceau” of each. Before going back to Cluny Sejour, I did a bit of souvenir shopping around the market.

Around noon, the rest of the student began to flock to the classroom and we setup for the presentations of each of our individually selected wines and cheeses. In total we had 8 presentations, 12 cheeses, and 5.5 bottles of wine.  The cheeses were Beauxfort, Cantal, Salers, Munster (2 types), brie di meaux, morbier, 3 ages of goat cheeses, emmental, and Roquefort (which this time was much better with bread, walnuts, and a very sweet wine). Five hours later, we finished. It was a long, *difficult* afternoon.

We purchased every bottle of this wine that
Le Cellier del Abbaye had!

After tasting so many wines, we all took a trip over to Le Cellier del Abbaye to purchase a few bottles of our favorites as souvenirs. 

We then had our final dinner at Le Cloitre as a group. 

Our last escargot!

My last dinner in Cluny: seafood and
potato in tomato broth. Mmmm...

As we ate, there was torrential downpours outside--I'd like to think of this as a sign that we're not supposed to leave.

This past week has flown by and I can’t believe that tomorrow we’re going to be leaving this place. Will I ever return here, to Cluny? Perhaps I should make that a goal. And now I have to pack up all my clothes, all my souvenirs for my friends and family, all the memories, and bring them home. It hasn’t hit me yet, that we’re actually going. This was honestly one of the greatest experiences ever. Nothing can compare. I’ve learned so much about myself, about cheese and wine, about the history of this little gem of a town and its region, and I’ve made several friends: all in two weeks time. Alright, 7:00am is going to be here before I know it. It’s time to pack. 

Comte Coma: Part II

Last night there was the craziest storm. So, we couldn’t close the windows in our hotel room because it was swelteringly hot, and around 5am the thunder started booming. It was violent and earth-shattering. Thus, the time to wake up came far too early.

Breakfast was awesome! I was so torn because I’m pretty sure I was still full from the night before. But for the first time since coming to France, breakfast was more than just bread. So, of course, I had to embrace the moment, go down a notch on my belt, and dig in. There were eggs, whole fruit, cereal, and yogurt (my favorite)—of course bread and croissants were options, too, but there were so many other things!

Once again, I was really full. We left hotel and boarded the bus to go visit a farm where they were making Comte (yummmm). 

When we arrived, the milk truck was still in the driveway and huge copper vats were being heated and stirred. 

We then watched as the contents of one vat were pumped and showered over another tub with 8 molds with sieves. 

The molds were catching the curd, and as we watched, the copper vat emptied to completion, the sieves were removed to leave behind the metal mold, filled to the brim with fresh curd. 

These were smoothed, capped and set on racks by machine to drain further. 

They then set up for the next batch. We learned  that they received their milk from a cooperative of farmers who independently did not produced enough milk to make the cheese. This facility would process 4 or 5 batches of milk per day to yield 32 to 40 wheels of Comte.

After observing the process, we were shown the rooms where the cheeses age for several weeks. On sight, there were thousands of cheeses waiting to be sent to caves for further aging. Like all the other cheese facilities we’d been to, this one had a store as well. But in this store, we could taste some Comte. Could I resist? Ha. No way.

We stopped off at the Jura market that afternoon to purchase some supplies for a picnic lunch in the mountains before our visit to an old fort, where they now age Comte up to 4 years. I picked up a cucumber and some irresistible 26 month Comte. Now this cheese… this cheese. I really hope I can find some at home. Our picnic was pretty epic. We had bread (weird, right?), a wide variety of cheeses, carrot salads, cantaloupe, figs, cucumber, tomatoes, cherries, and so on. We also had the opportunity to try real English Cheddar cheese FROM Cheddar. Now, after that, I really don’t understand how they got American Cheddar. Why abandon the method of something that was already so good? Or defame it’s good name with such an imposter? Oh geez… I’ve been spoiled.

Our bus tried to fit though this tunnel...
It was WAY too big.

