butterrific!

The search is officially over! After combing the aisles of every major grocery store, I finally found nirvana in a 250g stick of imported French butter. Many of my friends know that I have been obsessed with European butter FOR YEARS. I might have tried every brand available in the U.S. (at least in Northern California). But I hadn’t found anything that comes close to what you can get in France.

Until this Saturday that is (!!!).

Luckily, I’m a Facebook fan of Milk Pail Market in Los Altos. Steve (the owner) made the following announcement the other day:

“French yogurt, Poilane Bread from Paris, Delice de Pommand cheese, unsalted French butter, small jars of black truffles, dried French morel mushrooms, Lobster soup bisque, Petite Suisse and several other French foods just arrived this morning from our air shipment.”

Faster than you can say “voila!”, I whipped over and picked up two packages of Echire butter, some lovely lemon yogurt (in stoneware cups no less), asparagus, leeks, strawberries and two loaves of Acme bread (could not find the Poilane as the place was packed). I suffered a bit of sticker shock at the cost of the butter but, hey, I am shameless when it comes to esoteric food items. Happily, my husband, Paul, is like-minded and he was thrilled with my finds.

Thus, we had a ‘butterrific’ Easter brunch with freshly baked Milk Pail croissants, THE BUTTER, Mountain Fruit Raspberry Tart jam and my favorite Blenheim Apricot Jam (now carried at Emily Joubert Home & Garden in Woodside but the jam maker’s name escapes me because we polished off the rest of the jar and it’s already in the recycle bin). We also enjoyed a spiral ham, hard-boiled eggs, strawberries and, of course, Paul’s perfect cappucinos. It was a fairly simple meal but I was in culinary heaven. If you’re in the area, I highly encourage you to get some of said butter before it’s all gone (of course, I might be stockpiling it so be sure to stop by my house and try some if you’re in my neighborhood).

The real irony is that I’m going to Paris next week and will be in intimate contact with a lot of French butter. But the good news is I can abandon my plan to smuggle some home in my luggage!

A bientot! kathy