Tips for easy dinners from French supermarchets

[vincettenoir]

I felt like we did too much cooking on our last holiday so I’m looking for some advice to make self catering in France easy. How does the traiteur hot counter work? What can you get and do you need to speak good French to use them? I’d rather eat things that are more typically French without much prep rather than pasta and sauce (although we will defo have that too). Can you buy things like coq au vin ready made?

Big jars of cassoulet.

If you’re anywhere near a Grand Frais supermarket you can’t go wrong, also Picard for frozen stuff.
Agree with market rotisserie chicken and potatoes or paella.
Also, Lidl smoked chicken!

Our family circumstances make restaurant eating difficult/not worth the bother, so we self cater fully in rural France every year and have done for 15 years or so.

I don’t tend to buy pre-packaged stuff, but my desire to be a gourmet chef is vastly outweighed by my desire to spend as little of my holiday as possible making dinner so I go really simple. A protein, a starch and a green thing with a bought pudding and some fruit. I find that the quality of the ingredients is so high that you only need to do a bit of seasoning and cook it and it’ll be at worst absolutely fine. We’re in France now and tonight we had full chicken legs which I half-heartedly marinaded in whatever I could find, cooked on the barbecue with rice. I made a tomato salad, we had some bread and that was dinner. Tomorrow night will be similar, only with a giant curly sausage and potatoes of some sort.

We have a shared plate of saucisson, cornichons, rillettes etc before dinner with a drink.

Breakfast and lunch as others have suggested.

We always google and see if there’s a pizza vending machine nearby because it’s fun.

The Traiteur usually has all sorts that you can buy a bit of and reheat - much fresher, nicer selection than in the uk.

@Tinymrscollings sounds great. Enjoy!

Do you just pour the contents of the tin in a saucepan and cook it like that?

I usually put the meat skin-up under the grill, to crisp it up. This reheats the meat also.

You are then left with a tin of fat - which you can use for potatoes etc, although it can be a bit smoky and messy so maybe if keeping things v easy just chuck it.

Very tasty!

This!

Tinned cassoulet or confit duck or coq au vin and rice sachets. - go to the posher supermarkets or delis - I e always found a big selection of ready to eat - as someone else said rotisserie chickens are good .

If you can find a grand Frais ( supermarché ) they have lots of goodies .The salad / fruit is top notch, the cheese sections carry a lot of different cheeses and there will be a butchers counter as well .As a brit who lives in France its my favourite food shop , even if its 1.5 hrs from where we live ( rural France)

We do pretty much all of this, can’t wait.
Hopefully we won’t be in a millefeuille desert this time!

What I do with duck confit is....
Put the tin or jar in the fridge for a couple of hours before opening, so it's easy to take some of the fat off.
Tip the duck and jellied juices into an ovenproof dish, if possible keep the duck skin uppermost, removing most of the fat. Heat the duck in a moderately hot oven till the juices are bubbling and the meat hot.

Serve with beans or potatoes. Haricots blancs or cannellini beans are perfect for this, just heat up the tinned or jars of beans.
If you prefer potatoes, Picard do a whole range of easy to prepare potatoes, individual gratin cakes etc. They also do potatoes Sarladaise which are very close to the traditional potatoes served with confit of duck.
Spoon some of the duck juices over the beans or potatoes for extra flavour!

What can you get and do you need to speak good French to use them?

The standard of English spoken by most French people has improved immeasurably over the last 15 years or so. Even if the person you are trying to communicate speaks very little English, you are very unlikely to get the shrug and "comprends pas" that used to be the norm.

I would prefer an independent traiteur but the one is the supermarket can be fine too. We like “vol au vent” which are flaky pastry stuffed with either chicken or ham or fish and some bechamel and a few vegs. Eat with a salad. They will have quiche of course as well as lasagna and potato gratins. They have a “plat du jour” too so you could go everyday and eat something different if you fancied it!

but all this is pretty heavy (sauce/cream/fat) so be sure to buy salads and fruits (melon/watermelon) to balance your meal

what we do also if look online or ask around if there are truck foods somewhere. Usually once a week they will be somewhere and it is a nice evening spent, trying different specialties.

Finally, better than the traiteur, most cities will have “les halles” where you will find the most gorgeous food as well as many small eateries/traiteurs. They will be slightly different from the ordinary ones so worth a shot

Bon appétit!

@babylone is les halles a food hall type place?

This with ready made (even frozen) dauphinoise potatoes and green beans.

Make sure you get some Snacky for your pre-dinner drinks 😋

Another vote for Picard or a traiteur.

We always buy a quiche. My DC only like quiche lorraine but there are usually other options. Then we get salad and some sort of frozen potato. The DC'S favourite are pommes noisettes - little potato balls. They usually come in a small.bag with not much left over. If you don't have a freezer you could just have baguette.

Also sausages - Merguez if you like spicy ones - with couscous.

Also apericubes are an essential component of aperos! 🍸 🍸 🍸 🍸

Les halles is the covered market hall for local produce. What area are you going to @vincettenoir, there might be someone with local knowledge to help you.

@vincettenoir as PP said it is a market hall, ususally that is where you will find the best qualityfreshest products. Most halles (but not all) will also have some traiteurs or litttle eateries to take away mainly.
check the opening times! Often they close after lunch. Best time is to go early, do your shopping for the day (or for two days) and pick up some croissants on your way back home. Then you have the whole day in front of you 😊