Filled to the brim, we entered the Comte storage facility. Unfortunately, all the food began to take its toll. This is precisely why I can do big lunches. I could hardly stand I was so tired. At one point, when I was standing as far as possible from the creepy mannequins which were demonstrating the cheese making process in repeated, rigid motion, I leaned against a wall and started to fall asleep on the spot. I was jolted awake as my knee started to give out under me. I resorted to pacing.

As I said, the facility used to be a fort, so the walls were several feet thick stone. Thus, the temperature in the cellar was naturally seven degrees Celsius year round. We entered the room where there were 4-year-aged rounds of Comte. The stench of this room set our eyes watering and sent us running: it absolutely reeked of ammonia. It turns out that this smell is a natural product of the aging process because as proteins are breaking down, they release nitrogen compounds, therefore, ammonia.

We ended our tour with a sensual movie with a man in a robe talking about all the efforts involved in caring for the Comte during the aging process and producing a high quality product. And again, we were provided with a tasting of 6 month, 12 month, and 18 month Comte cheeses. The 12-month was produced using summer’s milk and had a distinctly more yellow hue. Further, it was texturally different. It was more crumbly, whereas the non-summer milk cheeses were slightly more firm and rubbery. All different, all delicious.

After lack of sleep last night because of the storm, all the food today, and the intense heat, I readily stretched out in the last row of seats on the bus and fell right asleep for the entire ride home. 

I’m now working on my presentation for tomorrow morning, before which I need to get up and go to the farmers market to purchase some Salers!

Comte Coma: Part I

This morning we left for Jura on…. the big bus! Hopefully it works out…

  

We first visited the old salt mines. Compared to the blazing hot day, the cool depths of the salt mines was refreshing. We descended several stairs into the mines, standing on compact coal ash with thin, needle-like stalactites above our heads.

 We made note of what appeared to be architecture of the Sistersian monks in the tall tunnel archways. 

We observed the methods of harvesting brine and even tasted brine straight from the spicket. The mines are no longer mass producing salt, but do continue to pump brine which they use to make salted caramels among a few other things.

We had a light lunch at a nearby café then headed to Pasteur’s home. Before visiting his house though, we pulled over on the side of the road, where we got out to stand in the vineyard where Pasteur’s family had owned plots of vines. But also where Pasteur made several significant deductions about bacteria and yeast metabolism, by observing wine fermentation.

After dropping our things off at our hotel, we walked to La Maison de Louis Pasteur.

We were warmly welcomed and given a tour of the home. Our guide was very funny, and led us through the dining room, living room, bedroom, and laboratory. 

I couldn't tell you how many times I've seen
drawings and textbooks images of this
microscope.

I was intrigued to see the original swan-necked flasks which disproved spontaneous generation and the microscopes involved in making significant scientific deductions about yeast, bacteria, tartaric acid crystals, vaccinations, and so much more.

The original swan-necked flasks!

Later that evening, we had another 4 course meal planned for us. But first, we had some shopping to do. Seven fifteen came too quickly and we headed to the restaurant for dinner. 

My first course consisted of a salad with lettuce, tomato, walnuts, that delicious Dijon vinaigrette and cubes of Comte cheese. This was my first time trying Comte. It was love. Go buy yourself some Comte right now. It’s available in the states because although it’s a raw milk cheese, it’s aged for several months. Buy summer’s milk Comte. It’s there, you can find it, and I guarantee you will not be disappointed.

Anyway, the meal continued on, and I had an omelette for my next course which was filled with, you guessed it, Comte. Then came the cheese course. Being in Jura, the regional cheeses are Comte and Morbier. So I indulged in just a bit more Comte. Then, dessert. They had this cheese… no, just kidding. There wasn’t cheese in the dessert. What there was, though, was a tasty apple tart (which could have been 12x more tasty if it was warm, and had a scoop of vanilla ice cream…. only in America).

