Market Day

You may know that, for me, Saturday is market day.   Almost every Saturday, I go to my favourite village market in Villereal, in the Lot et Garonne departement of France.  It's a truly gorgeous market, which I love.

Well,, today is Tuesday, which is why I went to market this morning.   Things have conspired against my weekly visit to Villereal for the past couple of weeks and although I managed missing the first trip, when I then missed the second, I decided that I really needed to supplement the fruits of the garden with some local purchased produce.

I'm lucky, where I live here, right on the border of the Dordogne and Lot et Garonne departements, there is a different market on every single day of the week.  And they are all within a few minutes drive, the furthest away being only a 25 minute drive.  Tuesday, it's the role of Castillonnes, to host it's local market, and, as Castillonnes is just 5 kms away, it was to there I rushed this morning.

I wouldn't say I was a regular visitor to Castillonnes market but I do go fairly often as it is also where the nearest branch of my bank is found, and that branch is only open on market day!!!! And so I found myself wandering through the market, nodding to the various traders I know.    Rene and Sandrine were there from the permaculture farm at Lasspisottes.   The "leek" lady from Villereal, who I have often written about, was also there, with her bicycle propped against the wall behind her st.... well, it can hardly be called a stall, just a basket of delicious fresh produce picked that very morning.  Lauren, my long suffering green grocer at the market at Villereal, also has his stall in the main square at Castillonnes, and, indeed, it was to his stall that I first headed.

But as I arrived in the main square a rather nice seedling stall caught my eye.  I have seen this man here from time to time and his seedlings always look so good.  He sells a large variety of herbs, all potted up and costing just a few cents each.  There was mint, and basil, and coriander, and tarragon, and a host of other truly aromatic herbs lining a stall about 20ft (6metres) long.   All his herbs are sold in pots and he uses a thin plastic former to hold 12 pots.  I like the formers as they are great disposable seed trays, and I often use them if I have any.   Each "pot" is about the same size as an individual yogurt pot, which I also use extensively.

But then, right at the far end of the stall, something caught my eye.   There was a pile of those plastic formers but I noticed that in the top one each cell had a live snail in it.  I thought it was surprising to have that many snails on the plants he had brought to market, but wandered on my way.   I suddenly stopped and turned back as the realisation hit me...

He had snails in every one of that pile of formers.... He had them, quite simply, because they were just another produce of his garden that could be sold as food.

Another Pech Bessou Gourmet Evening

Saturday night was the date for another gourmet evening at one of our local vineyards.  I wrote about this annual event last year and you can read that post here

For these evenings, which are very popular in this part of France, you wander along, taking your plate, knife and fork with you, and of course, the all important wine glass and then you sit at one of the communal tables and eat what ever produce has caught your eye and you have bought.  The local farmers bring their produce, transformed into delicious dishes....

This year, our local pork farmer brought his mobile barbecue set up and produced delicious escalope of pork, pork chipolatas and Saucisse de Toulouse, a beautiful thick sausage, very similar in texture to a Cumberland Sausage.    Sauscisse de Toulouse is my favourite so that part of the decision making was easy.  The meat, which was cooked simply in its own juices was soooo good and was accompanied by a fried potato and onion dish, pomme sarlataise.

Next came the question of a starter and as many of you will know, when I spied "foie gras de canard", I was sunk.   On this occasion the foie gras was served on a simple slice of bread and accompanied by the most exquisite apple segments, which had been delicately sautéed in white wine. Another tour of the stalls revealed a cheese producer from the Pyrenees with a superb creamy Brebis.

Brebis is the name given to a cheese made from sheep's milk and the Pyrenees are famous in France for this particular type of cheese.

Just desert left to choose and with two excellent choices what could I do but opt for both, sharing them around the other guests at our table.

Some of the tastiest strawberries I have yet eaten this year, and yes, that includes those I pulled from my own garden, had been grown within a few miles of the event and were being sold by the grower, and a tourtiere.  A kind of Apple tart......with attitude....  it's covered in layer after layer of the thinnest crispiest pastry flakes....

Of course, to wash this all down, the hosting vineyard were selling their own wines, by the glass or by the bottle...  I opted for a bottle of Red and a bottle of Rosé to share at the table.

And finally, the entertainment.  My favourite local band. Les Tourist's provided their own brand of music, humour, excellence and just occasionally, total anarchism.  Their rendition of classic French and English songs was wonderful and to hear three French lads playing and singing classic Beatles tracks, to visitors who had just arrived from Liverpool, was something never to be forgotten....  Up on the stage they continued with a fabulous version of the Blues Brothers Everybody needs Somebody.  If ever you are in this part of France. make sure to catch this band.

