Vintage Cakes at the CCC

I think baking standards rise. The organisation and hosts were again cool, calm and welcoming. Their efforts to make these afternoons such a treat is very much appreciated!  It seems to be more fun and we seem to be less inhibited about our baking efforts - certainly it is not a competition though there may be some light-hearted competitive spirit!  In fact it can be quite fun when someone else makes the same cake and one confers and compares.  Folk gathered round the table sampling and chattering, so no one really sat outside to relax in the afternoon sunshine. All too soon the bell rang to signal the end of the session and so it was time to take a choice of cakes home.
For me: Austrian Sachertorte was fudgyyummy, Brandenburg was exquisitely engineered, Coffee Walnut was excellent.

I loved the 'better than my grandmother's bread and butter pudding' which was always served as a cake, the jammily filled Swiss rolls and Parkin is always such a treat.

N. made a Caraway Seed cake too so we stood and compared the two. His was more orangey with the Cognac. He could taste the butter in mine. Other than that they taste the same to me. Maybe his was more pointy because of the s.r. flour whereas I used plain and added baking powder. I am uncertain.  We each added about the same amount of Carvi (= Caraway).  I also made a completely gluten free version.

Then there was a Strawberry Cake to die for, an Old Grumpy Aunty Fruit Cake, a moist Carrot cake, another cake of which the description I have forgotten, a Pineapple Upside Down Sandwich cake and a Victoria Sandwich.

17 cakes evidently!

It took a long time to get the photos in this format but not the same as the editorial format. I went into HTML to try and space them in the preferred position but methinks I need a tutorial!

Whilst trying to present a decent posting I was wondering why I spend so much time at it when there are other things in life!!! ... and when I am not getting on with essentials!!!
A: I do it for me as I like being a kind of journalist! It is creative. Creativity is important to my happiness.

A cake designed to keep lovers together...

Caraway seeds (not exactly a seed but a fruit comprised of crescent shaped achenes)  are, according to folk lore, designed to keep lovers together, or to prevent the theft of any object, including one supposes that hearts are not stolen and fidelity is guarded!

It is the CCC today.  I missed the April event but realistically was too busy with family visits and imminent travel.

The theme this month is VINTAGE cakes.  My first thought was Caraway Seed cake so didn't bother thinking what else I could make.  I wasn't prepared to fuss about with Brandenburg or Angel Layer Cake which I made many years ago.  I'd made gingerbread but not yet a fruit cake for CCC!

So... this Old Fashioned Lovers Seed Cake would be just the ticket! It would be interesting as I had not made one for maybe thirty or forty years!  Thanks to the wonderful web I learned a great deal, some of which I once knew but had forgotten.  Ah... caraway ... wasn't that in the medication we used to give as a colic treatment to babes in the 1970s?  It certainly had that taste! Caraway belongs to the Umbelliferae family and is related to cumin, fennel and anise.
These are three websites that give
1. good recipes including a gorgeous recipe for Courgette and Caraway Seed cake... very Modern!!!  2. good botanical information....  and 
3. good encyclopaedic info all for caraway seeds.

I think it must be the next superfood as evidently it is rich in

- minerals including magnesium, calcium, potassium, selenium and zinc, 

- vitamins A E C and B 

- anti-oxidants,

They are a rich source of fibre and can bind toxins together to protect (not cure!) colon mucus membranes from cancers and lower cholesterol levels.

They can be used as a cold remedy or for bronchitis,

for bad breath as a mouth wash

and assist digestive problems such as IBS and as an anti flatulent!

So… a good little seed it is….

Here is my recipe for a "Vintage Old Fashioned Lovers Caraway Seed Cake":

Cream 175g margarine or butter with 175g sugar. Whisk 3 eggs separately then mix into the creamed mixture, with 200g flour, 50g ground almonds, 1 teaspoon baking powder and 2 teaspoons caraway seeds.  Bake in oven about 160C for apx an hour.  Ready when an inserted skewer comes out clean.

