A French grocery shelf in Manhattan.

Ideas from a French kitchen.

Some of these products are everyday staples in France and less familiar here. A few ideas for using them at home:

• Panzani coquillettes: the small elbow pasta behind coquillettes-jambon, a dish every French child knows. Cook the pasta, stir in butter, diced ham and grated cheese.
• Sabarot dried morels: soak them in warm water until soft, rinse well, then cook them slowly in butter and cream. Serve with chicken or over fresh pasta. The soaking water can go into the sauce once strained.
• Pebeyre truffle salt: a pinch at the end, never during cooking. It is very good on scrambled eggs, fries, buttered pasta or a simple risotto.
• Herbes de Provence: rub it on a roast chicken with olive oil, or sprinkle it over vegetables before roasting.
• Délices du Luberon rouille: the garlic and pepper sauce from the south of France for fish soup. Spread it on toasted bread, add grated cheese and float it on the soup.
• Rougié foie gras: serve it cool, sliced, on toasted bread with a little fig or onion jam. It is the classic French holiday starter.
• Francine pizza dough mix: add water and oil, knead, rest and bake. An easy weeknight pizza.
• LU biscuits: Paille d'Or and Palmito are made for coffee or tea. Have them with a café au lait from our counter.

French gift ideas from our shelf

For a French friend living in New York, or anyone who loves French food, a small box goes a long way: the Paris tin of butter biscuits, a jar of foie gras and the truffle salt make a good trio. Add a bag of coquillettes for someone who grew up in France. Ask at the counter and we will put the box together with you.

Why a grocery shelf in a café?

From the start, Perrine and Aurélien wanted Frenchy to be a place where French people living in New York find the products they miss from home. The shelf sits next to the coffee machine on East 102nd Street, for French families in the city and for anyone curious about what people in France actually cook at home.