Eating out in France

This is a small mountain village near the area I live. I passed by there today to go and visit a property I was possibly 'thinking' of buying. As it turns out it wasn't appropriate after all but I still made the most of being in this beautiful part of the county. I fell in love with this place years back (when I took this photo) and discovered an amazing little restaurent tucked away in the little cluster of houses in the center.

This is the restaurant. It is otherwise known by the 'locals' as Chez Nana. Nana is the wonderfully characteristic female chef/owner who obviously enjoys her own food and enjoys coming out at the end of the meal to talk about the local products she uses and how everything is home made etc. It is the type of resto where only the Locals really go as it is a well kept secret and a little sacred to them. (I was lucky to get the 'in' so to speak years back from a friend who lived in the village.)

It's a cool little set up and a family run business. The interior looks as though it hasn't been decorated since the early 1970's but this simply makes it all the more endearing of an experience to me. The problem I have now though (as opposed to my 'meat eating days') is...... there are ALOT of typical traditional Meat dishes on the menu (which isn't that extensive to start with so imagine my chances of acquiring anything vegetarian let alone Raw lol). I was in luck though it seemed today, as there was a choice of 2 set menus today....firstly 18euros for a 3 course meal and 25 euros for a 4 course meal.



On the first set menu there was a starter namely 'crudities'. This is what appeared before me. Bare in mind....this platter of goodies was JUST for one....ME..... This ALONE was ample enough to fill me up for a few days. I must admit, I was pleasantly suprised and delighted at this sight as 'crudities' in my French experience over the years has varied greatly from raw veg to raw meat platters etc.

You may be able to see..... but the only 'Raw' thing here was in fact the delicious grated carrots marinated in parsley, garlic and dressing which I devoured immediately. The other dishes were, cooked beans, lentils, mixed cooked veg cubes in mayo and cooked chick peas in a sauce, beetroot....oh and a fish and potato salad. I ate all but the fish dish.

I knew that I managed to mangle out of the waitress a 'salad of sorts' for the main course to replace the meat offerings (which basically consisted of iceburg lettuce a tomato and onion slices and no dressing - obviously my punishment for being ' difficult' and 'Must be a Vegetarian'.... cough, splutter, blurgh....a terrible word to the French lol) that it would be wise to fill myself up on the starter as the salad wouldn't be upto much lol. I was right.

This was the view from the restaurant window onlooking the mountains.....beautiful no?!!?

Something recently I have learnt about eating out in France in this area is to ask for the traditional 'Salad Nicoise' (which is almost always on a menu and consists of a mixed salad with tuna and anchovies) is that if I ask for this salad but politely say ''sans poissons - without fish'' this doesn't seem to ruffle any feathers and they tend to make up for the lack of fish with extra raw salad goodies to boot. Using the 'V' word is a defo no no.
I declined the 3rd course politely ......and with  my green tea I was given a plate of whole clemintines and a bottle of locally made liquor as a digestive to help myself too.( this made me chuckle.... when I asked if they had herbal teas....... the waitress/part owner had to go check as she said that was a first!! God love this place..... I will definitely be going back for sure!!! Love the simplicity of the French living - guess that's one reason why I fell in love with this country) It was a delicious meal and the walk around the little village after (more like 'rolling around' I was so stuffed) was so picturesque that I had to take some photos of it to show you. Sorry for the poor quality photos....I only had my phone camera to do the honors.

After the walk around the town.... I drove a little out of the main area and decided to stop and go on a little hike to burn off the mamouth meal I had just devoured. I stumbled upon this cute little track to which.......

...... led me to this bunch of people Parapenting off  this hillside cliff area to hover/glide over the coast of Monaco/Menton . That is Monaco in the background behind the people.

This is the view as they dropped off the hillside and headed towards the Menton coastline. It was a spectacular day and I enjoyed every minute of the experience despite it not always being easy to eat out for a Rawfoodist here....... Today I liked it!!! :0)