Shopping in Paris, for delivery to Paris, from US; help!

Sugarloafer · Joined: 04 Dec 2005 Posts: 2

My daughter is spending the year in Paris and I would like to be able to purchase gifts for her from stores in Paris for delivery to her. Since she is on a limited budget I thought some unusual food & beverage items might be a nice treat. Movies or music might be a possibility, or some unusual gifts. I have had no luck finding businesses which can do this (unfortunately my inability to speak French is hampering my search.) Any suggestions?

Sugarloafer · Joined: 04 Dec 2005 Posts: 2

To answer my own post and add a thought: her boyfriend will be visiting over Christmas and perhaps we could arrange for a nice meal for two at a vegetarian restaurant (or restaurant with vegetarian entrees.) She lives on Boulevard Picpus.

Thanks!

melinda · Joined: 01 Oct 2004 Posts: 256 Location: Richmond, VA, usa

i would just give him a visa gift card & let them choose the place
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Monica · Joined: 13 Oct 2005 Posts: 90 Location: Chicago

For friends in other countries, I have often visited the websites of stores I know they like, or large department stores. There is often an English side of the site. You can usually contact customer service, via email, and ask if you may purchase a gift card with your credit card and have them post it within the country for you. It's a lot easier than buying items that need packaging and shipping. I don't have recommendations for Paris, but perhaps a litte web-surfing will get you some more help. Just another possibility.

creampuff · Joined: 10 Mar 2005 Posts: 104 Location: Oakland, CA

I no longer have the specifics, but Galeries de Lafayette definitely has an English site and an email that you can use to contact customer service.
I got an English language answer to my question, so it could be a place to start. (The store has a wonderful food court if you get her a gift certificate there.)

You might contact Paule at Promenades de Gourmand (I'm sure I got the spelling wrong on that one, she's mentioned in the forum topic on cooking schools) or Rosa Jackson (who has the food walks business) to be your agent for a fee.

My own inclination would be to send a check or arrange for a gift card.

Good luck

David · Posted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 5:07 pm Post subject:

Hi Sugarloafer, hope this comes to you in time! Pim of Chez pim gives a very good review of a vegan restaurant in Paris.

Green Garden
20 Rue Nationale
Metro: Porte d'Ivri
13th arrondisement

And on top of apparently having good South Asian food the price comes to about 15 Euro a person!!
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fannie · Joined: 25 Mar 2005 Posts: 21 Location: Paris

Dear Sugarloafer,

I would second David's recommendation on the vegan restaurant. Here is the link to Pim's review:

http://chezpim.typepad.com/blogs/2005/12/green_garden_re.html

I salivated throughout her post and am planning on trying the restaurant soon!

Another veggie option is the restaurant :
Le Grenier de Notre Dame
18 Rue de la Bucherie, 75005
tel# 01 43 29 98 29,
Metro Maubert-Mutualite

I found this restaurant in a very funny way. When I was in my second year of French in high school (10 years ago!) we had the obligatory section on learning to speak to a waiter and ordering food. In our book was a list of restaurants with addresses in Paris and a description of the food they offered. The Grenier de Notre Dame was one of the restaurants listed and I chose it for my in-class skit since I was a vegetarian at the time. That spring our French teacher offered to take 10 students to Paris for spring break and I had the opportunity to go (for my first time!!). My friends and I thought it would be funny to see if the restaurant really existed. You can imagine our delight when we saw the restaurant's sign in a little alleyway across the Seine from Notre Dame. I haven't been back to the restaurant since -- but the food was great!

Other ideas would be to purchase a UGC or Mk2 movie gift card (UGC and Mk2 are movie theater companies) which are available at the box office at the movie theater and come in 5 or 7 movies.

When I was a student studying abroad in Paris I really missed certain things from home that we couldn't get in Paris or that were cost prohibitve to buy--- like peanut butter, Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, microwave popcorn, ranch dressing etc. I always asked my parents for these items in care packages(and still ask visitors from the US to bring them to me!) Just a thought!

Just a word of advice: few merchants in France have online stores and for those that do exist, one often needs a credit card issued by a French bank in order to purchase from their sites.

Cheers
Fannie

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