Posts from — October 2011

I’ve written before about how French customs help to generate social capital, a term from sociology, signifying interaction among individuals who are friendly towards one another, and who give each other mutual assistance, such as conversation, company,  or congenial contact of any type.

This concept has really been brought home to me again since I arrived in Toulouse just over a month ago. Although I’ve visited this city a couple of times before, and know a handful of people here, I’m still a stranger, and have to spend long hours alone slaving over a hot keyboard, in order to get my work done, although I’m not complaining as that’s the reason I came here in the first place. Very different from my busy life in Melbourne, where I often long for enough solitude to get my research and writing done, my lifestyle in France gives me a little glimpse into what it must be like for people who are socially isolated or have few friends—no matter what country they live in.

In France, however, there are numerous markets, and I always make this one of the centres of my life, shopping each day for the few things I need, deciding what to cook based on what looks good and affordable that day.

In Toulouse the historic Marche des Carmes is a few steps down the road from where I am staying. Apart from the comforting sights and smells of markets, they are also wonderful places for social interaction.  And in France, the most important place in the market is arguably the cheese stall.  On my first day there, faced with the bewildering array of French cheeses, I asked the fromager for some recommendations, and he gave me tastings and also advice about the different cheeses. He focuses on a different two or three types each time I go there, and I’ve come to refer to these sessions as my ‘cheese tutorials’.  I excused my ignorance of French cheeses to him by explaining that I was Australian. In turn, he told me how he learned about Australia in the English courses he took at university, and also how his business was originally owned by his great-grandparents.

On one occasion during my ‘tutorials’, when he was giving me two morsels to taste and compare—one of one-year old Comte, and the other aged for two years, I noticed in my peripheral vision that the queue  behind me was quickly lengthening. I turned apologetically to the woman next to me, although my mouth was too full of cheese to do much apologising, but she was smiling and nodding — probably in approval that a foreigner was interested enough in her culture to learn about this important part of it.

As for the Comte, I prefer the older of the two, and when I bought more of it this morning, I was informed that this particular one was aged ’26 months’!  To complement it I bought a creamy mild cheese, and a blue d’Auvergne, as this gives a good contrast of cheeses to follow after the main course and before the dessert. But I’m not going to give you any more details than that. You’ll just have to ask your fromager yourself.