Off to the cheese shop

So now I am sitting in the Opera Suite, with its black-and-white photos of famous people I have never heard of—all French, no doubt—eating chocolate and waiting for Diane to call and tell me where I can pick up some cheese.

After half an hour, she rings me up. She is very excited. “I have found a place for you. Marie-Anne Cantin. It is not far.”

I tell Jan I’m off to get le cheese. She doesn’t care. She has half a bottle of the Veuve Clicquot left and the bathwater is still hot. So, with Diane’s meticulous but complicated directions in hand, I head off in the general direction f the golden cupola heralding Napoleon’s tomb, which, evidently, is near the cheese shop.

Let’s pause right here while I’m getting a bit lost wandering up and down streets that, for some reason, all seem to end at the Parc du Champ de Mars. I want to give you some information that, at this point in our story, I’m unaware of but I’m about to discover. It’s about this cheese. Epoisses. Epoisses de Bourgogne, as it is officially called.