My Top 10 French Foods

TOP 10!

10. In tenth place comes the humble baguette (or as my fellow countrymen like to call it - the French Stick). No one does it better than the French themselves, and i've probably eaten more bleached batons of goodness than I really should have. But hey, when in France..

9. Beurre - or Butter. It's really good here. I'm not lying. Move to regional France and try not not put it on anything. Also ties in nicely with my number 10. Bread and butter. A simple pleasure in life that's hard to beat.

8. Prince Biscuits. Basically a digestive with filling in the middle. Found in a lot of countries in Europe i've never seen them in the UK. Grab a three-pack of the chocolate bad-boys next timeyou're in Western Europe.

7. Haribo Dragibus. Marble-shaped bonbonbonbons with a hard shell casing and gelatinmiddle. Slightly sour, the black ones are ace. Throw away the yellow ones. Fucking lemon...

6. Gaufre. French for waffle. There was a street vendor I made my best friend that sold big fat ones the size of your head. I'd get him to slap on plenty of Chantilly cream and Nutella. Triple-tasty!!

5. Milka. The Alps biggest selling chocolate is the proverbial 'man'! They do a 'Daim bar' flavour which simply cannot be beaten for a commercial chocolate bar. My new favourite! Overtakes the humble 'Toffee Crisp' in my books.

4. Moules - or Mussels. I used to get my chef to buy them for me. So so cheap when you buy in bulk. 5kgs for 10€. I had to stop myself dousing them in wine, garlic and cream every night.

3. Pain a Raisin. I came to France wanting to try every pastry my boulangerie makes. I succeeded on that mission and came to the conclusion the Pain a Raisin cannot be beaten! Gooey bakery custard, glues a crisp buttery snail-like casing. Doused in dried grapes. Mostmornings kicked off with one of these couples with a cappuccino. I'm going to miss you...

2. Croute Forestier. There are many plays on the cheese-ham-bread combination in regional France. This one was my favourite. A Savoie dish native to south-east France it takes day-old bread, drenched in white wine, ham, wild mushrooms, and stinky cheese. This gets baked in a ceramic pot until the cheese is bubbling and piping hot. A handful of parsley is put on top to ease your mind of the fact you are about to eat your daily calorie ration in one meal. I ate it every night on my last week.

1. LION BAR CEREAL. I could of done a 'best of cereal' blog. France likes it's kids cereals. From the disappointing 'Crunch Chocolate' cereal, to the impressive 'Miel Pops', and the excellent 'Chocopic'. Myself, and colleague Adam tried them all. Cereals were judged on a number of elements apart from taste. How they were as a dry snack, to crunch retention, all the way to final flavoured milk taste. Lion bar was the clear winner, hands down. What impressed me most was its similarity to it's Chocolate bar brother. Lion bar cereal; I LOVE YOU!