A taste of France, without the airfare

If you’re looking for a bit of France, there’s no need to go Dutch. A half-day of strolling, noshing and reminiscing is well within reach. Just bring your imagination.

Sunday mornings present the perfect opportunity for my husband, Melkon, and I to relive our Paris honeymoon with a stroll around the Silver Lake reservoir. Some might find us quaint as we amble arm in arm, him lighting up a Gauloises Blondes and me putting it out. We pass determined weekend joggers and dogs reveling in their very own park. It’s no Seine, but the water and the cool morning mist put us in a romantic mood for breakfast.

With its grand windows and tiny outdoor tables, Figaro Cafe in Los Feliz maintains our French fantasy, replete with Old World silver, butcher-papered tables and a sinful basket of bread. Even our lanky waiter with his tea-length apron is French. Practicing my French, I order a hot chocolate, scrambled eggs and the world’s tiniest croissant for me and an apple tart and cafe au lait for the monsieur. Someone has left behind last month’s copy of French Vogue, which we thumb through. I translate the essential fall fashions for Melkon.

We’d love to stick around for another round of coffee and fashion, but it’s almost 11:30 a.m. and the marche might be stripped bare in an hour. The Hollywood Farmers Market on Ivar between Sunset and Hollywood feels like a bit of France, especially since so many French speakers shop here each week. “Les asperges fines,” I hear a man gasp reverently in French to his companion as if they’d discovered a Chagall on the back of a Starbucks napkin. But the French aren’t the only ones ecstatic over produce.

Melkon squeezes the cantaloupes and sniffs grapefruit while I sample goat cheese and talk chanterelles with the tattooed mushroom vendor. I inhale the heady scent of the season’s first truffles like an addict.

Melkon catches up with a perky bouquet of yellow and orange sunflowers. We stroll to the grown-up-friendly Arclight Cinema located conveniently at the Sunset end of the market. Almost always, we’re regaled with a choice of obscure art films, tormented foreign releases and even Hollywood-style blockbusters.

On one Sunday, we caught the end of the AFI film festival. Coming later this month is “A Very Long Engagement,” featuring Audrey Tautou. What better way to end a French date than with a thoughtful film, viewed from comfy chairs?

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The tab

Breakfast $24.50

Where: Figaro Cafe, 1802 Vermont Ave., (323) 662-1587

What: Breakfast for two with tip

Shopping $3.00

Where: Hollywood Farmers Market, on Ivar between Hollywood and Sunset

What: Sunflowers

Movie $22.00

Where: ArcLight Cinemas, 6360 Sunset Blvd. (323) 464-1478

What: movie tickets for two

Total $49.50