Episode 52: Favorite Foods Since Becoming an Expat

Mamma Mia! In this episode Chandra shares the foods that have made the list of her absolute favorites since becoming an expat. From pastas to French pastries and even drinks, tune in and and let the drooling begin.

And of course this episode's "Chan Select" has to be among the rankings, so keep listening all the way until the end!

• This episode's "Chan Select": Amorino
• Follow us on Instagram: @Expatriotical
• Episode Reference: Episode 1: Who I am & How I Started My Crazy Expat Life and Episode 35: Solo Parenting as an Expat with Kim Ross, and Episode 48: Mistakes I've Made as an Expat
• Quote of the Day: "The only thing I like better than talking about food is eating." -John Walters
• Other Resources: Barilla and Ristorante Borgo di Vione

"Live and Travel in the Know" with Expatriotical!

Transcript

Bienvenue, Benvenuti, and Welcome to Expatriotical, the podcast for expats, travelers, and other adventurous souls. I’m Chandra Alley and after living as an expat with my husband and 4 children in two different countries for 6 years, I’ve learned the arts of pivoting during pitfalls, traveling tastefully for less, and soaking in amazing new cultures without losing your own.

Join me, as we dive into the joys and challenges of travel and the expat life in every episode!

Hey everybody! I am super stoked about this episode! As I said last week, I am a bit of a foodie. Like seriously, I love food! My husband, Chris, teases me about how much I can gush and go on and on about how good a specific meal was or the intricate flavor profiles of a new food I have tried. It might be ridiculous, but what can I say, it is something that brings me a lot of joy and since being an expat I have had the opportunity to try SO many new foods.

And while I have tried things like frog legs and escargot, which honestly, I actually like escargot, those things are not going to be on this list. Simply because I'm listing my favorite foods, not just foods I've tried. For the most part these are in no particular order, but I definitely have some favorite favorites, if you will.

And I am gonna start with a family favorite, one that is a go to for an easy dinner, and one that I have gotten so many compliments on when I make it at the fellowship dinner at my church. And it's also the one that when I mentioned in last week’s episode that I’m going to do a pretend cooking show on an Instagram reel, that's the one that we're going to cook. And I'm super excited about it!

So without further ado, it's pasta pesto. I know that it’s super simple most of you have probably had that before, but this is a specific brand that makes all the difference. I love homemade pesto, though I rarely make it, and nowadays, the pesto made by Barilla or Barilla in my American accent is the reason why.

I was actually first introduced to it when we were in our first year in Milan and we're going to a church that was new and it was being held in the pastor's home. And so afterwards there would be lunch, and everybody would bring something to share, basically a potluck. And either the first or second time that we did that, there was a huge bowl full of this green colored pasta. And when I got some of that, my mind was blown!

And so I asked my friend Elizabeth and she said her husband, Andrea, had made it, how he made it. And so I asked him how he had made it and he said, “Oh Chandra, it's just Barilla.” And I looked at him curiously, and so he went over to the recycling and pulled a jar out and showed me an empty jar with a blue label that said Barilla.

So from then on, unless the market was out of it, I have only bought pesto made by Barilla. I am not an affiliate for Barilla, I don’t think they do that, but if anybody from Barilla hears this and wants to pay me to be one I would be super happy and proud to do that! Because I absolutely love their products. Not just their pesto. I also choose to pretty much only buy their pasta. I may pay a few cents more, but it's absolutely worth it to get a product that is made with love and with almost 150 years of experience behind them.

And though I know I'm not Italian, I recently did an ancestry test, and there is zero Italian blood in my lanes, I feel like as I said with in my interview with Regan last week, that a piece of me will always be in Italy, and I definitely believe I've gotten quite a bit of it in my blood.

Another delicious type or shape of pasta that I discovered when living in Italy was Paccheri di Gragnano. I was first introduced to this type of pasta and it became my favorite dish at Ristorante Borgo di Vione, which was the very first “Chan Select” ever. You can find out more about it by listening to Episode 1: Who I am & How I Started My Crazy Expat Life.

But I'm so happy to say that even though I tried that 6 years ago it's still on the menu there. It's listed under the Primi Piatti, which means first plate, section and is called Paccheri di Gragnano trafilati al bronze in salsa di pomodoro, burrata, e crema di pesto. Which basically means bronze cut pasta covered in a delicious Rich tomato sauce served with creamy Burrata cheese and dollops of delicious pesto. You can hear why I like it. But the pasta itself is a thick tube that just perfectly fits into your mouth and when it’s covered in that Pomodoro sauce it just fills your senses with delight.

OK, we're gonna wrap up the pasta section, but I have to tell you four other favorite sauces that I have discovered since living as an Expat.