What an evening, thanks go to Sylvie and Pascal of "Clos du Pech Bessou".  Their web site says that they are concentrating on production of high quality wines....  I believe they have achieved the production of high quality evenings as well.

lunch at the old porch

I went out to lunch the other day, to a lovely restaurant not far from here called the Old Porch.

I've been there just once before, a couple of months ago,  when a friend and his wife rang me to invite me to join them.

We were welcomed into a lovely dining room of an old hotel with about 20 tables set out.   Only 2 or 3 tables were occupied though, when we arrived at about 12.15.

We took a table near the door to the kitchen and were rewarded with some very pleasant cooking aromas as we started to study the menu.

Once we were all seated, our waitress arrived with a basket of lovely bread and a carafe of red wine and I realised that wine must be included in the price.....which the menu quickly confirmed...

As we discussed the menu a few more people drifted in and the room began to take on a convivial atmosphere with the buzz of people enjoying themselves.

The first course was a vegetable soup.  Home made from fresh vegetables and thickened by pureeing the vegetables and adding creme fraiche.   It was delicious and the large tureen that was left on the table for us to help ourselves from meant that those with a mind to, could have a second bowlful.....The assorted breads in the basket went wonderfully well when dipped into the soup and four very clean bowls went back to the kitchen at the end of that course.

Next we were served with a platter of crudités and some cold meats, 2 or three different hams.   The traditional French crudités were freshly prepared and included grated carrot, grated celeriac, cherry tomatoes, grated beetroot and just a little sweetcorn with each vegetable prepared in an appropriate, light dressing. The wealth of tastes was amazing and we all sat and happily chatted and munched our way through it.  During this course I looked around the restaurant and realised that every table was now full and, in fact, the waitresses were just adding an extra table to accommodate two more people waiting.  Again the various breads were nice to eat with the different dressings and the basket needed refilling before we had even got to the main course......

For that course we had been able to choose from a selection of dishes and around the table we selected the whole range.  I had cous-cous and others had confit de canard, roast chicken or steak.  Now I know some of my readers will be astounded that I didn't choose the canard (duck) as it was offered...but I'm only really writing this to show that I do occasionally eat something else!!!!!

Confit de canard is a speciality of the Perigord region and is also one of my favourite dishes.  Duck is preserved in it's own fat and then gently warmed until all the duck fat has dripped away and you are left with the most tender and tasty duck imaginable..like I said, I do love confit de canard....

The cous-cous came as two separate dishes, a bowlful of just cous-cous, beautifully cooked, loose and light and a separate bowl of a broth containing chicken and pork and a some large chunks of vegetables. I didn't finish all the grains but no vegetables or meat went back to the kitchen!!

Next there was a choice of cheese or dessert and I chose cheese....Another marvelous dish with four great regional cheeses served with just a few walnuts.  Walnuts grow around here, I have three trees in my own garden, and they are used a lot as a simple accompaniment....  I'm told the creme brulee was also delicious.

Coffee wasn't included in the set meal price so we paid the extra and enjoyed a cup of rich, thick, dark, espresso to finish off the meal.

We were also the last table to finish... after eating a truly memorable meal which had cost us just €11.50 ($14.50)($AU22.35) with an extra €1.00 for the coffee.

Thank you to the Vieux Porche for making a Wednesday lunchtime so very enjoyable.

I'm on vacation and may not be able to post for a few days...depending on whether I find Internet access or not....

Foire aux Potirons

Today was Issigeac's annual Pumpkin Festival....

 Issigeac is a very beautiful Medieval village dating back to the time of the hundred years wars, when much of the present village was built but actually going back even further than that to the Gallo-Roman era and is very popular with tourists and locals alike.

What I really like about these special food festivals is that they bring out lots of people and because of that lots and lots of traders turn out as well.  The local apple grower was there today with his array of apples all grown within a few miles of here.  The florist was selling locally grown Chrysanthemums and the basket man was there with his woven selection.

The regular Oyster man was there selling his oysters raised in the Marennes-Oleron basin,  just a couple of hours drive north of here and the walnuts are the famous Franquette, (Noix du Perigord).  Of course, no Pumpkin Festival would be complete without the garlic man....

Actually, all these pictures were taken rather late in the day.  When I first arrived I was unable to get any photos because there were simply too many people....but too many people to take photos gave a great buzz to the festival and I enjoyed my few hours there.   There are more PHOTOS here

Gardening with Kate

Sunday was to be a day in the garden with Kate....

In preparation we had bought leek and small white onion seedlings at Villereal market.

