From Harold Derouet.
IT seems that the French market traders who came to the Weighbridge last weekend will not be returning to Jersey until Christmas.
Is there any way we can persuade them to come here more often, say once a week? And when they come, to bring a full range of pâtisserie, charcuterie and all the other delights which are so difficult or impossible to obtain in Jersey?
On Saturday, I bought melons, peaches, apricots and nectarines, all of a far higher quality and lower price than anything available in the St Helier market. To make a price comparison: Peaches and nectarines were being sold at £3.50 per kilo – approximately 40p each. In Jersey inferior peaches imported from France via England cost 50p each. The same was true, mutatis mutandis, of melons.
From the cheese stall I bought a Pont l’Eveque, a Munster, and a Camembert, all for £5. A Camembert alone in the Jersey market will set you back £4.50. To buy all three of these cheeses in Jersey, I calculate, would probably cost £8 or more. No doubt we were enjoying the benefits of la promotion.
But it was more than that. The French market traders were unfailingly friendly, good humoured and, above all, knowledgeable. I asked one of them why it was so difficult to obtain gooseberries nowadays, and he treated me to a well-informed and detailed explanation.
When I asked the same question of one of our St Helier market traders, she replied, with surly indifference, ‘I don’t know, I never eat them’.