Oh, and I forgot to include mention of the wine’s we had with dinner tonight. Jura does something completely different with some of their wines: when the wine is matured in the barrel, a thick film of yeast is allowed to form over the surface and it sits for a few years. Then, the wine, called vin jaune, is completely transformed. I was surprised it was still a wine, because it seemed something far from wine, and closer to sherry. Upon first smell, I got a whiff of apple cider and acetone. My senses aren’t always spot on… but anyway, it was very interesting. And it does grow on you. Apparently, one bottle will keep forever which might be a good thing—I can’t imagine vin jaune being an everyday drink. But perhaps with some Comte and walnuts…

I love ice cream.

Today we were in the classroom once again focusing this time on salt and the microbiology of the cow rumen, which is pretty much as densely packed with bacteria as physically possible. After such appetizing discussion, we broke for lunch. After lunch, we were not returning to the classroom in order to give us a little extra time to work on our final presentations. 

Laura and I went to Le Cellier del Abbaye to purchase the wine’s we wanted to do our research papers on. I absolutely love the Chardonnay from the Macon region, compared to California Chardonnay. The fruit really comes forward and shines on its own, enhanced simply by the soil’s minerality. I never thought I’d really enjoy Chardonnay so much.

The wine I chose with Sonia's help!

It was super hot out, and what’s the best remedy on a hot day? ICE CREAM. I got a perfect scoop of violet ice cream and I felt like a cartoon. In Cluny, they have these big, big ice cream cones that taste like American waffle cones but better because they have a fragile, light, layered texture. Adding to this ridiculous cone, was a perfectly round scoop of lavender hued ice cream—like Easter purple. Ice cream cone in hand on this beautiful day, I was happy as a dog with two tails.

After spending the remainder of the afternoon working on my cheese and wine presentations, we headed out as a group to Auberge du Cheval Blanc, a really nice restaurant on the edge of town where you pretty much have to have a three or four course meal. No messing around.

At 7:30 we sat down and began piecing together our meal selections. For my first course (entre), I selected a salad topped with gingerbread toasts and warmed brie. 

My main course was sea bass with a creamy seafood sauce, asparagus, and rice pilaf. All our main dishes were accompanied by tiny side portions of nutmeg spiced carrots and mushrooms in cream sauce. 

Then, they wheeled over a cart of cheeses with a glass window through which the cheeses could be seen for selection.

I decided on 2 fresh goat cheeses, one aged goat, and Roquefort. The aged goat, once more, was my favorite. The fresh goat cheeses had no flavor, and the Roquefort was straight up salt—I guess when it come to blue cheese, I’ll be sticking to Stilton. After that, there was the option of dessert, but there was no way I was fitting another morsel in me. 

A leisurely three hours after being seated, we dragged ourselves out of the restaurant, and, me, I scurried to the bar to catch the Spain and Portugal semi-final euro cup game! I arrived toward the end of the game, and the bar was packed! Except it was packed with Portugal fans (boo!). There was one family, who’d I’d seen at the bar for several of the other games, that had everyone there. Their young children, around 2-years-old, were decked out in Portugal memorabilia. They even had their dogs there with them: green Mohawk and all. Yep, the dog had a green Mohawk in support of the Portugal team… awesome. But alas, Spain was victorious and I pretty much floated home on excited.

Tomorrow we have to get up pretty early for a 3 hour bus ride up to Jura where we’ll be visiting salt mines and the house of Louis Pasteur! We’re hoping we don’t get the big bus again because, although it would make the drive nice, we might not be able to maneuver all the roads we need to have access to. Time to pack for the over-night!

Wine tasting in one of the biggest cellars in the world? No big deal in Beaune.

Today we visited Beaune. We were supposed to depart before 9am, but the bus was nowhere to be seen. It wasn’t pulled into Cluny, Sejour the way that it had done the other days. So, after several minutes of waiting, we went to look for the bus. And bus we did find. A GIANT bus. Not the minibus which had taken us on our previous trips, this was a bus suited for nearly 50 people and their luggage. The ride was comfortable, to say the least; we each had a row of seats to ourselves. Living the high life, for sure.