But Kate was staying here so first it was a breakfast of grilled tomato, with sautéed red kidney beans and mushrooms eaten with some of my homemade bread and a cup of good French café au lait.....or Flat White, as I gather it is called in Australia.

My vegetable plot is not large, so the first decision was where to plant about 100 leek and another 100 onion seedlings. The Chinese Cabbage leaves are still being eaten as fast as I can mix up and use my insecticide, the red Cabbages are now very nearly ready to be harvested, half a dozen frisée lettuce have been picked and picked and picked and now there are just a few leaves left growing and then there is the volunteer pumpkin which has grown to about 10metres long (35ft) and has only a couple of tiny fruits on it...

After a lot of discussion, a fair amount of poking and prodding and a good deal of giggling Kate decided to sacrifice the pumpkin and the lettuces...who am I to argue??? so we set about pulling out those plants that had lost the right to live.

After removing the plants and the weeds we set about breaking up the soil to prepare the bed before making trenches, laying the seedlings in and then simply pushing the earth back over the roots and firming.   The whole thing took us about 3 hours including the discussion on what to do!!!!  I think this is the most productive way of planting out seedlings I have ever come across!!  A big thanks Kate.

All this activity during the morning meant that Kate had worked up quite an appetite and as it was now something past 1 in the afternoon we stopped for lunch.   Kate had already decided to cook a risotto for dinner that evening so lunch was destined to be a light affair... fortunately, we had some chicken in the fridge so everything was ok.

After lunch, it was back out into the garden to plant out some broccoli and fennel seedlings which I had raised from seed...  Yes...from seed!!!!   I had sown the seed about a month ago and all 24 plants had been hardened off and were ready to be planted out.   All the spare space was filled wit the seedlings until there were just a few broccoli left.

Next we discussed the 25,000 other things I wanted to grow... and decided that we had better extend the bed.

My vegetable bed is slightly raised and is contained with some wooden border fences.    It was a relatively short job to define the new bed size by moving fences and once that had been done we soaked the grass that the bed was now going to cover for about an hour....Next we smothered the grass with newspaper using the thickness of about half a newspaper, and then soaked that for another hour.  While that was soaking we collected a trailerful of compost from the compost area at the bottom of the garden.

We then added about 150mm of compost and soaked it all again.  Finally we spread a bog of commercial compost across the top before leaving the new area of bed to settle.

At the end of a long day we decided to  relax in the new pool for a few minutes before I dispatched her to make supper....

I had a great day, wonderfully relaxing and topped off with the best risotto I have ever tasted..

 

Thanks Kate.. Come again next year....

Villereal, Kate and a day in Perigord.

Kate, of Hills and Plains Seedsavers, is spending a couple of days  here as part of her Vegetable Vagabond world tour.

Yesterday, Saturday, we went to Villereal for the weekly market.   The market has quietened down a bit from the business of the height of the season and it was nice for Kate to meet and chat to some of the traders that I regularly visit.... I just had my usual weekly fruit and vegetable shop to complete but Kate had decided to cook dinner for us on Sunday evening and happily bought mussels, ginger, limes, lemons and other bits and pieces for her chosen recipe.

Before getting back to start some serious gardening, we paid a quick visit to my friend Bernard's vineyard where Kate was able to taste our local Monbazillac wine....   Kate doesn't drink that much wine but she certainly enjoyed the sweet dessert wine and tried two or three different vintages before deciding which year to purchase.

Later, we visited another friend with a large kitchen garden and Kate spent about an hour and half chatting happily about fruit and vegetables, taking in the way we do things here in the south west of France and passing on the differences and similarities to her own gardening experience in South Australia.

Our friends Michael and Mary met Kate on Friday evening and invited us all to go along on Saturday so that they could prepare a typical Perigordine dinner for us.  Kate's love of food meant that this opportunity could not be refused so we ended the day at their house enjoying a great meal.

When we arrived we spent about an hour looking around her potager and fruit trees before strolling over to the "chook" house.    In their household, Mary does the gardening and Michael looks after the chooks.  Before we had been their many minutes Kate was inside the fenced enclosure moving about trying to get photographs for her blog while the chickens, and in particular the large cock, rushed about trying to avoid her whilst herding his girls.

Dinner started with a cocktail and Michael produced his cocktail "menu" for Kate to choose from.... a selection of 101 cocktails!!!

After the cocktail, served with duck boudin, home grown cherry tomatoes, prunes and apricots wrapped in bacon we moved to the table for dinner.  

