Tuesday, 3 October, Tallahassee to Paris

Written 5 October 2023

Neighbor Carolyn showed up to drive us to the airport right on time, as she always does! Our flights were uneventful except for our travel agent's (or maybe Delta's?) strange decision to add Raleigh-Durham to our usual TLH-ATL-CDG itinerary.

We had lunch at the Longhorn Steakhouse in the Atlanta airport. David is smiling because the burger he wanted medium-rare, but was told would have to be at least medium, came out medium-rare anyway.

I had a salad showered with croutons, diced tomato, and crumbled blue cheese, then topped with sliced medium-rare beef sirloin. Double portion of ranch dressing on the side.

At the left here is the multicolored chandelier and interesting ceiling configuration in the Concourse B Delta VIP club, where we repaired next.

If we'd known that, in addition to their usual buffet fare, the offerings in the club included this huge paella (left), studded with shrimp and mussels, we might have held out for lunch there. As it was, we made dessert off their cookie selection, with decaf cappuchino.

Boarding went smoothly for the trans-Atlantic flight, and the food we were served was surprisingly good. Almost as soon as we were seated, we were offered OJ, sparkling wine, or a combination of the two, with a little dish of warm roasted nuts, heavy on the pistachios. Then, once at cruising altitude, we were brought the assortment shown here at the left: mushroom bisque, poured hot from a thermos pitcher; cold shrimp with remoulade sauce; a bread bun and butter; and a salad consisting mostly of chick peas, red bell pepper, and cucumbers, accompanied by its own tiny glass bottle of balsamic vinaigrette. The stewardess even asked if I wanted chives and sprinkled them on before setting the tray before me.

For the main course I chose the braised boneless beef rib with polenta, roasted cherry tomatoes, asparagus, and bright-pink pickled red onion. The asparagus was pretty crunchy, the polenta was very good, but the beef was outstanding! I'm really going to have to work on that sous-vide technique with boneless beef short-ribs, if I can ever again get my hands on any—between them, Viking and Delta seem to have bought up the entire world supply.

For dessert, I chose vanilla ice cream with sour cherry compote and chocolate sauce. A great combination.

I watched just one movie (In the Heights; critics grumbled, but I liked it) before flattening my seat into a bed and napping for a few hours, until they woke us all up for breakfast.