Not only did the bus have its perks for comfort, but it also lifted us several feet off the ground, providing a beautiful view of the surrounding landscape through which we were driving and allowing us to see much more than we could from the ground level. As we drove out of Cluny and headed north, we began to pass dozens of Charolay calves on pasture. The miniature cattle had pure white coats from being so young.

Soon enough we began to enter Cote de Chalonnais, and vineyards began to pop up around us. We saw a wine maker pruning the tops of his vines using a tractor-like clipper. Before we knew it, we arrived in a drizzley Beaune.

Our first stop was the Musee du vin (Wine Museum) where, prior to entering, we saw several historical wine presses.  Once inside, we were pulled back in history, to the very beginning of the discovery and early production of wine in ancient times. The museum described grape varieties, regional development of vineyards, plantation standards, cultivation and harvesting tools and baskets, the different types of bottles used, and methods of corking. 

We also sat down to watch a video of the great deal of labor put into the assembly of wooden barrels used in wine aging. The difficult thing about the museum was that everything was in French. Thankfully, in each room there were summary cards in a variety of languages which we could reference. These cards didn’t go into full details about everything in each room, but were very informative nonetheless. We only wish we could have stayed longer!

Our second stop was the Hospice de Beaune. This was a town hospital where the sick poor of the city could be treated for free. It’s noted for having beautiful tiled roofing visible from the courtyard of the hospice. The tiles were hand-painted glossy slate, arranged in a diamond pattern. The tiles we saw were a reconstruction of what the original roofing was imagined to have looked like, though it was noted that the original may have had more coloring. 

We went through the hospice using audio-guides that provided us with in-depth descriptions of each room via reenacted first-person dialogue between the two founders of the hospice. Despite being a hospital, the hospice was beautiful. The tiles bore a crest with the initials of the founders. Even the ceiling beams were carved and painted as heads of several animals. 

We learned that the hospice was funded by donations and over the years had acquired several plots of land which were Beaune vineyards. This resulted in an annual auction of the wine produced by the vineyards to this day as a fundraiser.

After the lengthy tour of the Hospice we took a break for lunch at Brasserie Le Carnot. This place was busy—a tremendous change from the quiet town of Cluny which we’d become accustomed to. After our meal we regrouped and walked over to the Petriarche Caves, which are one of the largest wine caves in France.

As we arrived, the rain began to let up and some of us gravitated toward a few beautiful rose bushes which were outside. 

Soon enough, we were ushered inside and provided with small stainless steel cups with which to taste thirteen wines in the caves. These cups are small and shallow with a little ring as a handle and ribbing and bumps lining the interior. Monks used to hang the cups from string around their neck so they could carry a candle down into the cellars. The bumps and ribbing in the cup would reflect light from the candle through the wine and the monks would be able to tell if the wine was clear or not.

As we walked through the cool, dark caves, we passed stack after stack of dusty, unmarked bottles ranging from as few as one or two to stacks of hundreds, each differentiated by a small sign hung or placed near the stack. 

There was even wine so valuable that it was kept behind steel bars. Other bottles had dates indicating when they were to be opened. One such stack was wine from the Beaune Auction of 1994 (a very good year). This wine was both behind bars and partitioned into three groups which were to be opened in the years 2020, 2050, and 2094. A hundred year old bottle of wine! I can’t imagine thinking that far in advance. Then again, these cellars held wine dating back to 1904, 108 years ago, and bottles ranging from under ten euros to over a thousand euros in price. 

We were also told that just the previous week, the cellar was forced to switch from standard candlelight to electrical candlesticks as lighting. The tour guide was frustrated, and I can understand why. In such a historical place, where candles had been used for over a century with no real problems, why switch to dim, artificial lighting? I was slightly disappointed that we had just missed them, too. We were freely allowed to taste a select group of wines which they’d had set out. These included 1 sparkling, 4 whites, and 8 reds, the last white and the last red which we’d tasted were my favorites of the bunch, but unfortunately none were really good enough to purchase. 

After a big lunch and all that wine, I’m super tired. We’re currently on the road back to Cluny. I think when we get back I’m going to rest up and do some more research on Salers. Perhaps now find a wine that suits it, too!