A tasty cultural scandal

It seems I am constantly finding new ways to expose myself as an American expat in Paris. The traps lie around every corner for the unsuspecting foreigner. Today was no exception: I walked into a boulangerie which makes particularly attractive fruit-topped desserts, perfect for the summer season. I spotted a beautiful cake, but imagined only one way that it could be better: my cake was a pistachio custard-based cake topped with macarons and rimmed with raspberries. Alongside it was another tempting but non-fruity dark chocolate custard-based cake decorated similarly with macarons, only lacking the raspberry rim. I inquired: would it be possible to advance order one of those chocolate guys, just with the raspberries like the pistachio twin alongside? Easy, right?

Oh, you have mistaken the French. Here I was thinking that if I advance order, not just ask them to defile one of the already-made masterpieces by tossing on the raspberries, no harm will be done. I was not thinking this one through: Not only do you not order food custom-made (and not entrust the chef to his own culinary creative freedom?!) but you do NOT order dark chocolate and raspberry. The ladies behind the counter had a little chat. Fortunately one of the women, a foreigner herself from Sri Lanka, defended me: "c'est le gout anglais !" she declared: It's English taste. (Apparently the Brits got this dark chocolate and raspberry thing down too.) She'd been abroad enough to appreciate that in some cultures, blends offensive in the eyes of the French (like dark chocolate and raspberry, seriously?) are not only accepted but also much enjoyed.

The Sri Lankan called out the head baker, who had a pow-wow with the servers and accepted my order on the condition that I pay up front (who else would ever want to buy my chocolate raspberry cake?). I walked away with the pistachio cake in hand and an order placed for a dark chocolate and raspberry cake. Score: +2 for American with the debit card (the bonus point there is for the free baguette they gave me on the way out), 0 for French proper tastes. An important lesson in Paris is that almost any "poor foreign tastes" will be quickly overlooked as long as some money comes in the bargain. Also, note to self: don't go asking around for chocolate raspberry desserts. Yet another way to stick out like a sore thumb amongst the French.