Apologies if the title of this post makes you think automatically of the Steve Martin film by the same name. It’s quite a moving film actually, but not really the theme of this post. The jerk I’m talking about is a gentleman whom I met today at a free cheese and wine taste-testing workshop at our French school–do I really need to add that it’s a French school seeing as it’s a cheese and wine “workshop”? Anyways, this European acquaintance of about my age turned out to be quite the individual. For example, upon having the cheese pictured below passed to us, his reaction (in a rather loud voice) was, “In my country, we throw [stuff] like this out!” (He didn’t use the word ‘stuff’.) He then went on a little tirade which in no way bears repeating. At the moment, I was taken aback by his rude verbal seepage. Don’t you know you’re in France, buddy? 

Rude, yes, but if I’m being completely honest, from times to times it’s easy to have that sort of reaction to cuisine, especially if you come from a country that wouldn’t even consider eating such things. Our professor remarked today, for instance, that everything on the pig is good to eat (except the eyeballs). Brain? Check. Tail? Check. Skin? Check. Feet? Check. Other bits and pieces? Check. I consider myself rather daring when it comes to trying new foods, but pig brain isn’t a must-try for me. No way. Still, there’s no need to be a jerk. Plus, you can probably find folks where I come from who eat all those things!

Here’s another cheese that we sampled. Can you guess what the tiny black and grey bits on top are? (Answer below.) And no, my “friend” didn’t try this one either.

It’s pepper! What were you thinking? This turned out be a really nice cheese, though the pepper proved rather strong.

Here’s the craftswoman behind the workshop, our very generous professor Kristel who is here briefing us on the next cheese we were about to try. They do take cheese seriously here. There’s supposed to be a different type for each day of the year even. Unfortunately, we haven’t been trying a new cheese a day since we arrived. Dommage.

Voila. Now for pictures of the kids to liven the mood.

Poppy doing Granny’s hair at playgroup.

Henry resting his legs after spending the morning strolling around.