First a thick creamy garlic soup....  Then a plate of local cold meats including sliced dried breast of duck, Foie Gras, duck saucisson and various other local delicacies.... Next a "confit de canard" served with local potatoes sautéed in duck fat.... A cheese board with 5 different cheese from the south of France was then followed by Kate's apple pie and cream, made to her own special recipe.

It was a great traditional French evening with lots of good food, lots of good wine and most importantly, lots of good conversation and humour.

September's here

September has brought with it an autumn feel to South West France.... It's 9:30 pm and I'm sitting at my laptop writing this wearing a sweater for the first time for several months.  Overnight temperatures dropped to 9 C (49F) last night, the first time we have seen temperatures in single figures since April.

In my garden, the horse chestnut tree is always the first thing to announce the impending arrival of autumn as it starts to drop it's leaves quite early.    Today there is hardy a leaf left on it...

So it's time to start to think about what to grow over autumn and winter and as this is my first year I'm a bit stuck where to start.

I already have some Chinese Cabbages growing which look like they are going to recover from the caterpillar attack.  Also the red cabbages which have been in since the spring are looking nice and will be ready to harvest soon.

I'm going to try and grow some broccoli and some fennel.   Fennel is a wonderful herb which is native to the Mediterranean region although can now be found all around the globe.  I have become a convert to it since moving here to France.   In the last week, I have sown seed for both fennel and broccoli, although, I am still very new to growing food and my success with seeds is not brilliant, but I will persevere.  The fennel has peeped through the surface with a spindly little shoot which I believe is normal...  I have half a dozen broccoli, from a  sowing a couple of weeks ago and I have just sown a few more...

I also recently put some peppermint in which is just beginning to show and hopefully will be a nice addition to my mint pot.   In the herb pots, the mint is doing extremely well, the basil is also doing well now after a couple of false starts and the flat leaf parsley that was sown back in July is now developing well

I have a volunteer pumpkin whose vine has grown to about 8m (26ft).  It is in a 2.4m (8ft) bed and I am winding it up and down the bed trying to contain it.  I didn't know whether it was pumpkin or melon or quite what, but on Kitchen Garden day, one of our guests assured me it was pumpkin and as he is a commercial pumpkin grower, I guessed I should listen....

I am also in the process of deciding about extending the garden.  This year I have had a lot of successes but have really had too many varieties with not enough of any one thing.    I'm thinking of doubling the size of the plot, as I don't want to overwhelm myself and I am also going to grow next year's tomatoes in the ground rather than in pots, so that will need some more space...

I still have to make a decision on lifting, splitting and moving my rhubarb as well...  At the moment it is in a rose bed.. but is producing nice rhubarb and I hear stories of people losing the whole lot once they try and move them....The other problem is that the space I had earmarked for it has now been taken over by Strawberries....

I also picked up the first walnut today....so before long, the annual race between me and the squirrels will start in earnest..

I think it's a good thing that I have got the swimming pool construction out of the way now as it seems I'm going to be busy in the garden for a while........

KG Day Cocktail, 2008

 

Several people have asked me for the recipe for the Crystal Blue Cocktail, I served at Kitchen Garden Day, 2008 and I'm pleased to pass it on...

The recipe is given by volume so use any measuring cup to produce the amount you think you will drink!!!!  There are a total of 14 units of measure in the recipe....

2 Tequila 2 White Rum 1 Blue Curacao 1 Cane Sugar Syrup 8 Schweppes Tonic

Be careful though. The drink is very pleasant but all that Schweppes can give you a false sense of security.... I hope you enjoy it....

There are a lot more photos from the KG Day 2008 event in our web album.  Just follow the photos link in the sidebar.

Kitchen Garden Day 2008 France

About 30 people turned up here on Sunday to celebrate Kitchen Garden day with me.

Kitchen Garden Day is a celebration of local food instigated by Kitchen Gardeners International. It takes place on the fourh Sunday in August and is celebrated all around the world.  I know that year it was celebrated in the USA, Pakistan, UK, Norway, and two states in Australia as well as here in France.

For our celebration, we organised a meal at lunchtime which was held in the garden.   Everyone who came brought some food to share, made either from produce from their garden or from something farmed locally.

On arrival, guests were served with a special KG Day cocktail which had been dreamed up by Michael, the photographer and myself.  I was looking for some connection with the earth and eventually came up with this crystal blue cocktail, which was deliciously lovely!!! but which also represented what our oceans would look like if they and the atmosphere were less polluted.  Continuing with the sea theme. we served aperitifs with farmed smoked salmon.

Here in France people tend to organise their food into distinct course and I have started to think that way myself... So although I broke the dishes down into courses, really it was just a superb buffet.  There was so much good food it's impossible to list it all and I may well have forgotten something.. but it was all very tasty and very beautifully presented.