Yesterday
I had a baking afternoon as I needed a cake for today,  plus a gluten free version for a coeliac and one for me, (lower three in the pic)  a fruit cake to donate to and express my gratitude to the neighbour who mowed my long grass (on the board),  a fruit cake (in foil to be gifted to a friend) and a fruit cake for 'I know a man who can' (on the plate). He is arriving in one week's time to help me renovate the kitchen  which is very 1980s. VINTAGE is not the word!  Yikes company coming!

easy peasy orangey or lemony cake

I have been meaning to post this recipe... adapt it as you wish

375g clementines or 3 citrus fruits!
I also tried it with leftover wintry wrinkling lemons and limes but it was an acquired taste!
6 large eggs
225g sugar
250g ground almonds
1 teaspoonful baking powder

Cook for apx two hours the orange fruit in boiling water.  Drain and cool. Cut each in half and remove the pips. Blitz the fruit to a pulp in a food processor...add to all the other ingredients. Pour into a prepped greased 21cm springform cake tin or whatever cake tins you have.  Bake for apx an hour about 190C... maybe you have to cover it with greaseproof paper or foil to prevent the top from burning or lower the temperature ... you know your oven!....
An inserted skewer comes out clean when you test if it has finished baking.
Leave to cool before eating.
Nice the day after it has been baked.
Can be iced.
Can be served with custard, cream or ice cream!
Can be frozen.

Glorioso Weekend Feastings

SUNDAY: Sleepy head on the first day of the month got up late as did the Workers...
At about two thirty we had something to eat but none of us were hungry until we started to eat...
from the freezer a leftovers rice dish from October served three with raw carrot strips and a bit of lettuce, the last of the Ciabatta rolls and the last of the Pear Meringue tart... A FEAST...
Then we partook of a WALK for an hour and a half to 'Le Roc à Midi'.  On the return journey I found a route I haven't taken in years!!!!!! Splendissimo! I also started to learn the days of the week in Italian and Spanish! Tricky!
Pics to follow tomorrow......
Two Roasted chicken cuissons stretched to feed three persons with potatoes, garlic and parsnips roasted. They had not ever eaten the latter! More carrots. I made a gravy with roasted red pepper out of a jar, swished with apple juice, carrot juice, pesto, cream and a  little flour to thicken.  I don't do gravy cubes or powder. YUK! We were stuffed! No one wanted apple crumble. Good oh.. it is for tomorrow! 
In addition, I cooked a casserole of three chicken legs on a bed of onions and potatoes, lemon and ginger......that should feed us for two days... AND I made BREAD,  which was started Thursday night using left-over Ciabatta mix and flour scraped out of the bowl and off the kneading table. It had kept covered with a cloth whilst the wild yeasts grew... then I added flour etc on Saturday night, kneaded it Sunday morning, cooked it late Sunday evening!  YUM!

SATURDAY, they brought the trailer to the house, filled it with weeds, emptied my front-of-house plant troughs brought into the outhouse last November as they are not frost proof... One cannot have everything as they were only 3e from SuperU. All the soil is in black bins ready for Spring plantation! Some geraniums etc show signs of life, so we extracted the living and repotted them into three troughs in my kitchen hoping to flourish!!! Give life I say! They had also moved more logs into drier storage.  My lovely workers managed 3 hrs labour and I called it a day as I was tired. They left me alone so I took opportunity to indulge in a bath and to test where shower water now spatters to... will still have to be careful!
Yesterday we ate beef casserole... it is a Bourgninon (spelling?) cut of beef and for 3.50e served four ( one portion in the freezer for me at a later date!). We had rice and carrots!  The Italians were complimentary!

Yesterday and Today

Yesterday was full of rain and cold and drear! I lacked confidence, was full of doubt,  felt responsible for the weather, found myself apologising,  hearing myself say, 'but it's not my fault'.  I was embarrassed by the number of overwhelming tasks / jobs I need help with.  Down, down, down.
(I don't think I was nearly as mature and understanding of the elderly as they are at their age!!!!!!!!)

M. was fine as we settled to sort photos ... and negatives .. remember those? !  A jolt down memory lane to my former English home, which my last partner helped me to renovate, and..., oh my..., look at what we created, and look at what we took apart... and left... I was and am so saddened.

However, if I was still there I wouldn't be here. I wouldn't have met the wonderful people I have met nor would I have had, and am having, the amazingly challenging tear-jerking or laughter-making experiences.
What has LIFE been all about when so much of MY LIFE has gone and so little is left? 
Make the most of it while I can and if I am down, down, down,  I have the choice and opportunity to change it for up, up, up.

So,  she and I sorted the photos into a set for HER and a set for HIM, because when I left HIS house, four to five years ago, to come to HER house,  I took the photos of MT house in UK, intending to divide them up!  ... and now, after ten years, I have!!!  What HE does with HIS set is not my business but he will be given them!  More importantly, quite a few of those hard-copy photos reached the rubbish bin!  My set is now in two albums. M. did an excellent job of sorting muddled photos and negatives of that 2/3rds of a Tudor former inn.

