Bonjour French Market Friends,
This week in Paris all the Fashion celebrities were spotted attending the annual Paris Fashion Week(R) 2025 at the Palais de Tokyo and other key venues in Paris, to view the latest trends for Womenswear 
Spring/Summer 2025 organised by the Federation of Haute Couture (FHCM).This brings together the most recognised French and international design Houses with a focus on creativity and a unique and innovative know-how. The selection of the Designers is controlled by FHCM. All the great Fashion Houses held their “defiles” parades in front of the most famous “influencers” in the trend setting world, from Fashion magazine editors to Hollywood stars. Difficult to identify key trends but Loewe’s floaty, sculptured delicate summer gowns held up with thin wires to create a circular frame appears to be a new trend, worn with flat shoes. (Image Credit Launchmetrics.com/spotlight)
Back here in Cape Town I celebrated the 18th year of the launch of my French Market. I started the
idea because I could not easily find real French cheese in Cape Town, which I would normally buy at any grocery shop in France. This was only available at a few top restaurants. The Old Biscuit Mill was launching in 2006 and looking for traders for their proposed weekly food market. At that time, I had completed 3 tough years travelling non-stop around Africa managing the sales and marketing for a global travel company with targets in the millions of USD. A challenging and sometimes risky task in an unstable and fast changing environment. I needed a break, and I was looking for a way to occupy myself and thought it would be fun to host a French cheese stall for a couple of weeks. The first people to come to the market were the trendsetters and I could immediately see the demand for this high-quality product.
I followed up this concept with a weekly market at the Alliance Francaise du Cap for a few years. In 2012 I opened the t
iny shop in the Gardens Shopping Centre and closed the market stalls. Whilst I still have the same floor space and the same core French cheese, I have grown the French product range to include most of the regular gourmet products found in a French grocer plus I added treats such as caviar, fresh truffles and frozen French pastries, freshly baked baguettes, traditional patisserie made by a French baker and some local fresh produce.
The Pandemic was the biggest challenge, and thanks to the help from my beautiful daughters, we converted overnight into a delivery service (thanks to Nicky) and built up our website (thanks to Juliette) www.frenchmarket.co.za. This required an integrated LightSpeed Point of Sale system and Xero accounting software. A great deal of time was taken to create the website, but it was worth it and now we deliver around the country with a 24-hour turnaround to most major cities. I learnt how to import my cheese direct and now we fly in about 150kgs of French cheese each month. which requires a lot of planning, but I still love this “hobby” which has developed into a serious business. I have made wonderful friends with my clients and created the opportunity for young people to gain sales skills and learn about special products through working alongside me. I could not have made it this far without the really amazing support from all of you, my clients and my family.
Apart from all our amazing French cheeses in stock this week, the latest news from our shop is the first of the 
season’s fresh white asparagus – please pre-order as it sells out immediately. This is grown on the same farm as our violet artichokes, which are still in season. From the same farm Ayama, I have brought in some chilli oil and some of their wines, Grenache blanc, Viognier, Wooded Vermentino and a Rose. I thought it would be fun to pair their fresh produce with their wine.
New in our frozen range are Profiteroles filled with cream and covered in Belgian chocolate, made in Belgium. You defrost for about +30 minutes, and they are ready to eat. This is a really easy dessert to serve at a lunch or a cocktail party or just enjoy as treat with a glass of Champagne.
My recipe this week is the simplest poached trout fillet with baie roses (pink peppercorns), this is such an easy and delicious dish, perfect for a light meal. Pair it with a glass of Tribaut Schlosser Brut Origine Champagne, see recipe below.
Thank you for your love of French cheese. I look forward to seeing you in my shop again soon.
Regards
Suzanne and The French Market Team