Cèpe Foraging – Bordeaux Mushroom Season

While best used fresh - my ideal serving for cepes is to get really firm smaller ones, trim the ends and sear in a pan with olive oil then adding butter, minced garlic and parsley towards the end. These mushrooms are a great addition to risottos and meat jus for sauces. However, often you'll find you have found older cepe or just have too many and I find slicing them and freezing or dehydrating is the best way to reuse. I'm not a huge fan of the canned ones as they lose a lot of their texture. Making a dried mushroom powder to add to dishes for that extra umami flavor is also a great way to savor them year-round.

The Palombiere and Wild Pigeon (Palombe) hunting in France

My in laws tell me that back in the day in South-West France, during the months of October and November, there were so many people hunting wild pigeons (when the birds migrate flying from the northern lands towards the Iberian peninsula), that it was not possible to get married because the priest would have been at the palombiere.

Armagnac en Fete

The south west of France has always been a land of passage and trade: the Romans introduced the vine (la vigne), the Arabs the still (l'alembic armagnacais) and the Celts the barrel (la barrique). This is how the oldest recorded distilled wine in France came about. There are even documents citing the Armagnac as early... Continue Reading →

Slow Food and Slow Travel

A culinary tour is one of the best ways to see a new place, learn a bit of history and understand more of the culture. It's a multisensory journey...if you are looking for something a bit different, off the beaten path? find that countryside cottage or villa in the vines to cook your locally sourced products to enjoy that farm-to-table style life. If you should want to visit coastal oyster farms or the inland caviar farms...

SW France Countryside of Captieux, Gironde

...best way to see the real France and during these covid times a great way to have fun, avoid large groups of people and support smaller communities. Captieux has a lake, Lac de Taste, incredible farms like La Ferme des Filles, is home to one of the most Northern bull rings, and is where the delectable 'puits d'amour' pastry is from! Besides selling incredible produce from seasonal vegetables to eggs on-site, La Ferme des Filles has gites to rent, will eventually run educational events (when covid allows), and offers a lovely large area for your children to roam and meet goats, sheep and chickens...

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