After much weeping and wailing which didn't actually last too long, she and I seemed to bond as women, and we managed to laugh through the task.  One fun thing to do was to complete an album from about 1995 (??) when my son and I went to Spain. That was after my father died!   We had backpacks but hired a car to drive from Barcelona to Orihuela and return. It was a great DRIVE... I could have gone allthe way around the edge!  Lovely again to to see my son so young in photos and to remember Elche and Rioja!

I think my down mood on such a grim wet dark day was SAVED by the greeting cards I found welcoming my daughter into the world.  Funny that her 'birth' day was the day before I re-discovered them!!!!!  Such a pleasure to see 1978 style 'BABY GIRL" cards and messages inside from some people I am not in touch with anymore!

I think F. felt frustrated by yesterday's weather, as did we all!  It was so bleak.  First of all he took my new Ikea trolley out of its box and put it together.  He called it the  'vegetable shelves'.  I liked that!   Then he was impressed by the new indoor or exterior lights I bought ages ago which needed to be connected, but I couldn't work out how to make them light up... I am impractical!  Negative destructive thoughts of  'how could I be so dumb' is what I thought!!!!  Evidently, I can buy more and make a longer string!  Ooh... I may just do that. Sod the cost!

Then he volunteered to work outdoors in the rain, to investigate what needs to be done to repair wooden gates at the barn down the lane, and to establish for himself what tools and resources I own and what are owned by my former partner.  All left in my possession.  I have full permission to use what I will!  Eventually, he repaired one screw in the main garden gate... such a little task, but it secures the keep on the latch and is extremely important.  I was so grateful.  He was so wet!!!!! Then, bless him, he wanted to de-nail the timbers in the newly re-roofed attic and was gone for a couple of hours. I must go up and see what he has done!

Throughout the day I battled with being in a gloop of depression, which was really a kind of sadness and eventually an Ibuprofen sorted it as well as some lively music.  It is lovely to have people to feed but takes my time! It is inspirational to have people stay who appreciate food.  The evening meal was delicious - two slices of lambs liver cut into small pieces in a creamy tarragon sauce with cauliflower leaves and florets, julienne carrots and Ciabbata rolls that M. made!  OK, it was a prepared flour mix but she has always let her sister do the cooking.  I made a Pear Meringue Tart and a Hazelnut Torte because egg whites needed to be used.  We were stuffed!  I am eating more than I normally would!

They wished me to play the piano so had to endure two Chopin Nocturnes plus two pieces from the film 'The Piano' composed by Michael Nyman.  The deal was that they would sing and play Friday evening but then we had a musical soirée.  She has a beautiful voice and he plays guitar well... a couple of 'The Doors' pieces. This was followed by a discussion about something I did not understand, so I showed him a video of the Stroh instruments played by a French theatrical, musical group who I know... then he showed me videos of guitar playing by Bob Brozman.

Today I got up at nine but they didn't get up until ten and started work at 10h30!!!!!! But by then the sun was shining and although they looked reluctant without adequate clothing, for the wind was keen and bitter,  they were bossed about by me.  I laughed heartily, yet severely when I told them I was bossy when necessary!!! They had to wear a hat!! "Choose one of these"... and a gilet and a coat or jacket... "Choose from these" is what I said!!!   "You can shed them as you get warmer."   They did not understand this use of the verb 'to shed'.  So they worked for an hour and I took them coffee and Epiphany cake.   Then they worked another hour and a half and I made them Red kidney bean and Red pepper soup, lemony with sage, served with ciabatta. Pear tart was to follow!

I explained to these two that in January, despite my own rules which I break,  the weather is inclement for starting much before 9 or 10 in the morning. One awaits the sun rising above the village roofs to shine on my garden!
BUT WOW... today they forked over and weeded three sections of my potager AND made the fourth quarter ...  all this in addition to work on Tuesday and Wednesday where they have finished widening the rose and lavender bed! How I love them! In addition, they moved weeds to the trailer (dechetterie trip next week) and moved logs exposed to rain when wind whipped off the bache to the space in the sheltered area where logs have disappeared since October!

