Generally speaking France is quite expensive. The guide books always say that if you’re going out for a cafe or restaurant meal the most economical option is one of the set menu’s. We can confirm this after our lunch at Al Duende, a little cafe in Ceret that we stumbled upon in the back streets of the old village. For 12.50 Euro (about $NZ 23) we signed up to the 3 course Menu du Midi – a little unsure as to what we were about to receive. It ended up being a salmon salad followed by a protein (and cholesterol) heavy main of sausage, steak and bacon (with lashings of roast potato, no doubt generously aided in their cooking with plenty of duck fat), and finishing with (what we think) was a kind of soft cheese with raspberry coulis (all washed down with a ½ litre of Rose). Bottom line is that for $23 each it was a generously portioned (even over portioned!), very tasty meal. Backing us up in our choice was the fact that everyone else in the restaurant (including the locals) ordered exactly the same thing. The only problem was that we were so stuffed that we had to discard our plan of visiting some vineyards in the afternoon.
Speaking of which, as I’ve already observed, wine is very cheap. Here’s an example of the way the locals buy it – by the litre (in the way that we might buy beer by the fill your own flagon). Cheapest we’ve seen is 1.30 Euro a litre (...I just can’t bring myself to take my empty Sprite bottle down to the local grocers to give a try). In Ceret we saw this sign at one of the local wine shops. I’m not sure that I could ever envisage buying 10litres of wine in one go (that’s about 13 bottles) – that’s assuming I had a vessel which could hold 10 litres - but at 27 Euro ($NZ50) that equates to about $NZ3.80 a bottle so is certainly worth consideration (and Mas Rous is a very nice drop from a vineyard close to our village).
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