back to basics ... take bread, for instance

well, now that I'm coming up on my 3rd winter in France ... and experiencing the solitude and reflection that allows when you live in the French countryside ... here's an example of what I love about the life I've created here that will most likely and, sadly, change.

Bread. Here it is still a simple basic of life. part of the 'quotidien' (routine) that I embrace and others cling to. our daily bread is still a fact for so many.

Imagine a daily routine that includes arising and walking in to town to collect the bread for your breakfast. you do this daily, because the bread you choose to eat is baked daily and without preservatives. likely just 2 or three ingredients. prepared in an old bread oven, brick (four à pain), that is located in a tiny bakery (boulangerie) that has existed for several hundred years ... in the heart of a medieval village that houses a benedictine abbey founded by Charlemagne. Your bread is prepared by the 5th generation of the family that has operated the bakery. While there, you might choose a chocolatine (pain au chocolat) or croissant to accompany your morning coffee. Most french will opt for the simple daily baguette (or two) that will be eaten with butter and confiture at breakfast ... and the rest will be eaten with lunch or dinner.

You buy only what you can eat because by tomorrow, the baguette will be hard and suitable mostly for croutons, tartine or a treat for the ducks. You will rise and go to the bakery in the morning for your fresh baguette.

My village (the one with the benedictine abbey) has three boulangeries for a population of 2,000. Everyone has their favorite ... and some, like me, have divided it further ... whose pain au chocolat do I prefer versus baguette versus pain au campagne. Parisians who visit decry the quality of the baguette for the lighter crusts of the north. When I moved here, the first question demanded of me by my french acquaintances was if I had chosen my bakery yet.

Unfortunately, the behemoth Carrefour bought out and expanded our local supermarket last winter. The 2 'hypermarchés' (markets) in the center of town forego selling any bread save that sliced white stuff the non-french cherish so. Carrefour now hauls in a variety of baguette style breads at a discount to our downtown boulangeries. They of course have preservatives and last longer. they taste like it as well.

This is just another reason I resist giving my business to Carrefour except when absolutely backed into a corner ... when I need a supermarket's wares versus my local boulangerie, butcher and my beloved vendors at the Friday market, I frequent the tinier markets in the center of town.

I prefer to give my support to those who recognize the need to support these small, history sustaining businesses. There's a fragile connection that is worth tending, even at the cost of the few daily centimes more I may be spending to do so. For once the boulangeries and butchers are gone ... the Friday outdoor market, unsupported due to Carrefour's so-called advantage ... well my quotidien will be not much different than it was from whence I came.

funny what a big difference a small thing like bread can make.