POSTSCRIPT TO SUSAN's comment below:
The soil appears to be remarkably friable this year ... most of it only needed a light fork even though it was of course wet with the amount of RAIN we have endured!  Hey ho! My back has been saved and what would have taken four weeks 'potager' digging has been achieved in a few days. I did a few rows of forking over to demonstrate technique!  Last year or the year before I added a lot of 5 year old chicken manure... I also added wood ash from the woodburner, wood shavings and oak bark dust once I have sieved the oak bark.  Waste veg matter is just dug in randomly!  I don't bother to compost!

Meanwhile, whilst monitoring progress in the garden, I discovered my son's school reports plus his photographic accomplishments...so am sorting those into a chronological order and boxing up!!!!!!!!

My Italian helpers went to sleep. I took a fast walk, whereupon at apx six pm, for it is still daylight 'twixt twilight, I became aware of bird song which I have not heard for so long. Then, Blackbird trilled. When I reached ' The American Way' I returned along the road from whence I had travelled. A tawny owl hooted hhhhhhhhhooooooo.  I felt full of the joys of Spring. So happy!!!!!!

Today, the artisan came to instal a shower screen... the para-douche!  I only waited three days.   It was bought at the end of October.  Previously, I never found one that I liked. Now I've completed the action but the glass tiles I think do not have the correct grouting. Hey ho!  BUT ...How glad I am!!!!!!!!  It's another hymn I am remembering!!

Glad that I live am I;
That the sky is blue;
Glad for the country lanes,
And the fall of dew.

After the sun, the rain,
After the rain the sun;
This is the way of life,
Till the work be done.

All that we need to do,
Be we low or high,
Is to see that we grow,
Nearer to God on high.

A simple Italian feast

On a depressingly dark, cold wet Wednesday morning, I suggested the Italians sand two doors in Le Grand Salon. They cleared the dust and went to grub up the three young plum tree roots that I razed to the ground in the Autumn. Over five years I let them grow but I could not get the mower between and with no fruits they were unattractive where they were!
I had a dental appointment. One wished to purchase clothing as washing had been left in the machine at their last residence, from which they escaped unexpectedly, one night before their intended departure.  A valid story.  They had been intimidated, nay threatened!
My dentist is good but always at least one hour late! Eventually, after almost two hours, I found the two at The Loft, where I suggested we had a warming drink.  Then we proceeded to look at garden stones / gravel at Jardiland - only to dismiss the shop as ridiculously expensive.  Missing the turning to Bricomarché, we went to Lidl and Leclerc for food, as there were no fruit or vegetables dans la maison, apart from onions and potatoes. Laden and tired, we returned home.
For lunch we had the last of the garden leeks that I thought were non-edible! I made them into soup with garlic and mashed potato from the previous evening but one...plus juice from one lemon. Delicious. I also made individual shortcrust pastry tarts baked for ten minutes, then filled with a mixture of canned spinach, mashed potato, cinnamon and cream into which is cracked an egg and baked for another 15 minutes or so!
It was agreed they would cook the evening meal!  He used the factory-produced, 'fresh' Tagliatelli from Lidl and made a sauce of cream, milk, butter, olive oil, gorgonzola warmed but not boiled. Crushed walnuts and grated nutmeg were added.  Meanwhile the pasta is cooked in a pan of salted water, drained and the sauce poured over and mixed.  I wished to scatter rocket over it ... but they preferred to have the rocket and walnut oil afterwards.  Each had one glass of a Roche-Mazet Chardonnay.  Still hungry, he tucked into Goats Cheese and the 'Pain Nordique' that I discovered in Châtellerault.  Marvellous! Exactly the same bread that I discovered on the Ile de Re. I  tried to emulate it without a recipe but mine was too heavy! I will try again.

Spanish memories, French delights

The rhythm of the Gypsy Kings rings in the air whilst my innate passion, (probable Spanish ancestral roots),  is transported to memories of Barcelona, Tarragona, Parc Naturel del Delta de' L'Ebre, Peniscola, Valencia,  Guadeleste, Denia, Moraira, Altea, Alicante,  Elche, Orihuela, Torrevieja, Marbella, Estepona, Granada, Jaca, Zaragoza....ah.....  I can feel it in my bones!!!!!!!!!

