chic must: picard

there is something soothing walking into an all white store with nothing but freezers-- eerie, i'll admit, but calming too. picard is one of those amazing french concepts that has yet to be exported. the concept is this-- nothing but frozen food. but not just your basic frozen pizza-- picard's pizza has ingredients that you can pronounce and if not all natural, pretty close. but if you don't want pizza, how about duck or tarte tatin or chopped fresh herbs, or, really, almost any french delicacy that you can imagine. but frozen? yes-- and it works. it works so well that it is the skeleton in the closet of many a french dinner party hostess.

it's not only a chic must because it is oh-so-yummy, but the customer service is top notch too. the staff where clean white chefs jackets with neat blue aprons. they bag your groceries for you and they do it with a smile-- not at all like the poor service at big supermarket maven monoprix. so next time you are in paris and you wander by picard, stop in to peruse the offerings. some stuff [cinnamon figue ice cream, for ex.] doesn't need to be cooked at all....