No Beef with these bikes

Cadel Evans with my girls in Bordeaux in 2010

The 2018 Tour passed along the road through Menthon-Saint-Bernard

Here I go again. Talking about food when I have no right to do so. But, in honour of the Tour de France - a race that I have come to know and love over the last ten years - we made a French meal. Actually, we never need an excuse for this, and I use the term 'we' loosely. I watched, took photos and sampled the red wine as the beef stew (boeuf bourguignon) was being put together.

But, back to the bikes. In 2009, we were in the final months of preparation before our family adventure (which would take us from living in Melbourne to living in France) when the Tour passed through Annecy. I stayed up that night to watch the SBS coverage on Australian television and, as my interest to that point in the Tour was scanty and my knowledge sketchy, I didn't understand a lot of what was going on: the idea of teams working together for one lead rider, the different specialists within the teams, the terms and duration of the Tour, the names of the riders etc. was all unfamiliar territory. I can't tell you who won that stage, where the race went after Annecy and had to look up the eventual overall winner (Contador), but I can tell you that that night was thrilling. It was a turning point of sorts, as it had been suggested to all of our friends that they, too, should stay up late to see our future hometown. After years of planning, there was no alternative but to finally walk our talk...and go.

I now feel like an old hand. Not only did Annecy again feature this year as a start town for the 10th stage, Taste Le Tour with Gabriel Gaté visited Le Père Bise in our village, Talloires. Go to Series 14, Episode 10 for more.

***Purchase your copy of 'But you are in France, Madame', which takes you with us on our French adventure, at Amazon, here ***

 
 

French love Down Under

A quick post today, to share some photos from an inaugural Bastille Festival in Sydney. We celebrated a week early, but the love for France in Australia is in evidence as, not only were there large numbers around me today, but Brisbane is hosting a big festival this weekend, Melbourne hosts theirs on July 14 and 15, Circular Quay in Sydney celebrates over four big days Thurs 12 through to Sun 15 July, the Sunshine Coast holds their festival on the 28th July...and that is just a small selection of all of the parties, get-togethers, balls, special film sessions etc. to celebrate the French National Day Down Under. I was the guest of French Cargo and spent a lovely morning with Kathie signing books and chatting to her customers. I might just take this opportunity to say 'thank-you' to Kathie. She has been such a wonderful support for me and this writing venture.

***Purchase your copy of 'But you are in France, Madame', which takes you with us on our French adventure, at Amazon, here ***

A circular, culinary blog

I have lived and breathed the French language for a very long time. Yet, every once in a while,  a word comes my way that requires a bit of extra thought. I don't mean the words that are new to me but that I understand because of their context, or words that I have forgotten and that I can jiggle to the surface. I mean words that I know, but that don't seem to make sense in context. Writing about how to make a baguette last blog led me down several cooking related paths including to the salt farms of Brittany and the following:

La Fleur de Sel, Le Guérandais, est délicatement cueillie, selon une méthode traditionnelle millénaire, à la surface de l'eau des oeillets par les paludiers de Guérande. 

But, un oeillet is a carnation (or an eyelet). Of course, a carnation is a flower and the fine salt (La Fleur de Sel) that is being collected is so-called because of the flower-like patterns of the crystals that form in the salt crust as the seawater evaporates. But, this is somewhat of a false path.*

In fact, in the salt harvesting process, sea water passes through a succession of ponds and it is the final set of ponds that are known as the 'œillets'. Is this more related to the winding related to eyelets?





An interview with chef, Jamie Oliver, in which he talked about his mentor, a lady named Rose, came up in conversation. She was strong, kind, clever, someone who, according to Jamie, favoured simplicity and taught him to focus always on what he could do better. A 'salt of the earth' sort of person.

