The Sweet Life in Paris: Delicious Adventures in the World's Most Glorious - and Perplexing - City Read Online Free PDF

don’t have a dryer (which is almost everyone in Paris), means having to be creative about hanging your clothes in every spare space available in your apartment,
à la Napolitana
, as they say: in the style of a Neapolitan washerwoman. Which means if you have guests, you can’t be too shy about their knowing whether you’re a boxers or briefs kinda guy. Unlike the Neapolitans, I keep mine indoors, since I don’t want my neighbors, especially
le voyeur
with the binoculars across the street, to know that much about me. Although he seems to be pretty fixated on whatever’s going on in the apartment below mine. (And because of him, now I am, too.)
    Part of becoming Parisian means an initiation into the surely decades-old tradition of buying your first drying rack, which requires as much thought, reflection, and comparison of features as your very first car purchase. My initial foray into the world of drying racks required a hands-on demonstration that lasted well over thirty minutes. The eager salesman, whose talents eclipsed those of hyper-hawker Ron Popeil, unfolded and flexed and contorted every single drying rack in his department. I wondered whether he was on commission or just bored, standing among all those drying racks each and every day. Regardless, I was won over not just by the sturdy, well-designed rack I went home with, but by the fact that I actually got a salesperson’s undivided attention for more than thirty seconds in a French department store.
    Aside from my new part-time job as an Italian washerwoman, I had to think about my real-life job, which involved a lot of cooking and baking. How could I work in such a petite
cuisine américaine?
And when I say “American kitchen,” you’re probably conjuring up images of expansive granite countertops, shelves stacked with shiny cookware, all the latest gadgets, and restaurant-style appliances.
    Here in Paris, “
cuisine américaine”
translates to “completely impractical.” My counter is so high that if a spoon handle is sticking over the edge of a bowl, I’m in danger of putting an eye out. It also means that even though I’m close to six feet tall, when folding batters and such, I can barely see into the bowl and I have to assume things are getting mixed in properly way up there. I suppose I could put a mirror on the ceiling, but when I moved in, the painter removed all the seventies-style mirrors, which covered every conceivable surface of the apartment, and I wasn’t about to call him up to find out where he’d put them.
    What the countertop lacks in practicality, it makes up for by not imposing itself and taking up too much space in my apartment. Consequently, my entire cooking area is roughly the size of a rectangular gâteau Opéra, the size that serves eight. And we’re talking eight French-sized servings, not American-sized slabs.
    The first thing you realize when horizontal space is at a premium is that there’s only one way to go, and that’s up. So things get stacked one on top of the other, which is more than mildly annoying. If I need the sugar bin, it’s invariably the one at the bottom of the stack, and to get it I have to move everything else on top of it, which may include any or—if I hit it at the wrong time (which I always seem to do)—all of the following: flour, cocoa powder, cornstarch, confectioners’ sugar, cornmeal, brown sugar, and oats.
    My precious stash of American goodies—molasses, organic peanut butter, dried sour cherries, non-stick spray, wild rice, and Lipton Onion Soup Mix—get crammed in the back of one of my two cabinets, reserved for special occasions. The onion soup mix is especially rare around here, and a guest has to be someone pretty dip-worthy for me to tear into one of my prized foil-wrapped pouches.
    Baking as much as I do, I stockpile ingredients. Everything closes at 9 p.m., and there’s nothing worse than running out of sugar at 8:40, the time when the employees actually decide they’re