Lobby Lounge, Fairmont Monte CarloMonaco is a country built for people who want to be seen.

ignore that and order the barbajuans, the little fried pastries the Monégasques have been eating since long before the yachts showed up. ricotta, bresaola and spinach folded into dough and fried, and they were incredible. then I did something no self-respecting traveler should do and ordered a club sandwich. sometimes you’re a long way from home, the sky’s gone grey, and you just want comfort. no shame in that. it was decadent, too tall to bite into, and fucking delicious. the fries were the real story though, shatteringly crunchy outside and fluffy as a cloud inside. a martini, a rainbow over the Mediterranean, nowhere to be.

the barbajuan is the closest thing Monaco has to a national dish. the name is Monégasque for “Uncle John”, and the story goes that a man called John ran out of sauce for his ravioli, stuffed them with greens instead and threw them in the fryer. Menton, just up the coast, says it got there first. Monaco eats them on its national day every November 19th, and in between at every bar counter that knows what it’s doing. the classic filling is Swiss chard and ricotta; this one went with spinach and bresaola, and nobody’s calling the police.

the club sandwich, meanwhile, was probably born in a gambling club. the most famous story puts it at the Saratoga Club House in upstate New York in 1894, the year Richard Canfield took over and turned it into a casino. so eating one a few minutes’ walk from the Casino de Monte-Carlo isn’t a cop-out. it’s a homecoming.

the fries deserve the last word on the food. crunchy enough to make noise, soft enough inside to feel like you’re eating a cloud. that doesn’t happen by accident.

the Fairmont sits on the famous Grand Prix hairpin, the slowest corner of the fastest weekend in Monaco. on a grey Thursday afternoon it was just a terrace, a martini with a lemon twist, and a rainbow over the water. the weather called for it.