When Lucy and I were in Paris earlier this month (I love saying that) one of the things we wanted to do was eat falafel. Did you know Paris has some of the best falafel? Who knew?
We made our way to one highly touted place in Saint Germain Pres, and it was a very crowded little street place so we got in line, sorta, and tried to figure out how to order. After 5 to 10 minutes of waiting and watching, we were still unsure about how/what to order and decided to make our way to the second place, directly across the narrow little cobblestone street. GOOD CHOICE.
There were a total of 6 seats in this place, and 2 of those seats became free as we crossed over, so I shooed Lucy into them while I went up to order for us. I was surprised the one girl manning the place didn't start fixing our order and started to worry that she hadn't understood me. But, wait....
I saw her walk back to the fryer and check the temp. Then she opened up a big kind of Tupperware container, grabbed a scoop, and proceeded to make our falafels---fresh. She scooped up the batter for 8 falafels and dropped them in the fryer. While they were cooking, she opened up another container, took out a couple of large pitas, and ran them through a toaster/griller thingy. My mouth started watering.
When our little falafel balls were cooked to a beautiful brown-ness, she plucked them out of the fryer, drained them, and plopped them into our pitas which had been coned and wrapped in paper. Then she handed them to me and motioned to the two full rows of toppings and condiments I could choose from to customize our sandwiches to perfection. I wish I could tell you what all we chose---heck, I wish I knew what half of the stuff was. It was all delicious, and my favorites were some kind of pickled cabbage and the tzatziki.
Was it messy? Way. Was it the best falafel I ever ate? Definitely. Is that girl drinking cafe creme on a Paris sidewalk the coolest kid ever? You bet.
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