Life in France

Peanut Buster®, parfait!

Whenever someone from the US is coming to visit Carcassonne, they always ask if they can bring us anything from the grocery store. During our first year here that answer might have been, “Yes, please, spices for Mexican food” but now we’ve even found those so we can confidently thank them and say, “no”. Inevitably the follow up question is, “Do you miss anything from America?” and that too gets a truthful, “no”, although there is a little wiggle room on that response. This headline from French TV/radio BFM will give you a hint as to why: “Dairy Queen to open restaurants in France.” A cliché but true, we all scream for ice cream!

Koenig sorbetière

We had no appliances when we first bought our house here so along with a cooktop, oven, dishwasher, refrigerator, and washing machine was that other essential purchase, a sorbetière, otherwise known as an ice cream maker. It must work well since our friend Larry said that Bill’s recipe for butter pecan ice cream was the best he’s ever tasted. 

The article from BFM said that it would take Dairy Queen at least a year to finalize the details of their first locations that would eventually be expanded to at least 200 stores countrywide. DQ anticipates success in the market given that one of their competitors with soft-serve desserts, McDonald’s, is well known here. In fact, while the US is the number one consumer of McDo fast foods, France is number two.

Columbus Café & Co mugs

There are several other American fast food chains in France such as KFC, Burger King, and Popeye’s, all with branches on the edge of town in Carcassonne. In an interesting juxtaposition, the McDonald’s that used to be downtown, closed and was replaced by the Bank of France. Meanwhile, a former bank building that Starbucks was supposed to take over is now open as a coffee shop by the French-owned Columbus Café & Co.

Donuts? Oh yes, you can find Dunkin’ and Krispy Kreme but expect to pay around 3€ for each plain donut and more if you add fillings and toppings. And what about that Peanut Buster® Parfait Royal Treat®—its official full regal name—coming soon from a DQ perhaps near us? I saw an estimated price of 7€ each with a nutrition count of 710 calories. I think we’d better stick with Bill’s expertise with our sorbetière! 😋

Photo notes: Thanks to Koenig for the cover, first and second paragraph photos and merci to Columbus Café & Co. for the picture of the coffee mugs.

4 thoughts on “Peanut Buster®, parfait!”

    1. Sorry, Katherine, no Dunkin’ in Carcassonne yet. Now I see that even the first to open in the country, in Paris, is still in progress. Maybe we should open a branch here after all? But talk about eating the profits! 😋😂

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  3. Wow! It seems a wave of American franchise restaurants has reached France in a big way with more on the way! I’ve been amazed at the growth of what I know as “Dunkin Donuts”. Dunkin Donuts first appeared in Quincy, MA in 1950. They opened their first franchises in 1955. By 1958, one had sprouted at the Porter Square Shopping Center in Cambridge, MA – where I was brought as a pre-schooler and introduced to the magic of creme filled, boston creme, honey dipped, jelly, and my favorite (go figure) the french cruller, like a honey dipped but made with an egg batter and fluted all around. Almost 70 years later, there is still a very busy Dunkin right there in the same store front, even as nearly all the other stores have changed many times over the years. As Charlie McCarthy would say, “Who’da thunk it?” But I sincerely hope that in France they never replace cafés and pâtisseries!

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