After years of waiting, at very long last someone has had the brilliant idea of opening a bagel shop right next to my office (which also makes it right next to home). This is absolute bliss.
One can say all one wants on french cuisine -- which is indeed delicious for full meals -- it is impossible not to notice just how short it falls of making a good snack.
No one in France, even in Paris despite its lush restodiversity, knows how to make a proper snack. If you don't want a full meal, you have a choice between endlessly boring variations on waffles, food-poisoned kebaps, McDo / Quick (the latter being palatable, but not every day), or sandwiches that would make those Douglas Adams describes in So Long and Thanks for All the Fish (yes, the ones that are there for british people to atone for their sins) seem like delicious treats in comparisons.
So a bagel shop, even though it's not a very good one, is immense relief. The next step is for someone to start doing Fish 'n' Chips, but sadly, I'm not holding my breath.
Welcome to the civilized world...
ziggy on 2001-12-19T00:08:58
Forget thousand year old castles and art galleries that house collections more valuable than the gross national product of Ghana. Here's how to judge when you're in a civilized place:
- There's a supermarket less than 5 minutes away that's about the size of an aircraft hanger (bonus points if it's a natural food supermarket)
- There's a coffee shop open until midnight nearby (bonus points if it's open before 8am, serves good coffee and isn't Starbucks)
- There's a good bookstore nearby with amazingly obscure titles always in stock (Bonus points if it isn't either Borders or Barnes and Noble)
- Great local produce, and great restaurants to match
- Great bread
- Great beer and wine (both amazing, wonderful, fresh local stuff, and a sizable selection of imports)
- More Perl programmers per capita than Java and Python programmers (combined)
But, most importantly:
- A bagelry that makes amazing fresh bagels daily, and has a kickass selection of smoked fish (double bonus points if they make good bread and serve top notch deli meats)
Oh, and
truly civilized places have some other things that aren't even food related.
:-)