 

 

One of the things that the Perigord region is famous for is duck.  So for our local starter we had a duck liver mousse served with some homemade multigrain and muesli bread....

Guests arrived from all directions and even the gardener turned up.

The meal continued with barbecued pork for the omnivores amongst us and a delicious mushroom  and aubergine quiche.  The quiche was made by one of our guests and the pork was reared, slaughtered and cured right here in our little community.

I was surprised at the range of ages of people attending with the seniors in their 80's happily joining in the fun with some of those a fraction of their age.  The youngest person in attendance was minus 3 months but seemed to be enjoying the food pretty well!!!!

The meal finished off about 6pm after everyone had eaten some of the delicious range of desserts, brownies, chocolate chip cookies, rhubarb crumble, fruit tart, rhum baba, cherries in juice and of course, all home made....

Thanks to Roger Doiron of Kitchen Gardeners International setting aside this day to give people all round the world the chance to celebrate together and get just a little bit closer to the planet we live on... and to think, I almost forgot my friend Bernard, who provided the wine, Bergerac AOC Rouge 2007 from his vineyard less than ten miles down the road

 

Kitchen Garden Day 2008

	Sunday is Kitchen Garden Day... and here we are expecting about 20 people to celebrate it with us. As this is France we thought we would celebrate in the traditional way so we are having a meal.    Our meal will be in the garden at midday on Sunday and everybody who is
coming is either bringing something made with produce from their own garden or something farmed locally.  A neighbour has provided some wine made from his own grapes and "My Friend Bernard" is also providing some wine. I had my first full day in the garden today for several weeks...  and realised what a mess it had  become....I wonder how much tidying up I can get done by Sunday......

Another Saturday, another party....

This is a nice time of year in South West France with everyone organising a variety of social events.  There is always something happening every weekend and often the odd evening during the week gets taken up, as well, in a whirlwind of social activity...

Last week I wrote a piece about a nice party we went to on Saturday night... This weekend it was another Saturday and another Party.

This particular party was a celebration for the residents of the tiny community amongst which I live... Everyone was invited and everyone turned up so there were just 20 of us there.

The evening started with a cocktail being served....  It was delicious, but was a secret recipe of the host... he did list all the ingredients for me but I lost track after Gin, White Rum, Grenadine and lots of tonic water.... To soak up the alcohol, there were little pieces of a fruit bread... I had the Fig one and it was fabulous.....but there was also an olive version.

For the main meal a cous-cous had been prepared.... everything was served in separate dishes so you just helped yourself to copious quantities of lamb, sausages, meat balls, a super vegetable dish of mixed homegrown vegetables in a light jus...the jus was delicious poured over the cous cous along with a vast array of accompaniments....It was great as it catered for both the omnivores and vegetarians amongst us with everyone just choosing whatever they could eat.

There was a cheese board with a selection of locally produced cheeses and then for dessert...

Well, to start with I should probably say "desserts" as there were a choice of 7 or 8.  A fabulous mixed fruit tart, a lovely cherry cake,which was my favourite, aniseed biscuits, a Perigordian gateau amongst a few others.

One of the residents used to play in a rock band and happened to have another member of the band staying with him for the weekend, so they turned up with guitars and provided some great 1970's music.  The girls provided the backing vocals but everyone joined in and drowned them out....

Another neighbour plays the saxophone and he was subsequently persuaded to play a couple of very nice pieces as well....

 

The host for the evening had one last piece of entertainment lined up for us and at about 11.00 pm he invited us all out into the garden to see the lunar eclipse.  the eclipse was spectacular and a clear sky ensured a great view. It wasn't a total eclipse but was very substantial.  Our host apologise for this, but explained that nowadays, a total eclipse was just too expensive to afford....

 

Michael was there and of course, provided all these photos for me....The party went on well into the night and some of the younger guests just curled up and went to sleep.

It was another wonderful moment in my life in France

 

Drinks with a Lerot....

 

	We were invited out for a meal last night in the very pretty garden of one of our neighbours. There were about 15 or 16 people attending and we were to have a drink and aperitifs, then play a game
	of cricket, then carry on with the meal.   The second team would have their innings before dessert and then it would all end up with coffee and digestives.... That was the plan, and
	Mrs Ian and I duly arrived about 6 pm for the start. Of course, in France, aperitifs went on far longer than planned... Then we got the game underway with two teams of five picked each with a
	mixture of British and French players. About half way through the game we discovered this Lerot had come to join us and was happily eating the grapes totally oblivious to the huge

amount of noise and all the cameras...What a budding star he is...

