For breakfast on my last day in Bordeaux I had a berry smoothie, I don’t drink coffee, and a real, buttery, light and flaky, French croissant 🥐. If you have been following this blog, and if you haven’t, you should be ashamed of yourself, you know that I developed an addiction to chocolate croissants for breakfast while I was walking the Way. I thought that these Spanish chocolate croissants were heavenly. But in the morning, when I gobbled down my Camino chocolate croissant, I was usually sleep deprived from trying and failing to get a good night’s sleep in an alburgue with a bunch of smelly, farting, snoring Pilgrims, and I was hungry enough to eat roadkill. No surprise that I thought the Spanish chocolate croissants were to die for. The real French croissants that I have been feasting on during my stay in Bordeaux have made me realize how pedestrian, no pun intended, the Spanish attempt at croissants truly is. If the wiley Spaniards had served real French croissants on the Camino I would still be walking the Way, eating croissants and gaining instead of losing weight.
Speaking of gourmet food, get a load of this sign I saw at a bus stop down the street from my hotel.
Does that sign really say what I think it says? “Steak N Shake – A Pioneer of Gourmet Burgers!🍔”
Are you kidding me?? Even for the disingenuous French, who are masters at the old bait and switch, this is over the top! Raise your hand if you have ever eaten at a Steak N Shake. They do serve a good hamburger, but the buns are of the Wonder Bread variety and the only cheese they have to put on your hamburger is American cheese. And American cheese is not really cheese! They make this so called cheese out of corn oil and soybean oil and a whole bunch of petroleum based chemical preservatives. A block of American cheese will stay edible for centuries. American cheese is NOT gourmet food. It is barely food and should have a health warning on the packaging, modeled after the health warning on cigarette packages, “DANGER, eat enough of this stuff and it will kill you!”
The fries at Steak N Shake are pretty good and the shakes are great, but definitely not gourmet. And most of the Frenchies who are eating at Steak N Shake in Bordeaux are sipping on a glass of fine red wine 🍷 or quaffing a cold brewski 🍺 with their burgers and fries. They are not even sampling the best part of the Steak N Shake experience, the milkshakes. If I had a few more days in Bordeaux I would protest the disingenuous advertising of Steak N Shake as a pioneer in the field of gourmet hamburgers. What a crock of French crap. And the French know better! What self respecting Frenchie is going to eat a hamburger at Steak N Shake and declare it a gourmet hamburger.
It gets worse. As I was walking around this morning I spotted this sign advertising a gourmet food festival in Bordeaux on November 16, 17 and 18. I assume that Steak N Shake, the Pioneer of Gourmet Burgers in Bordeaux, will be one of the lead exhibitors at this gourmet food festival.
I decided to take a break from blogging and stroll around the neighborhood in search of a place to have lunch. While I was strolling around the neighborhood I noticed this street art.
After this culture break I decided to get serious about lunch. I could go around the corner to have a gourmet hamburger.
Or I could have a tasty toasted Subway sandwich.
I decided to try to be healthy today and have a salad 🥗 for lunch at Eat Salad.
Eat Salad is the descriptive name for a salad bar about a block from my hotel. I am sure you all know how a salad bar works. First you give your salad chef a hearty bon jour in French. I am getting so good at this that my salad chef was convinced I was French and would only speak to me in French. I finally convinced her that bon jour was the extent of my French and she haughtily agreed to help me make my salad, in English. I picked out a nice kale and spinach base layer and then added a number of vegetables, shrimp and cheese. At the end of the line I had to pick out a salad dressing so my salad chef could toss and serve my salad. I assumed that my choices would be limited to olive oil or vinegar or olive oil and vinegar. With an insouciant wave of her hand my salad chef pointed to the board that listed my salad dressing choices. I took one look at this board and let out a primal scream of joy and exhalation! RANCH DRESSING!!!
Thank God! No more vinegar and olive oil. And this was real Ranch Dressing. Behind the counter I saw a 10 gallon tub of Hidden Valley Ranch Dressing. I love these guys at Eat Salad! I apologize and take back every disparaging thing I have ever said about the Frenchies. You have made amends for all the snootiness and high handed behavior you have subjected me to while I have been a reluctant guest in your country. You put ranch dressing on my salad and for that I will be forever in your debt.
I hope everyone is having a great Wednesday.
Good afternoon Bordeaux, France 🇫🇷.
AbeAndMarkontheCamino 