Lights on the French Riviera

Go on a trip to Saint Laurent du Var (borders the Great Nice) and go round the city with Coralyne and taste typical foods, and moreover French.

Get more confidence in speaking French. On the French Riviera your teacher is your guide

Hello, I am Coralyne and I live in Saint Laurent du Var, a city that borders the great Nice, the pearl of the French Riviera. You can stay in my house to practice French. In this fully immersed language course, you will share the culture and lifestyle of the French people.

You can visit, study, ask and… understand at your leisure. I will be your teacher and guide, as well as your host. An example? Come with me to stroll through Nice, a city full of culture. Let’s start with Cours Saleya, the most typical place in Old Nice, its soul and lung.

A stone’s throw from the seaside, there is the famous Flower Market and all the local products. Taste with me the “socca”, olive caviar with truffles, and tell me about it! The place is also famous for its restaurants and bars. My favorite? It’s the Thor, with its two floors and mini concerts.

Do you have shopping or gourmet desires? From Cours Saleya to rue Masséna, via avenue de Verdun and rue Paradis, there’s a lot to choose. But let’s take a break on Place Masséna, the real centre of Nice.
With its architecture and arcades, its fountain and pines of Tuscany, you can feel Italy nearby. Come on, now let’s go enjoy a “two-ball cone” at my favorite ice cream parlour, “Harlequin”. There, a sign warns gourmets: “probably, the best ice-cream in the world”.

To finish the day, I will take you through the alleys of the old town, to Garibaldi Square with its Italian flavours and its legendary coffee from Turin, more than a century old. With each step, an explosion of colours, a firework display of the scent of spices and specialities from Nice.
Back home, with a heart full of memories, we just have to organize together… our next day.

See you soon,

Coralyne

And finally… You’ll have a little more Niçoise salad?

Famous throughout the world, the Niçoise salad has been so (badly) copied that it has become, in familiar language, synonymous with “anything”, a catch-all, an incoherent mix.
At the beginning, in the 16th century, it was a “poor man’s dish”, easy and cheap. Basically, only 3 ingredients make the “Nice” salad: tomatoes, anchovies, olive oil.

In the 19th century, it took on colour and fullness with various seasonal vegetables:
white onions (cébettes) or radishes (but never both!), peppers, fresh basil (mandatory!), beans and/or artichokes, black olives (from Nice, of course!)

The recipe
Rub the plate with a clove of garlic, a little olive oil and salt and…. that’s it! You see how simple it is! Just the ingredients from here. Green, red, white, white, yellow… a fireworks display on the plate! And for the palace, what a celebration! It crackles, it crunches, it’s sweet and sour, salty, sweet, bitter, it’s soft… In the end, a good Niçoise salad is happiness at the table.

Enjoy your meal!