Michael was there, with Mary, and I thank him for these photos... I did take some with my own camera but Michael is a bit more skilled than I am!!!!

The first team were all out for 51, as the sun set and the moon rose in the sky.   By the time we had eaten the first course, and the second team were put into bat, light was failing fast....  Even the strategic use of the car headlamps failed and the match was eventually stopped for bad light when an entire over had been bowled with not a single person seeing the ball....

Then we just sat and ate and drank and chatted and drank and ate and chatted until the early hours of the morning when we all left for our beds.  By that time, the Lerot had, apparently, already found his..

Ah.... life in Summer in France....

FoGroBloMe

FoGroBloMe

My friend Patrick over at Bifurcated Carrots has been organising a food growing bloggers meeting in the UK which will happen towards the end of September.  There may be a seat or two left if you would be interested in going.   Probably the best thing to do is to contact Patrick directly on his blog although I do know he's away for a few days, visiting Germany and Spain.

Sadly, I can't go as I have a prior family engagement the same weekend.  I say sadly because I would very much have liked to be able to attend as there are people going I'm very keen to meet in person...  Maybe I'll get to meet you on another occasion..

Which neatly leads me into promoting my own event in 2009.   September 19, 2009  - the same weekend, next year, that Patrick has used this year.....  My goodness, it's almost beginning to look like there is some sort of plan unfolding....

The event, near Bergerac in France, will happen over two days, Saturday and Sunday, and I already have confirmations from Australia and the USA, as well as here in France. The weekend will be organised in such a way that it will be possible to come along on either day or for both days...  I will be getting a schedule together in the near future.

Thanks to Patrick for organising this event.

FoGroBloMe, 20 September, 9:30am - 5:30pm, Oxford Botanic Garden, High Street, Oxford, UK

 

Sunday August 24th is Kitchen Garden Day

Just a quick reminder of Kitchen Garden Day, later this month....  I'm holding an event here near Bergerac which consists of a meal in the garden at lunchtime...  I'm asking all attendees to bring a dish of something to share, preferably something grown in your garden or farmed locally.  I shall be providing a barbecue of local pork, but there will be lots of choices of both vegetarian and omnivarian dishes.

If you want to come, then please, leave me a contact email address as a comment..

Hope to see you here later this month....

Another Saturday at Villereal

As many of you know I go to the market at Villereal every Saturday. 

It's funny what goes through your mind as you wander round a beautiful market and today was no exception.

Last night I was reading round the world in blogs and I arrived in Adelaide, South Australia at the Central Market.  Kate's Friday visit to the market has become a regular piece on the Hills and Plains Seedsavers Blog and I enjoy to read it each week.   This week , there was a paragraph about the preparations for her 50th birthday party amongst the wonderful words describing life in Central Market.

No doubt, partly as a result of reading that last night and partly from seeing a huge birthday cake in a patisserie, I suddenly found myself thinking that at the same time I was wandering around my Market, over on the other side of the world, Kate and her family and friends were having a party to celebrate her birthday.  So Kate, by the time you read this, your party will be over,.    I hope you had great fun....and thanks for a great blog.

July and August are the busiest months in the markets in this part of France as the incoming tourists swell the numbers of shoppers dramatically.  The queues in the fruit and vegetable stalls which I frequent grow as fast as the  local produce on the stalls increases.

This week, I saw local producers selling strawberries, apples, melons, tomatoes, plums, prunes, walnuts, homemade jams and walnut oil.  This farmer only sells melons, and this week, only one variety of melon.... Charentais a popular French variety which does well in this area.  We were discussing a dish where you cut the melon in half and scoop out all the seeds. Then you fill the recess with our local sweet dessert wine.  I've never known what this dish was called so I refer to it as gwm (great winey melon).  It's wonderful.

In my own garden, I've had quite a lot of produce lately.

We had some friends for dinner the other evening and served tomatoes, salad leaves, a few beans and potatoes all from the garden...I accompanied these with some poultry and home made bread to make a delicious meal.

The poultry guy at Villereal is there every Saturday, whatever the weather, all year round.  I don't think I've ever known him have a holiday.  He always has far more customers waiting than he has chickens ready....and just look at those quail on the bottom spit.... Talking about gwm in that last paragraph, makes me think this guy should be called pwm - poultry with meaning!!!

Today was the same, except that this week, the queue was particularly  long.  In the photo above,the queue for chickens starts with the girl in the foreground, goes almost to the opticians and then comes back to the guy in the white tee shirt.  As soon as I took the photo another couple joined the queue...

