Toucy Shopping

3 more images

The boudin noir or black pudding, also known as blood sausage, is a very popular delicacy. At this stall it was made in the morning. At the end of the morning I found an enormous queue!
I often buy boudin noir in France, sometimes still warm from cooking. I fry pieces of it for breakfast and spread it on fresh French bread. Lovely!

What to buy: Don't forget to see the other photo's in this tip!

What to pay: Oops, I forgot to look for the price. However, it can't be more than about 2 euro for a 'partie', a 30 cm piece of sausage.

Little dried sausages that I usually cut thin slices off with a pocket knife and munch away happily. Often made of pork or game and different spices or herbs added. Great stuff.

What to pay: 5 sausages (choice) for 10 euro. In 2007 (this tip was written in 2005) they were still the same price. However, when I bought them this time, the guy threw in an extra sausage :-)

French supermarkets are always just outside town and quite large compared to Dutch supermarkets. Well stocked too with fresh fish and vegetables, butchers department and delicacies (cheeses and such).
I found the Intermarche (which is the name of the chain) in Toucy very clean and organised. No funny smells.

Live animals are also sold. For eating, that is. Pheasants, turkeys, chickens, rabbits... they look so sweet. With our supermarkets we often forget that this is what we eat. It may seem sad but a fresh bit of poultry goes way above any chicken breast, plastic packed from a supermarket shelf.

It's an absolute sin to store your cheese in the fridge. It comes out much too cold and they don't do the taste any good. Better let them ripen further in these little cheese larders covered with gaze so that the cheese is in contact with open air. Just leave the cheese in a dark, coolish (but not refridgerated) space.

What to pay: Depending on size between 30-50 euro.

Be early on the Saturday market in Toucy, if you want good choice of fish. It's all laid out on ice, so keeps fresh and good. Fish is not cheap but so quick to prepare and delicious and good for you!

What to buy: For our fish meal I bought a slice of fresh 'thon' = tuna (for a raw tuna fish cake), scallops (coquilles St. Jacques), and for the barbecue 3 red mullets, some 20 fresh sardines and some 30 large shrimps.

What to pay: Just over 30 euro for the lot.

In a little bakery in one of the streets I found these elaborate cakes, a far cry from the usual pain au chocolat or other more 'breakfasty' pastries. Look at the 3rd row from the right: little coffee cups made of nutty caramel, filled with some sort of praline...

What to pay: around 2 euro a piece

Often you find stalls with only different kinds of goat's cheese (called chevre). Goat's cheese salad is great, with bits of cheese on bread, melted in the oven. Or the little 'crottins' (small goats cheeses that would fit snugly in the palm of your hand or even smaller), marinated in olive oil with thyme. Or a goat's Brie that melts off your plate. I'm salivating as I type!