Riveting ep of @garlicandpearls.bsky.social this week as @suzanneraine.bsky.social and I welcome expat food writer Chris Newens, author of Moveable Feasts: Paris in Twenty Meals, who reveals surprising findings about Paris food! Tune in! @profilebooks.bsky.social podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/g...

Would you like to know HOW TO EAT EVERYTHING IN PARIS today? Tune in to our revelatory @garlicandpearls.bsky.social chat with Chris Newens, author of terrific food memoir Moveable Feasts! Insights galore! A sample… @profilebooks.bsky.social @robertloyko-greer.bsky.social @suzanneraine.bsky.social

Recent events have highlighted the importance of diversifying transport corridors, with railways central in the foreign policy strategy of Russia, China and the West. But it is not without risk, warns Sophia Nina Burna-Asefi.

Another Summer Short this week on @garlicandpearls.bsky.social in which I and @suzanneraine.bsky.social ponder the histories and meanings of our respective emblematic headgear. Yes - it’s the béret and bobble hat face-off. podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/g...

It"s time for my annual reposting of this piece. Somehow things happen in August- is it because we aren't paying enough attention and things just slip? Or is it that rogues take advantage? @engelsbergideas.bsky.social engelsbergideas.com/essays/bewar...

This week on the nonpareil 🇫🇷 🇬🇧 podcast @garlicandpearls.bsky.social @suzanneraine.bsky.social and I probe the many meanings of the high vis/gilet jaune, including as a fashion statement. Tune in!

Tune in tomorrow for the first of a short (naturally) series of zappy summery @garlicandpearls.bsky.social podcasts in which @suzanneraine.bsky.social and I compare and contrast similar things that our two nations do very differently…

This week on @garlicandpearls.bsky.social another French myth - Club Med. Was/is it really, as its founder hoped, ‘the antidote to civilisation’? Is it possible to return to the state of nature… at an all-inclusive resort? I investigate with fellow holidaymaker @suzanneraine.bsky.social Tune in!

There's a big storm heading for the U.K. and the BBC says: "Many temporary summer structures including tents could be damaged". Perhaps Club Med would have been better: Apple: bit.ly/4mosPnw Spotify: bit.ly/46xChjH

When I think of camping, these are the images that come to mind. Thankfully - as she nonchalantly cracks open a tin of beans - @suzanneraine.bsky.social paints a far more inspiring picture in this week’s episode of @garlicandpearls.bsky.social Tune in from your campsite or luxury suite!

I have been on ONE camping holiday in Britain in all my life. 🤔 Can @suzanneraine.bsky.social entice me back? Tune in and find out.

While in Japan, emboldened by my ‘memorable’ British pickled onion initiation at the hands of @suzanneraine.bsky.social in an early ep of our podcast, I felt it my duty to our @garlicandpearls.bsky.social listeners to try umeboshi - salted ‘pickled (brined) plums’, though ume is closer to apricots.

If it feels like what we all really need is radical change, here's one which was tried earlier but may just work a second time:

I was prepared to think this was bonkers but half way through I realised the French might have been on to something.

This week on @garlicandpearls.bsky.social the concluding part of the 1217 Battle of Lincoln, complete with Louis of France’s last-ditch return with fleet, a retinue of knights and the flamboyant ‘magician pirate’ Eustace the Monk! St Bartholomew appears too! @suzanneraine.bsky.social

This week on @garlicandpearls.bsky.social the indefatigable @suzanneraine.bsky.social concludes her breathtaking narrative of the last clash between Louis of France and the English troops led by William Marshall - and the redoubtable Nicola de la Haie. What would Macron think,I ask myself.

podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/o... @suzanneraine.bsky.social and Ali Ansari pass the baton to @wjhurst.bsky.social and me for our @camgeopolitics.bsky.social regular podcast. A very tough act to follow.

Part 1 of 2: a decisive turning point in the relationship between these islands and France, and one which most of us don't know that much about. With Great Knights and plucky heroines! @murielzagha.bsky.social

Acting lawfully in anticipatory self-defence requires proof of something that hasn’t yet happened. It is difficult to make such laws work when nations are in a state of permanent mutual hostility.

The perfect companion for the heatwave is our illuminating podcast @garlicandpearls.bsky.social where I tell @suzanneraine.bsky.social the pulpy story of ORANGINA: ‘Secouez-moi, secouez-moi!’ podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/o...

A drink as iconic as Orangina is more than a drink, I tell @suzanneraine.bsky.social in this week’s ep of @garlicandpearls.bsky.social - it’s a carrier of 🇫🇷 identity. Listen to the story of ORANGINA! open.spotify.com/episode/3W5K...

I know but I'm not telling.

This week on @garlicandpearls.bsky.social @suzanneraine.bsky.social takes to the high seas with tales of PIRATES and the British obsession with the marine Robin Hoods. Pictured: Blackbeard, John Morgan, Anne Bonny and Mary Read. 🏴‍☠️ podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/p...

