New in France

Normally, écrémé is green

sete is very high though for herault, not sure why but i've heard that from a french friend who rents out an apartment there too.

we buy our flocons d'avoine bio from the local super u, best porridge ever. My girls love it. @ Norman, well done on kicking d2 and losing so much weight.

Hi Marie-Claire - I would love to be able to avoid supermarkets and I'm sure when I get to know my new surroundings better, this will become easier. I believe there are food markets locally, and I intend to visit them starting this week.

Hi Gillian,

You'll be better off shopping locally and avoiding supermarkets, unless you just HAVE to have things like bottled water. I came back to France over 3 years ago and I haven't been to one of those awful places (Auchan, Carrefour, Leclerc...) even once. There are more and more places where you can find organic produce, milk products and meat, chances are there is one very close to where you live. In terms of property taxes, every place I go to in France, claims to have the highest... you could be entitled to a rebate, especially if your income is low.

Hi Gillian: We are not far from Salies - they seem to have quite a lot of activities,such as active book clubs (English).There are also quite a number of "foreigners", some English and others German and from the Netherlands. Another great place to go are the Thermes. The water is so hot and salty therefore really beneficial. The Casino often has cabaret dinner shows, which are great fun and not expensive. You can go to enjoy a lovely lunch there too, very reasonably priced. You don't have to gamble either !!

Flocons d'avroine ARE oat flakes as I understand it. I use them to make porridge in the same way as packaged stuff, only the flakes are generally bigger but you can buy large or small. In the hot water add a small pinch of salt and away you go, when boiled let them stand for about 4-5 mins and even add some raisins or flaked nuts and it's better than Quaker in my humble opinion.

I too am Diabetique 2, but no longer take the meds, as I seem to have kicked it. Lose weight (I dropped 20kg), get out walking or on a bike, and the weather helps, kick red meat into touch, eat more fruit and veges. Ignore threats on wine, eat dark chocolate only, and drink demi-ecreme milk and you've got it made!

Good luck

Thanks Judith - I think someone mentioned a Carreour near Sete, but needing a car to get there. I shall look into it. It would be lovely to be able to make some porridge (using organic skimmed milk, of course!).

Hello Gillian

If it's any help to you (though you haven't mentioned one I don't think) I buy Quaker Oats in my local Carrefour.

Good luck with everything and - most important - enjoy!

Judith

Thanks Tracy - I shall make it my quest in life to find somewhere in France that sells organic, skimmed milk. I believe Marks & Spencer are thinking of opening up food shops in France soon. If they get as far south as the Midi, our problems could be over, though come to think of it I never bought their milk as they only sold organic skimmed milk in enormous bottles, rather than small cartons.

Hi John - I think I may have seen écrémé in Monoprix and as I replied to another message, I thought that meant it was extra-creamy, when in fact it is the opposite. Must improve my French! Thanks for clearing that up; I shall go back to Monoprix tomorrow and have a look. I must also look for "flocons d'avoine". I had assumed that I wouldn't be able to find porridge oats here, but that might be an alternative. Oats really do keep the cholesterol down. Thanks for all your help.

Eventually being the operative word. Don't get too stressed, life goes very slowly in France and the Midi is even slower. Sete is a lovely town though it can get very busy in the summer, the river boat jousting festival is great fun.

The other part of finding fresh milk is that they will only have a couple of dozen bottles of it, so look very carefully, don't expect to find gallons of it. Fresh milk is in litre bottles, not cartons and is only available in full cream, red and semi skimmed blue - (think John has got them them the wrong way round, as skimmed is in green but not available fresh).

It's a matter of taste but after 15+ years here, I really can not stand UHT milk so always search for the fresh, if only UHT is available I go without.

Monoprix is the nearest to Waitrose you will find, it's considered expensive and you can find things often not found in regular supermarkets.

Hi Gillian,

We have the same experience as Jane, our local Spar in the village is very good, plus for bigger shops we tend to use Geant Casino or Leclerc. We usually can get fresh milk from all these stores, but occasionally they run out if we are not on the ball!!

Jane, we are in Pepieux, just down the road from you, just a holiday home, but it's a start!!

Phil

yep écrémé is skimmed as apposed to demi-écrémé half skimmed. the full fat UHT we give to our kids is red by the way, never looked for full skimed so don't know what colour it is :-(

Hi Jim - it's nice to know there are kind people around who are willing to help. I'm looking forward to getting all the bureaucracy of healthcare, house buying etc. over with so that I can relax and enjoy life in France. I shall no doubt get it all done eventually.

Thanks Andrew - I don't mind drinking Darjeeling with no milk and that's what I've been doing. Or drinking water. I just saw a post which said that the french for fully skimmed milk is ecreme, and I think I may have seen some of that in Monoprix, but I thought it meant it was even creamier than full fat milk (milk with added cream?), so maybe I should go back and have a look at that, and improve my French.

Milk comes in 3 'strengths' at (almost) all supermarkets:

Entier (full cream) usually with a green top on the bottle or green printing on the carton

Demi-écrémé (semi-skimmed) blue, and

écrémé (fully skimmed) red.

And the UHT treatment method has come on a long way from when we rejected the taste decades ago in the UK, makes fine porage with 'flocons d'avoine' (crushed oat flakes), tastes fine in tea and on breakfast cereals, although I also take my coffee black.

You should be able to find fresh milk in the chiller section near the butter, cheese, creamy puddings, etc, too.

Elaine, have you a local spar or vival near to you?

In my rural Aude experience, they usually have small amounts of fresh milk, but I have never seen fully skimmed milk anywhere.

We have a local huit a huit in our village, it is titchy, but it sells most things I want or need, and you get to know the shop keeper too, an integral part of the local community and a valuable source of local info.

Jane

Hi Gillian,

I just moved to France from Stirling area, in Scotland, September past and felt exactly the same as you are feeling now, I am getting round some of the hurdles and can assure you it does get better. My partner and I are near Nemours, an hour south of Paris. If there are any questions you want to ask me please feel free to drop me a line, I will try and help where ever possible.

Regards,

Jim Dawson