The first one is Arrabiata, which actually means angry, and it is a spicy tomato based sauce that has garlic and peperoncino, which is where you get that spice, and it's absolutely delicious. Another tomato-based sauce is called Amatriciana, and along with the Pomodoro or the tomato, it has Guanciale, which is cured pork cheek, Pecorino Romano cheese, and a dry white wine. The saltiness added by the Guanciale and the pecorino cheese and the extra depth of flavor added by the wine is absolutely superb.

Pasta sauce number three was also introduced to me by my friend Andrea, but that time he actually taught me how to make it. He and Elizabeth had come over with their daughter for dinner and I had wanted to learn how to make an authentic Italian pasta sauce and since Andrea is from Sicily, and pasta alla Norma is a southern dish. He taught me how to make it.

Again, it's a tomato-base sauce that \ starts with a base of sautéed red onions and garlic, and then you fry eggplant. This is probably one of the best ways in the world to eat eggplant in my opinion, and my six-year-old absolutely loves it! Actually all of the kids love it, but Caleb, especially, adores that way of eating eggplant.  You add some fresh basil and cheese, honestly, I can't remember if we added mozzarella, or ricotta, nowadays I actually just top it with Gran Padano, which is maybe an easier take on making it. Regardless it's delicious and other than the extra oil from frying the eggplant, (which you can also roast it- if you want- in the oven) it’s pretty nutritious as well.

And the final sauce that I'm going to tell you about, is not tomato-based. It's called spaghetti alla Nerano. And it's a creamy sauce filled with fried zucchini and provolone cheese. My take on it is again using Gran Padano or Parmesan cheese, because I actually don't know where I would buy provolone cheese in France, and I just use whatever pasta shape I have. But the cool thing about this recipe is that the creaminess doesn't come from adding any sort of milk product, but from using or keeping your pasta water. And slowly adding it as you add in the cheese and all the rest of the ingredients.

I just started making it again after years of not making it, and my family just devours it everytime!

One last Italian dish that my family absolutely loves, and that my dear friend Raffaella taught me how to properly make, because previously I had just looked it up on Pinterest and made it that way, is risotto.

In Italy, there's so many different variations or takes on risotto, but I tend to keep it classic and just make a plain white risotto. If I want to spice it up a little bit, I might cook some bacon to crumble on top, or sauté some zucchini to mix in at the end, but I will share a key tip or three actually that Raffaella shared with me.

To make a great risotto you must 1- never add garlic, her son actually told me that. Number 2- simply add salted water, chicken broth, or other brothes are not necessary, and the third and most important tip is, once it is finished cooking, remove the risotto from the heat and stir constantly for one minute. I know that that seems silly because when you make risotto, you're constantly stirring anyway, but there is something about removing it from the heat and continuing to stir that keeps it just creamy and wonderful versus when I didn't do that before it would clump up and stick together very quickly after it was removed from the burner. So that’s a special tip, probably the most important one.

Now let's switch over to some French food. I have probably said it here on the podcast at least once if not dozens of times, that my favorite French food is baguette et buerre or baguette and butter. The butter here is amazing. I'm not gonna go into it, but eating a delicious fresh baguette with salted butter is one of the absolute delights for me of living here in France.

But my second favorite food is Raclette. You can hear me gush more about it when I talked about it as my “Chan Select” in Episode 35: Solo Parenting as an Expat with Kim Ross, because Le Chalet de Neuilly serves that as a specialty.

For us, though, we usually have Raclette at home. After having it for the first time at Le Chalet, Chris had easily convinced me to buy a machine for our house, and so I'd say once a month during the colder months here in Paris (so fall through spring), we have Raclette as a family. The kids love it because they can melt their own cheese and slide the gooey hot yumminess onto their own boiled potato and choice of charcuterie meat.

Chris even invented grilling onions and red and yellow bell peppers that have been tossed in olive oil on our machine, and that is an added delicacy! Though definitely not traditionally French.

Another French favorite that I had for the first time about 13 months ago when we went to Strasbourg and to the Alsace region of France, right after Christmas, was Tarte Flambee or also known as Flammekueche, which comes from that region.

It looks like a pizza, but don't call it that because they get upset, but it's a thinly rolled out dough topped with fromage Blanc, which is white cheese which is like really a sauce, finely sliced onions, and lardon, which is like little chunks of bacon. When it cooks up the dough gets crispy and the creaminess of the fromage Blanc, and the saltiness of the Lardon and the acidity from the onions, just makes for an absolutely heavenly dish!

