Fontevraud Abbey

I’ve just finished watching Roland Joffé’s Vatel set in 1671 at the Château de Chantilly. It tells the story of François Vatel, a French chef, famous for inventing Chantilly cream during a visit from the court of Louis XIV. The kitchens in this charming film reminded me of a photograph I had taken at Fontevraud Abbey near Chinon. The abbey dates from the 11th century and contains the tombstone effigies of Henry II, Eleanor of Aquitaine and Richard the Lionheart who were buried here.
I loved the cookhouse chimneys each one denoting an oven and it’s hexagon architecture. The Abbey was unusual being both a nunnery and a monastery and to my taste has been over restored. The inner spaces tell little of the story of it’s inhabitants expect, maybe, in the nun’s ‘warming’ room off the cloisters and the kitchen, but this could be my imagination, as these two areas appear to be the only rooms that had fireplaces. Could it be that they warmed both the occupants and my opinions? Admittedly the austerity of the place was matched by the coldness of the day, however, warmth and cheer was at hand in a glass of Chinon cabernet franc wine.

Le Pigeonnier

It’s Saturday and the duck is ready to cook at last. (see below Can Do Canard) The legs are already tenderised and soft after the marinade, a quick rinse and dry and they are ready for the oven.
Talking poultry leads me of this beautiful pigeon house at the Château de Brézé, worth visiting alone for it’s quite amazing 12th century trogloditic basements radiating out from under the house and a bottle or two of their wine. Pigeonniers or columbiers in French, often elaborately designed and decorated, were built from the 14th century for status-conscious aristocrats and could hold up to five thousand birds producing eggs, meat and manure as well as much else. The frogblog has a wonderful chain of the consequences of pigeon keeping and diet from kidney failure through prisoners, literally, to their urine and on to glass-making, a must read! http://frogblog-lavache.blogspot.com/2005/11/pigeonniers-pigeon-roosts.html
British house-hunters in France have taken a flight of fancy to these pigeonniers and apparently are busy buying and restoring. Just writing that makes me want to sneeze, although of course, I can appreciate the attraction. The people in the photograph of the Château give some idea of the depth and scale of the dry moat.

The Dichotomy of Old France and Modern France

Near the mouth of the Loire is the tiny village of Saint-Marc-sur-Mer, made famous, to film buffs, by Les Vacances de Monsieur Hulot. A national treasure, you would think, but there appears to be still some resistance to Jacques Tati's work in France. Well that is according to some of the dedicated young French pilgrims we met in the renowned door-swishing/squeaking Hotel de la Plage that seems to be pretty much unchanged since filming in 1952. The problem is “the film openly lampoons several hidebound elements of French political and economic classes,” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Vacances_de_Monsieur_Hulot)
which apparently made it less than popular at home although a huge international hit. I can find little proof of these sentiments in online research and could have made a grave mistake in translation, especially in the heat of flowing armagnac at the bar. (I always believe I parle français fluently when two sheets to the wind, I don’t). Tati loved the old France and mistrusted the sterile development of Modern France as he depicted so succinctly in his satire Mon Oncle, a view that probably endorsed his complete endearment to us foreigners. Treat yourself and watch some Tati this Christmas. Above Nick and Tati, together at last.

Screen Goddess

The last time we enjoyed a jaunt up the Loire we combined business with pleasure. Nick had been invited to add to a retrospective of his work with an interview on his music and memories for Radio Angers, conducted by the ebullient Taran Singh for his dedicated Free Jazz Hour. It was Nick’s 60th birthday that day and although work always comes first for him, he was, I think, a little disappointed not to be celebrating. After the show we looked with more and more desperation to find a restaurant still taking orders, asking locals, getting lost, time ticking. Somewhere in a narrow medieval lane we spotted a tiny bijou place with four or five lively tables. No problem they said and made Nick’s birthday by sitting us next to his lifetime screen goddess, Jeanne Moreau. Santé indeed!

Winter Blues, Reds and Greens

As winter bites, it's a good time to remember last years fruits and plan for more and better next year. In September 2006 I visited Château de la Bourdaisière in the Loire for the annual Tomato Festival and come away tomato star struck with a great variety of heirloom seeds. All that winter I waited patiently for 1st April to begin to germinate the bounty. Every seed became a seedling so that by May I was giving pots of baby tomatoes to anyone who had a garden, window box or old shoe to grow them in. In the end I freecycled the last to grateful strangers. Wow and how they grew. By the end of the season I had picked over a hundred kilos. Salads, sauces, bottles, jams, pickles, ketchup you name it, we processed it. So here in memory of great harvest are some photographs. My favorite was an orange beef heart-type with a very thin skin, which tasted more like tomato than any tomato I ever ate. There were green stripped zebra types more acid and great for mixed salad de tomato. Black tomatoes from Russia rich and honey sweet. Yellow plum types to make surprisingly smooth and golden pasta sauces. Pointy ones, banana-shaped ones, tiny ones, the choice is yours. So if you fancy having a go, my advice is to look at www.kokopelli-seed-foundation.com to supply your every need, I assume they ship to the UK, or get on down to the Festival of everything Tomato, who needs an excuse to visit the Loire anyway?