We've had a few strawberries from the garden, but they haven't made it to the kitchen, usually getting eaten before they leave the garden.   Again, this is a picture of the produce of the strawberry lady.   This week she had only one variety of strawberry on offer (Marais des bois) but they looked, and I'm sure tasted, delicious.

I almost missed the prune man who was tucked away this  week in a corner.  By the time I got to him he had almost sold out.   Prunes, which are actually dried plums, are another speciality from this part of France... Pruneax d'Agen are sought out all over Europe, Agen being a town just a few miles south of here. This farmer just sells plums and prunes with a few odds and ends from his vegetable garden.   His prunes always look delicious.

There was one lady I had not seen before selling tomatoes.  She had two varieties, the huge Coeur de Boeuf and a black tomato whose name I'm afraid I don't know.  She sells all her produce at one price.  What I particularly liked was that the tomatoes had been grown for taste.  They weren't pretty, but she had almost sold out when I finally came across her, and I suspect they tasted wonderful. 

Another new lady was just selling some home made produce.  She had a selection of jams and jellies, a few walnuts and some gorgeous looking walnut oil.  I bought a jar of the jam and will be trying it out soon, probably for breakfast tomorrow. 

There were many other stalls at the market this week, wine producers, fishmongers, fruit orchards, flower sellers, nurserymen, book sellers, clothing retailers, jewellery makers, artists, foie gras producers, bakers, butchers and candlestick makers etc and there was a buzz of activity that really only happens in July and August...

Do I prefer the market at this time of year?   There are certainly far more stalls with many, many more customers about, on the other hand, it's hard to park, hard to get a seat for coffee, hard to get served and none of the sellers have quite as much time for a chat, which for me, is a big part of the experience.  I know that tourism is a huge part of the economy in this part of the world and provides a great deal of what I enjoy whilst living here.... but for me, the markets in May, June, September and October still have plenty of things to make them interesting but don't have the crush of people making them hard to enjoy.

I took this picture of some urns just because I thought the colours made an interesting subject and to remind myself of the diversity of products available.

Villereal market is not a farmers market....  It is a general village market, similar to those that happen up and down the length and breadth of France.  It happens to be in an area where some really good farmers and producers bring their produce to sell.

 

So, next time you're in south west France come to Villereal and just bwm (browse with me)

Marché Gourmande

I have another friend who grows grapes, Sylvie. She owns a very nice little vineyard whose land adjoins ours.

The other day she held a Marché Gourmande – a Gourmet Market.

This is the fourth year that she has organised this event and it has become an important day in the local calendar.

Sylvie has a large courtyard in front of her chai and the other outbuildings she uses for storing both the wine and all equipment necessary for making wine. The chai is the area where the wine is actually made.

She put up 3 Poly tunnels – the 6m (20 ‘) high sort and laid out tables and chairs under them. All around the courtyard she set up market stalls for the various vendors.

We arrived about 6.30pm and were greeted by Sylvie with kisses and an aperitif, her own sweet white wine (Bergerac Moelleux).

There were various vendors in attendance, Sylvie had a stall selling her own wines, by the glass or by the bottle, there were a couple from Champagne selling their local wine! A local pork farmer was there with his excellent locally bred pork offering Jambon Braisée – a kind of roast pork. There were people selling cheese including an excellent sheep’s cheese and people selling ever so fresh Strawberries.

We wandered around for a while meeting and greeting our friends before buying a plate of this and a plate of that and taking our places at one of the long tables to eat. For my first course I had charcuterie. In this case a beautiful mousse pate of duck accompaied by dried duck breast and some duck sausage. It was delicious and had been made within about 5 kilometres (2 miles) of where I was eating it.

Of course, there was a bottle of Sylvie’s rosé wine on the table to accompany it. I was joined by several of our neighbours who shared their foods and wine with us. We had bought a bottle of Rosé for the first course and someone else bought a bottle of red to accompany the main course of roast pork with sautéed potatoes. Bread had been bought by another of the neighbours and was also shared across the table.

We had forgotten to take our own plates and cutlery so one of my neighbours also came to the rescue providing us with both. I had carefully guarded the plastic glass that the aperitif had been served in so that I would have a drinking vessel for wine and water as the evening progressed.

Cheese came after the main course. I actually don’t know who bought the cheese but one of our neighbours bought cheese for all six of us and I enjoyed a very creamy cheese made from sheep’s milk.

We bought dessert for all six of us. It took the form of some of the biggest, freshest, juiciest strawberries I have seen this year and we all had a small glass of the Bergerac Moelleux to accompany them.