For those that don't mind being a little more adventurous, another French favorite of mine is called salad chèvre chau, which means warm, goat cheese salad. Hang in there because I know that sounds interesting if not slightly unappealing, but the mix of again saltiness from bacon, the tang of the goat cheese (but it’s also creamy), with a crunch of sometimes fresh apples, walnuts, maybe some tomatoes might get thrown in there, and then a delicious vinaigrette is really divine.

Not all salad chèvre chau’s are created equally, but in general, I find that it's something I really enjoy when I order it here in France.

And now let's move onto dessert. Well, some of these you can actually eat for breakfast, but they're sweet treats nonetheless. Two of my favorite treats to buy from a boulangerie or pasticcerie are: plie au chocolat and a financier. A Plie au Chocolat is a buttery puff pastry filled with pastry cream which is custardy and chocolate pieces and a Financier is a French tea cake made with almond flour, brown butter, and egg whites.

I honestly don't know what it is about financiers that makes them so special, but I absolutely love them.

And the final thing in the dessert department of my favorites is gelato, you may think that I should've added this in the Italian food section, but ironically, I found one of my favorite gelatos, which is actually an international brand, after we had moved from Italy to Paris. But you're going have to stick around till the end of the episode to hear the name because this establishment because it’s this episode’s “Chan Select”.

At last, but not least, the drinks. Most of these are adult beverages, but not the first one. My first experience having this first drink was when I was 18 years old at Six Flags Magic Mountain in California. It was late. We were all having a great time and I was kind of getting tired and so I wanted a coffee. My aunt offered to buy me one so I ordered an espresso and she said, “Are you sure baby?” So I ordered the espresso, tasted it and was absolutely caught off guard by how strong and seemingly bitter it was.

It was not at all what I was expecting, and my aunt kindly drank it in my stead, and let me order a latte or a cappuccino, so I could actually drink it.

Fast-forward 17 years to when Chris and I moved to Milan, Italy. After we would eat at restaurants, the servers would always come around and asked if we wanted a coffee. And I quickly discovered that you did not order a cappuccino after about 11 o'clock in the morning. Most Italians drank espresso after that because there was too much milk in the other drinks. But then I learned about this delicious little drink called espresso macchiato, which means spotted coffee. Because they would add a small amount of warm milk, which made that strongest espresso creamy. Top it off for me with one small packet of sugar, and it was the delicious end that added a little zip and energy to the rest of your day after a wonderful meal. In France, that same drink exists and is called a Noisette.

I don't know if you've noticed, but a lot of these favorite foods come with a story. I mean, it would be a really short podcast episode. If all I did was rattle off a quick list. And so the drinks are no different.

This next drink caught my eye the moment we walked down the sidewalks in Milan. It's bright orange color in a tall stemmed glass was so inviting! Unfortunately, I couldn't have any at the time because I was seven months pregnant. But I would see these 20-somethings sitting at little round table enjoying an aperitivo after work and chatting and I will admit that I was envious.

So after I gave birth to Caleb and we happened to be in the center of Milan with time to kill between getting his birth certificate and a doctor's appointment for him, we stepped into a Tobac or bar and decided to have a drink. And so I finally ordered an Aperol spritz.

The server brought me a drink, and Chris and I raised a glass to toast. And as I took my first sip, I thought, "Oh my goodness what on earth is this?” I felt like I had been deceived. This was not the tropical sweet flavor that I was expecting. It was only mildly sweet and had a bitter flavor.

You may be wondering why I'm listing this as one of my favorite drinks then. Let's just say I didn't give up after my first try. Later on while living in the Cascina on Fridays when the weather started to turn nice, we would have Friday Happy Hours, after the kids got back from school, in the pavilion across from my house.

I was talking to my friend Jena about this via Marco Polo the other day and she said that that was almost like a reward that we gave ourselves after getting through another week of expatting and getting kids to school and taking care of little ones at home. And that is so true, but it was also a really beautiful time of community where our kids played and had snacks together and grew in their friendships and so did we.

And so it was probably Jena that made me a proper and not overly strong Aperol spritz, and so it's something that I became quite fond of. And also one of its main ingredients is another one of my favorites and that is Prosecco.

Prosecco would definitely be at these happy hour get-togethers, but also I found that it was an Italian tradition that I absolutely love, that when hosting a child’s birthday party there are all the nonalcoholic drinks and snacks for kids, but there's also a bottle of Prosecco for the adults. What a fun way to celebrate!

Another drink that requires Prosecco, was one that I was first introduced to in Verona, Italy. I think we had taken a day trip there and while wandering the streets, we stopped to have lunch. And I saw something called a Hugo Spritz on the menu. When I read the ingredients, I thought, “That sounds fresh and interesting.” So I ordered one and fell in love! This is honestly probably my favorite springtime or summertime mixed drink and it's super simple. Along with the Prosecco, you just need mint, sparkling water, and something called Saint Germain, which is a French Liqueur made from elderflowers.