One roasted Herefordshire beef .. topside cut... succulent and delicious....
Another cooked potatoes... peel, boil, cut, sauté, roast with black pepper and olive oil... a few minutes each in that order...
Another sliced thinly white cabbage, leeks and garlic, to sweat in a pan with a little white wine (water or cream)  on top of the hob.
I mixed a batter and took my two carefully wrapped specialist pans to cook a pile of pancakes for 13 hungry mouths.
There was a delicious Burgundian white to commence ... it was a DOMAINE JOUARD - Chassagne Montrachet  - Clos de la Truffiere - a taste I had not ever experienced but at the price it was DELECTABLE!!!!!!!!!......ASTOUNDING!!!!!!!!!
 then a red, driven up from the Languedoc ( see this link ) .... Oh my oh my!!!!!!!!!!

After a walk we had Cremant de Loire with apx two pancakes each with lemon, honey, sugar, followed by coffee and Cognac chocolate!

What a lovely Sunday afternoon it was ... and after helping my friends clear the tables I came home to remind myself how good LIFE can be, and left them to family bedtime!

Temperatures

I notice that Blog devices for measuring outdoor temperature are different...
so  e.g. was Preuilly really 8 degrees different from here just a while ago?
Today, my kitchen with no heating is colder than the great outdoors!!!!!!! WHY?
Is it that the stone house phenomenon?...
or that three of the doors link to rooms colder than my salon.. and is therefore reason to have two radiators in that room once I start to 'do up' my kitchen...
I am keeping shutters and curtains closed on the 'barn part of the property' rooms so it is only electric light during the day.  Hat, scarves, thermal underwear have become indoor fashion in the last week but not yet seven upper layers, nor yet the coat.
I am grateful for oak logs...even if I do have to carry them in and ecoem dspondent that the will need stacking again.
I am grateul for my wonderful bed which with four hot water bottles is cosy!
I am keeping buoyant... going for a walk now...to get the grey light!!!!!!!
Addendum:
Have been out for five hours and although the kitchen is still cold the Big Room is 21C (rising to 24C two hours later) and woodburner has been slumbering on three medium sized split logs so 'tis good! Winter fuel essential as is inner fuel. Within the hour of being invited for a walk with three kiddies and three other adults, I'd made:
1. mushroom soup with fish stock... a bit acidic so I melted Valençay cheese in it... nice...
2. mincemeat tart with shop bought sweet shortcrust pastry, jar of ancient supermarket mincemeat, sliced eating apples below strips of pastry to make lattice work... cobbled together like my granny's tarts....   Here it was:

One slice each was more than enough! Very sweet! 

New Year Day's Picnic

It had to be a quick picnic. At midday, I decided it had to be then or never, as it was freezing! Getting the bike out from the store was tricky ... but arm strength has improved and I managed to lift it above two mowers.  Attired for the weather, I grabbed a paper plate, serviettes, tea towel and a picnic of smoked salmon gifted to me by a friend with her fig and anise chutney, two cherry tomatoes, rocket, crackers, two clementines and a posh caramel yoghurt, plus I filled an empty 25cl wine bottle with apricot juice and Armagnac... just to keep me warm!  There was sunshine by the River Gartempe but benches were in shade, so I nestled myself in the fork between trees for the Selfie.  I made myself cycle the circuit instead of returning home by the 15 minute route.  I walked the bike up the hill, past the bull, then saddled to Etranglar and back home.  It was an exhilarating ride but difficult to make breathing regular in such cold weather. It was wonderful to shriek out loud "Yoohoo" when there was no one else out on the high, empty agricultural plain.  I worked up quite a sweat in the glorious sunshine and cold air.  It was a lovely first day of the year.   I love these kind of picnics!

 

 

I took first footing gifts to my friends' house - a silver coin, bread, salt, alcohol, oak instead of coal for good luck, financial prosperity, food, warmth and good cheer but in fact I was the second person to have arrived that day.  After a family walk to the river and back, we had Christmas Pudding with my gifts of Armagnac and Cremant d'Alsace.   There was just a little red Chinon 2003 left which I tasted...mmmm. Following that were oysters... I ate two... they make the forehead feel funny!  Later, bread and Stilton cheese and Brebis. Nice!  Back home I ate the miniature yule log that I had bought on the Ile de Re and started to listen to War and Peace!

Food and too much of it!

