So I know I promised I'd put up the rest of the pictures from this weekend (and they're pretty cool, so prepare yourselves), but I just finished dinner with my host mom and her boyfriend and I have some stories to share.
    First off, my host mom is 58 years old and she's a widow, but has a longtime boyfriend named Etienne. Etienne works for the Ministry of Agriculture (which reminds me of the Ministry of Magic, again for those of you who appreciate my excellent references), and he's the epitome of a stereotypical older French man. He's extremely sassy and traditional, he knows what he wants in life and he's not afraid to tell you.
    Today he was on a roll with his sassiness, once you get him started there's no stopping the Etienne Train. We had a 10 minute discussion about cheeses, in which he informed me that pasteurized cheeses are pretty much the worst thing on God's green earth. I was happily munching on some Brie when he disdainfully pointed out that it'd been pasteurized (although he did grudgingly take a piece later on). Mostly he stuck with the Camembert though, which in his opinion is excellent because it's never pasteurized and is always the same size, shape, and color. He was also quick to point out that American trade laws forbid the importation of non-pasteurized French cheese, even though some American companies produce and sell it themselves. His general opinion seems to be that this practice is bullshit.
    He then went on to explain the varieties of French alcohol. Apparently each region in France has its own specialities, based on what fruits are available to turn into wine or liquor. Without Etienne, I will grudgingly admit that my knowledge of French food would be pretty lax. I never would've known that people make alcohol out of apples, plums, strawberries, and even peppers! Etienne also explained how cognac is made - apparently you just take wine and distill it for a second time, something about the vapors rising and mixing and such. Pretty interesting stuff.
    He also told me that in the past there used to be traveling wine producers. This was, of course, before the French government put limits on alcohol production to reduce alcoholism in the countryside (I add the "of course" not because it was something that I already knew, but because that's exactly the way Etienne presented the idea). Anyway, these wine producers were actually very skillful artisans who would wander across the countryside, stopping at each house of reasonable size in order to sell their services. Basically they would take whatever fruits they could find in the garden and distill it to make alcohols, hence each region developed its specialities based on which kind of fruit was native to the area.
   So, the moral of the story is, when Etienne is around I don't get to talk much. But usually I find his mannerisms so entertaining that I'm trying not to giggle anyway, so maybe it's good that I just sit back and listen....