Elderflower trees were actually something that grew abundantly around my house in Italy, so once I discovered this, and the fact that if you were careful, because the plant and the leaves are poisonous, but the flower is not, I could make my own elderflower syrup. So I would spend an afternoon collecting the blossoms along the canal by my house and one time I actually made the syrup.

Granted, I am not recommending that a person does so without learning how to do it properly first, a friend actually told me how to do it, because like I said the plant and the leaves are poisonous. And it was a lot of work for a very small amount of syrup. But it was a great memory. Also I have to put in there that this is an international podcast so I’m going to say that these are adult beverages and adult means different things in different countries. Here in France the legal drinking age is 18, in America it’s 21. So if you’re listening to this please, enjoy responsibly if you are an adult in the country you reside in.

When we moved here to Paris, I remember being at a restaurant and asking for a Hugo spritz and the bartender looked at me and was perplexed. So I pointed to the bottle and he said, “Oh you mean a Saint Germaine or St. Germain Which makes sense since it's a French liqueur, they just call it by its name. Though it does make me wonder who is Hugo and how did the drink get named after him, in Italy?

Another great spring and summertime drink, which I was first introduced to on a warm June day when my friend Tasha, Chris, and all four kids and myself had taken a train from Pisa (you can hear more about that trip in Episode 48: Mistakes I’ve Made as an Expat) we took a train from Pisa to Florence to discover the city and we were hungry for dinner and stopped into Il Mercato Centrale, which means the Central Market. This was my favorite part of Florence other than seeing The David because if I'm honest, Florence wasn't my favorite, but I've spoken to enough people that I probably need to go back one day and explore a little bit more and give it another chance.

But this market was wonderful! The food, the atmosphere, and …the rosé! Tasha and I each got a glass and as we found a table with Chris and all four kids and ate a smorgasbord of things we had gotten from different vendors, we toasted and tasted a little bit of pink heaven.

Here in Paris, rosé is abundant, and definitely a part of the magic of summertime culture in France.

And finally for the last and maybe my favorite drink of all, Gluhwein. It's funny that Chris and I call it by its German name, because I had had mulled wine before, and in Italy it's called vino caldo and here in France it's called Vin Chau, but I think we started calling it gluhwein when we went to Vienna just after Christmas in 2019 and had the best gluhwein we've ever had.

There's something about the warmth, the sweetness, and the spices added to red wine, but in Vienna, they also had a white wine version of it, but it’s not called Gluvein, it has a different name. Anyway, it just warms you inside and out on a cold day and it's lovely. This is one thing that I actually taught myself to make. It's a great way to save a not so great bottle of wine.

And that concludes my list favorite foods since becoming an Expat. I don’t know if you are hungry now, but I sure am! And before I sign off to make myself some lunch, I'm going to get to the name of today's “Chan Select” as promised!

It’s called Amorino or Amorino and it serves the most delicious and beautiful gelato I've ever had! Amorino was founded in 2002 by two Italian childhood friends, right here in Paris, actually. But now it has over 200 stores worldwide.

To me what makes Amorino special, is not only the quality of their gelato which is made from the finest ingredients, but also the fact that it's served like a rose. You can choose pretty much as many flavors as you want, and the artisans we’ll call them, will sculpt your chosen flavors into a flower in the shape of a rose.

Discovering Amorina comes with a special memory as it was the first time that Chris's sister Sarah, her husband, Nick, and their four kiddos had come to visit us in Paris. We were out and about, exploring the city and after lunch decided to get a treat and stumbled upon Amorino.

Watching the faces of my kids and my nieces and nephews light up with delight as they chose their flavors and enjoyed amazing gelato crafted into a rose, will always stay in my memory!

I will be sure to include their website in the show notes so that you can look for the Amorino store nearest you and as always I am not an affiliate, just a fan!

And now to close the show with our “Quote of the day”. It comes from John Walters who said, “The only thing I like better than talking about food is eating.” And I wholeheartedly agree!

Have a great day everyone, bon appetit, if you are about to eat and I will meet you back here again next week for the 1 year anniversary episode of Expatriotical!

It’s going to be great, as it comes with another big announcement, something I have been working on for months now and I can’t wait to share!

And speaking of sharing, if you haven’t yet followed me on Instagram, to find me so that you can watch the pretend cooking show that goes with this episode! My handle is @expatriotical, that’s at sign, E-X-P-A-T-R-I-O-T-I-C-A-L.

That's it for today everyone. I'll see you back here again next week and until then this is Chandra Alley reminding you to “Live and Travel in the Know” with Expatriotical!