APRIL FOOL--POISSON D'AVRIL! by P.B. Lecron

Crybaby, my Franco-American hybrid kids' pet fan-tailed goldfish must have been on my mind when I went to the chocolate shop. 

One more slip of the tongue, this time on the funnest day of the year in most places in the world, April 1.   In France the April's Fool prank is called a poisson d'avril, literally fish of April. The most common gag here is for school children to stick a cut-out paper fish on the back of a teacher or classmate, then giggle about it.

It's a big day for the chocolatier, too, who makes and sells ribbon-clad chocolate poissons d'avril, usually filled with smaller chocolate fish or fritures. Wanting to buy a chocolate fish on a first of April at our town's chocolatier, I inadvertantly asked the salesgirl for a poisson rouge (goldfish). It was not until after she began looking at all of the chocolate poissons d'avril on display that both of us realized that I had just pulled her leg.

All of these poissons d'avril were swimming around Aux Colonnes, a chocolatier in Versailles. 

Our prettiest poisson d'avril ever--a Lalique fish.

Vocabulary                              
un poisson:  a fish
un poisson rouge:  a goldfish
une friture:  a small fish
chocolatier, ière:   maker or seller of chocolate
faire marcher quelqu'un:  to pull somebody's leg    
une farce:  a prank
un canular:  a hoax
une plaisanterie:  a joke
Expression
Ton lacet est défait:  Your shoelace is untied.

A comedy of errors!
For more language fun, including some of my now famous slips of the tongue :
Sip 'n Slip
Caution: Language Barrier Crossing
Chic, Chickpeas
Madame Malaprop Goes to the Dentist
I Don't Think We're in Kansas Anymore
It's All in How You Say It
Accidental English
The Artichoke Next Door
Text & photos ©2011 P.B. Lecron

CAUTION: LANGUAGE BARRIER CROSSING by P.B.Lecron

I love speaking French, but sometimes I feel like what I 'm about to say is an accident waiting to happen. Like the time when I wanted to say "The best thing to do is to shut up and not say anything."

It came out instead a rather winsome "La meillure chose à faire, c'est de fermer ton clapier et de ne rien dire; or shut your rabbit hutch and not say anything.

Vocabulary & slang
Clapet: valve, mouth
Clapier: rabbit hutch
Clapper: to click one's tongue
Ferme ton clapet: hold your tongue, shut up
Quel clapet: what a chatterbox!




A comedy of errors! Click on titles to read earlier posts on the same theme:
Chic, Chickpeas
Madame Malaprop Goes to the Dentist
I Don't Think We're in Kansas Anymore
It's All in How You Say It
Accidental English
The Artichoke Next Door

Text & photo ©2011 P.B. Lecron

CHIC, CHICKPEAS by P.B.Lecron

Organic chickpeas. Soak overnight then simmer 2 hours
in fresh water with a pinch of baking soda.
Salt after cooking.

They're called garbansos (-zos ) in the midi or south of France, and pois chiches in the rest of country. When talking about chickpeas in French one day, I blundered and said we could serve une salade de pois chiques. That stirred up my French friends because chique can either mean chewing tobacco, chiggers, or if you're in Belgium, chewing gum. Take your pick.

Improvise and improve
Be that as it may, communication skills in a foreign language, like cooking skills, evolve through improvisation. Make a simple and quick salade de pois chiches with any typical Mediterranean ingredients you might have on hand: parsley, coriander or thyme; olives, capers, chives, scallions, fresh or sun-dried tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers; cooked and cooled eggplant, zucchini, etc... and splash with freshly squeezed lemon juice and olive oil. This one was made with just chopped scallions and parsley and came out fine.

Vocabulary lesson
Chique: chigger; quid (lump of chewing tobacco); in Belgian, chewing gum
Être du chiqué: to be a sham

Text & photos ©2011 P.B.Lecron

ACCIDENTAL ENGLISH by P.B. Lecron

In the French spirit. . .


Suffice it to say that English words have always had a way of creeping into the French language. Like week-end, e-mail or the less likely white spirit for paint thinner.

A French friend told me about a charming blooper she made in her younger, more innocent days when on a balcony having apéritifs before a dinner party, she accidentally brushed her skirt against some wet paint, peinture fraîche. (People are the same everywhere, always sprucing up at the last minute before having guests over.) 

When her host noticed the smudge on her skirt he asked her if she wanted some white spirit. Voulez-vous du white spirit? Thinking that it was a cocktail, she replied, "Oui, si vous en prenez un, aussi."  Yes, if you have one, too. . .

At apéritif time every Frenchman's grandmother used to serve Guignolet, a sweet cherry liqueur originating in Dijon. Gabriel Boudier, a French reference in fruit liqueurs, is given credit for creating Guignolet in 1874,  which is obtained by macerating the guigne cherry variety. Once a lady's apéritif of choice with its delicate cherry parfum and pretty ruby robe, the old-fashioned Guignolet which has long been relegated to the back of liquor cabinets, is inching its way forward as an inventive ingredient in cocktails and recipes.



For a very vintage apéritif, serve chilled at 8°C (46°F); or frappé poured over shaved ice. In cooking, lightly sautéed cherries are glazed with Guignolet for dessert toppings and fillings, or to accompany turkey, pheasant or duck.
 
Dessert idea: I think chilled Guignolet is best served over vanilla ice-cream.


Recipe for a Guignolo cocktail: 
In a champagne flute mix 3/10 natural cherry juice, 2/10 Guignolet, and 5/10 Champagne. Decorate with a preserved cherry or une cerise à l'eau de vie.
 

Apéritif, in French a masculine noun, is a drink taken before lunch or dinner to stimulate the appetite. Attention, there's the adjective form used to say une boisson apéritive. Or for short, the more youthful apéro (masculine noun).

For another easy cocktail recipe, see Recipe for a Hypocrite in the blog archives. http://a-french-education.blogspot.com/2009/09/recipe-for-hypocrite-by-pb-lecron.html

Text & photos ©2009 P.B. Lecron