For a dinner party of 4 adults and three children aged six and three, I could not get Bar which is Sea Bass.  However, a 2kg Norwegian trout was purchased at Intermarche, where the fishmonger explained how to cook it.  She descaled and prepped it.  In future I would ask her to take out the skeleton.  She had suggested that she could!  I would keep the skeleton for stock and stuff the fillets as I did for the whole fish... that way I would not have tricky bones and waste! After the dinner party, I froze some of the flesh as i got tired of eating trout for four days!   I made the debris into fish stock and used some of that as a basis for pea soup!  The rest of the fish stock has been frozen for winter soup!
We were supposed to start with oysters but my friends didn't go to the village and let me know.. Instead they brought smoked salmon on crackers with gravadlax for the aperos.  Nice!  AND they bought bubbly which I had already got but we opened theirs.  I hope I will take mine round to their house.
Then we had slices of finger thick, smoked salmon from a side fillet that I had bought a few weeks ago served with a green salad (rocket, avocado, shallots ( I wanted spring onions!) and asparagus.  I warmed up the salmon so it was cooked and very rich! The photo was blurred so got deleted!
NB That evening I realised the trout was not a good idea because it was almost like Salmon! T
For the main course the trout was served with small roasted potatoes which had been partially cooked in the kettle with the trout, plus grated celeriac and carrot which I had braised in lemon juice, zest and cream in the oven plus green shoots of Romanesco.
We were full. Parents were tired so the lovely Valençay and Gorgonzola cheeses remained untouched.   They chose the home made lemon curd dessert which was layered with crushed speculoos biscuits and plain yoghurt in individual glasses. I'd had desserts like that on Ile de Re so wanted to experiment. I haven't got it quite right. I also followed a recipe for lemon meringue pie / tart which i used to make almost weekly without blinking an eye!!!!!!!
I started it on New Year's Eve... because between the dinner party and NYE I'd made 12 mince pies with my own pastry and jar of 2005 vintage mincemeat! YUM!
The dinner party took me almost two days to clean, lay table prettily, find candles, plates, glasses and prep the food so that when guests arrived I had little to do except get food hot and plated!
C and JC loved the atmosphere with candles in several places and frankincense in the air.
I loved doing it but well out of practice!

It took several days for me to clear up as I have no dishwasher but between so I socialised and did other things! 

Christmas Day Menu 2014

 Breakfast at Z'Adore, La Couarde

Déjeuner at Le Belem, St Martin-en-Ré 

The 35e menu was served with a red Sancerre and water

Médaillon de thon mariné aux épices douces

Filet de bar rôti, sauce beuure blanc, étuvée de légumes frais

Gros macaron au caramel et aux pommes followed by coffee and brandy

Not quite a County Show

 

An agricultural event at the Exhibition Park, Poitiers was a display of perhaps Best of Breeds from other shows, yet here the cattle were being judged for Championship of Limousin beef. This gentle giant, Felicien was well tethered, possibly sedated and the Champion male! 

It was free entry - wonderful to keep children happy for part of a wet afternoon. We arrived for a 15e lunch which included wine carafes on the table, refilled as they were emptied. 14 persons to each long table.  I should think at least 300 covers if not more with polite and speedy service to the table. Plastic plates but real glasses and cutlery.  The starter was a salad with probably turkey livers, Main course was a superb faux-filet with a teaspoonful of canned haricots beans and several freshly cooked Charlotte potatoes.  A slice of goats cheese and a yummy sugary factory produced chocolate caramel dessert made us in good cheer to view the animals in their stalls or cages.

 The Poitou de Baudet donkey, an ass, was lovely, as also were the mules.

There were sheep, goats, chickens, geese, rabbits, pigeons, ride on mowers and tractors on display.

Food, Glorious Food

Purée of I can't remember

There was a 'citrouille' (pumpkin) soup... the French call it 'marmite',  but I forgot to take a photo!
There was another purée of something garnished with garlic sprouts... I forgot to take a photo
I can't quite remember the order that they came in!
Hey, look at this little fella!

Entrée: American Crayfish with crayfish and ravioli of foie gras

I ate it all!

Cherry Kirsch on ice to clean the palate

Main course: Goulash of Stag - the meat and sauce was delicious, served with fig, swede, carrot, potato, tomato, a toast of oeufs de lompe, and a sprig of watercress.

There was a selection of cheeses from which I chose very local goats cheeses.  My new mission is to deliberately prefer 'cru' cheese rather than pasteurised.  I try not to eat any bread.  I had to ask for a spoon for the stag sauce!

The Buzet coated the inside of the glass!

Warm, fresh pineapple, caramel salted ice creamlangue de chat.

Fronsac 1999 and Buzet 1995

Le Capucin - Tournon St Martin

Soup and gruel follow during the next weeks!