Our village is quite small. We have a council chamber and one permanent member of staff and we also have a community hall. There are 340 people in our village. I reckon about 300 people attended this evening market.

After we had all finished eating the band struck up and entertained us. As the stage had been set up across the courtyard from where we all sat under the poly tunnels, they soon abandoned the stage, preferring to come out amongst us and play an acoustic set. The three members took a poly tunnel each and climbed up on the tables to entertain us, leading the singing and dancing and trying to coax as many people as possible to join in.

It was a great evening and was well past midnight when we finally strolled back to the car for the short lift home. We ended the evening with a glass of Armagnac shared between ourselves and the two neighbours who had collected us.

Beansprouts

A few days ago there was a discussion on KGI about sprouting. I followed it with interest as I have always liked beansprouts - well for several years now anyway.

I learned from the discussion exactly how to sprout seeds and decided to give it a try.

I bought some dried red beans - haricot rouge in France - and started to sprout them. I soaked them for about ten minutes in warm water then drained them and put them into a dark cupboard in the kitchen.

I then soaked them for about a minute every day for the next week or so and watched fascinated as each day new progress could be seen with my tiny young sprouts.

Today, for supper, I decided the time was right and I chose some of the best sprouts and ate them.

They were fabulous. Much better than any sprouts I have had before.

I gave a few to my wife. She is not the most adventurous eater and sprouts were not high on her must eat list. She tentatively took a few - not enough to be called a portion, not even a small portion, but a few. She ate them. Tentatively.

Then she helped herself to a proper sized portion saying how delicious they were. She used the words earthy and I think I agree.

Another first for us.

Ian

Dangerous thing when you start thinking

I have been quite ill over the past couple of weeks suffering from Vertigo. I don’t know what caused it although it now appears that it may have been a simple ear infection and more importantly I didn’t realise what it was.

Many of my friends across the Internet have sympathised with me and my various ailments as I tried to pin down exactly what the problem was. I knew I was being sick, constantly and I knew I was getting dizzy, sometimes falling over as a result and I made all sorts of perfectly valid deductions which led me inexorably up the wrong path.

I was simply very tired. I had a touch of food poisoning. I had become allergic to one of the many prescribed drugs I need to take. But at no point did I think – oh – dizziness, being sick - that’ll be vertigo.

The situation deteriorated over a period of time until eventually I agreed that a doctor be called. Now I live in France but English is my first language so there were some words I needed to look up in the dictionary to find the equivalent French word in preparation for this rare treat, a visit by the doctor.

And there it was - the French word for dizziness – Vertige - means vertigo - and suddenly everything fell into place. The doctor arrived and I told him I thought I had vertigo. He then checked me out pretty thoroughly before looking fairly serious and saying – I think you’ve got vertigo! He prescribed a remedy that I am taking and which, after 3 or 4 days, seems to be working well.

All this gave me some time to think. Lying in bed feeling awful is a good time for sorting out your brain. So, I thought, I planned, I considered, and when I could, I came back to my trusty laptop and connected with the world outside.

I thought a lot about communications and the fact that I could struggle to my laptop, without the energy to even dress and send off a message which would be received as if I was in the best of health.

I thought a lot about the possibilities of faceless communication, which the internet now provided.

I thought a lot about Internet blogs and groups and forums.

And I thought a lot about how easy it was to be misled by the very medium that was supposed to be opening up communications.

And then I got to thinking about my own posts on various forums, discussion threads and blogs.
About how often I have realised that what I have said has been completely misinterpreted by the reader - sometimes because I have expressed my self badly, and sometimes because the reader and I simply speak a different version of English.

Then I got to thinking about gardening for food and I thought about some of the mantra’s now being pushed out in front of us and how they too were being slightly misunderstood – either by the reader or often by the speaker.

I thought about globalisation and globalisation of the food chain which is almost universally abhorred.

I thought about my own attempts to eat locally, grow my own food, buy from farmers at our wonderful markets, go to the farm and collect food or wine.

But then I remembered a report someone had made me aware of which said that the carbon footprint of a leg of New Zealand lamb being eaten in the US was LOWER than that of a leg of lamb raised and eaten in the US. And while thinking of that I thought of the tea I drink, of the coffee I drink.

Yes, a lot of what I consume is grown locally but some is not and cannot be.

Do I want to give up drinking tea and coffee – a simple solution. I should encourage all my European and American friends to give up drinking tea and coffee immediately. But what happens to the people who grow that tea and coffee, who rely on me drinking it to feed their families?

We have a very involved and complex society and far too many people are trying to give us one size fits all solutions. I think I just want to say:

It’s not that simple.