I was just going to post this but @murielzagha.bsky.social beat me to it. Tension builds ahead of tomorrow's @garlicandpearls.bsky.social set on the high seas!

This week on the @garlicandpearls.bsky.social podcast I take @suzanneraine.bsky.social on a hair-raising tour of French theme parks. Not a lot of rides; much controversy. podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/f...

My piece in the Financial Times about Israel’s attack on Iran.

On Monday 16 June @suzanneraine.bsky.social and I will discussing all things Garlic & Pearls! Book a seat via the link below: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/garlic-pea...

Is Pimm’s still the quintessence of British summer? Should we bring back oyster houses? This and other questions are considered this week on @garlicandpearls.bsky.social Apple: apple.co/3Hw9jX6 Spotify: bit.ly/4jWXpTH

In which I serve up some good old fashioned British cordial and @murielzagha.bsky.social and I consider our capitalistic options.

This week on @garlicandpearls.bsky.social I explain to @suzanneraine.bsky.social the history and significance of the French IDENTITY CARD. The medieval identity-theft story of Martin Guerre features, also the uses of anthropometry… Tune in!

One of the themes and features of the Shangri-La Dialogue this year is the sense of a marketplace for partnerships: youtu.be/o1uRXddl3XU?...

A story of the French struggle between liberté and securité, expertly guided by @murielzagha.bsky.social

This week on @garlicandpearls.bsky.social my visionary 🇬🇧 co-host @suzanneraine.bsky.social takes me on a tour of what might just be the ultimate British design for living: BUNGALOWS! Tune in!

This week on @garlicandpearls.bsky.social we explore the affinity between Paris and Surrealism, and wonder what it takes to make an object a Surrealist icon. From subliminal to sublime, one might say. Tune in: Spotify: spoti.fi/4jd5HX1 Apple: bit.ly/43a9mAg @suzanneraine.bsky.social

The nature balance of accounts for this spring: on the positive the barn owls and the swallows are back in their nests. On the negative there are honey bee hives in the house walls and a hornet nest in the roof.

With toast and marmalade! @garlicandpearls.bsky.social @suzanneraine.bsky.social

Toast, the world's most perfect snack, and one the French in their infinite wisdom don't seem to have discovered @murielzagha.bsky.social and @suzanneraine.bsky.social Apple: bit.ly/3RYsfzA Spotify: bit.ly/3GKoZW9

When I hear the word ‘toast’ I reach for a glass of champagne, but this week on @garlicandpearls.bsky.social I am schooled by @suzanneraine.bsky.social on the history and excellence of crisp buttered 🇬🇧 TOAST - with some true crime thrown in! Join us! Apple: bit.ly/3RYsfzA Spotify: bit.ly/3GKoZW9

"Until a resolution is found, Kashmir will continue to inspire and foster terrorist acts and remain one of the core grievances in the Islamist narrative." @suzanneraine.bsky.social on how Kashmir’s forgotten war has gone global engelsbergideas.com/essays/kashm...

HMS Belfast, plucky hero of the Battle of the North Cape where she played a key role in the sinking of the Scharnhorst, fired a VE Day salute in London at 3pm this afternoon.

Reminded by Garlic & Pearls latest episode how enraptured my parents were by Jacques Cousteau's 1965 "World without Sun." Suspend your irony filter for a glimpse into the scientific imagination of another era. @murielzagha.bsky.social @suzanneraine.bsky.social www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHau...

A great start of the day appearing alongside @gilescoren.bsky.social on the Times Radio Breakfast Show hosted by the esteem’d @thestigabell.bsky.social and Kate McCann. Many thanks for lively chat and kind mention of the UNMISSABLE @garlicandpearls.bsky.social 🇫🇷🇬🇧 podcast. @suzanneraine.bsky.social

This week on the podcast @garlicandpearls.bsky.social @suzanneraine.bsky.social leads me down the alleyways of 18th-century London on the trail of John Spilsbury, map maker and inventor of the JIGSAW PUZZLE!

Time to put your phone down, make yourself a cup of tea and move over to the table by the window and get out your 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle @murielzagha.bsky.social @suzanneraine.bsky.social bit.ly/44GdJny bit.ly/3EAiqou

It really is worthy of Zut alors! @murielzagha.bsky.social

Happy Easter.

Hurrah for the metric system! (*ducks*)

It’s miles better

One of the most fraught cultural fissures between Britain and France is how we weigh and measure things. @murielzagha.bsky.social explains why the French do it the metric way:

On this sunny day, remember what @suzanneraine.bsky.social said on @garlicandpearls.bsky.social and resist the urge to fling yourself head first onto a carpet of BLUEBELLS - they’d never recover! An alternative exists: here are three very different women whose favourite scent it is or was.