And then, absent-mindedly, I picked up a cook book that I have had on my coffee table for a very long time, but have probably never done anything more than flick through distractedly. I like the idea of cooking. I love the idea of being a good cook. But, sadly that is where the passion seems to start and stop. This time, though, I read the About section of the cookbook; a human story, which is of far more interest to me, and learnt that the writer/chef Patricia Wells and her husband's

"...love of France grew...Almost before we'd unpacked our bags in Provence, we had more French friends than we had made in all our time in Paris. Within a year, we could no longer even remember life before Provence. For us, it symbolised all the essential elements of happiness we sought in life - friends, family, food, and feasts."

Now, this was something that I could really relate to, and took me on a bigger wander around her book...which led to the Fleur de Sel.

Strangely enough, it was not just me baking last weekend, My FB posts attracted return comments from both Annette at A French Collection and Mardi from eat.live.travel.write who is about to publish a...cookbook.

*as far as I can tell - please do let me know if there is indeed a connection.

***Purchase your copy of 'But you are in France, Madame', which takes you with us on our French adventure, at Amazon, here ***

Make your own baguette

6 g salt
500 g plain flour
7 g yeast
450 ml warm water
...and that is it!

When we moved back from living in France to Australia, there were many things that we missed. So many, in fact, that it was a difficult period for us all. But, let's not dwell on that today. Instead, close your eyes and breathe in, listen to the crunch and taste the, nearly authentic, French bread that made us feel a little closer to our French home. Of course, you'll need to turn on the oven to as high as your oven will go, and chances are you'll look more longingly at the long, cylindrical shapes you create if you have on hand the nifty baguette trays (as ordered on line by yours truly). Don't forget to divide the dough into 3, score each loaf, set your timer for 18 minutes or so and then ahh..Miam! Miam!

One more hint: how to know when your water is warm enough? You can count to ten with your finger in the water and it doesn't burn. Like the precision of the technique? Let me know how you go.

***Purchase your copy of 'But you are in France, Madame', which takes you with us on our French adventure, at Amazon, here ***

Salt, flour, yeast and water and you are ready to go

Combine ingredients in order listed

After leaving to rise for a couple of hours

Flour your board, scoop out your risen dough

Ready to go

 knead away

and away

and away

and away

divide into 3 

shape, stretch and score

Taste test anyone?

A pizza-vending machine out here?

Out and about in France, in a small village, not at all on the beaten track, we came across...a roadside pizza-vending machine. We were curious. After all, this wasn't the usual fine, fresh French food that we had grown to love. 

Article in France Today magazine. Would you have stopped to give it a go?

I don’t remember the exact moment that my husband and I decided that we should leave Australia with our three young children and try out France for a year, but I have no difficulty recalling our arrival in France with only one and a half of us speaking French (myself and our six-year-old son) and a burning enthusiasm for our new adventure. We had no family or work to go to, no friends to call on and no knowledge of the place that we had chosen to live (Giez, 22 km from Annecy in the Haute Savoie) and it is an indisputable truth that it was tough, in a gentle sort of way. After all, for each new discovery and surmounted challenge, we not only felt more settled, we also felt proud of what we had achieved, and that is always a good thing.

Alongside the difficult (finding accommodation, buying a car, understanding the school stationery list, driving on the right side of the road (but the wrong for us), doing research without an Internet connection), came the delightful. Our flat, bayside Melbournian suburb had been replaced by mountains; real mountains, not Australian-sized ones, in the middle of which was a lake and a town with canals, old stones, disorder, colourful markets, strange opening hours and different light and smells.

Shopping was no longer a thing to tick of the weekly to-do list. Buying food from the market, queueing at Carrefours or enjoying a stroll around a vide-grenier (village garage sale) became excursions and mostly the children enjoyed them as much as my husband and me. 

Years into our French living (one turned out to not be enough), there is no doubt that the supermarket has lost its novelty, but we still look forward to our market and vide-grenier outings. To know what it is on and where, we take a look at vide-grenier.org. Sometimes, our findings are not altogether expected, as was the case recently.

Read more of this article here: https://www.francetoday.com/culture/shopping-boutiques/a-pizza-vending-machine-in-the-countryside/