JANUARY 2012

Evening sun Brochon

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Although my greeting is a bit late, here a Happy New Year can be sent out until the end of February. So let's go with the french tradition.

For my January weather report. As for winter it has been mild, but rainy and/or foggy. We have had sun here in Gevrey only a couple of days. Dreary, damp and cold can be tiring!
But the other side of this, mother nature is really confused. At the round-about the spring bulbs have all poked through and are about 5 inches tall!
And I have added a couple of photos from my yard, and this is January, supposedly winter! We have had a few nights below freezing, thus some frost. But this next week they promise winter will be here. Nights below freezing( oh no!) and maybe below freezing all day on Thursday(yikes). Get out the winter gear. Maybe it will be over after this week, one can hope.

Rose photo Jan 14

Same rose photo Jan 18..a little frost

Jan 29, dandy lion! ! ! Backyard

Even weeds are pretty when frosted

 Both of my clubs celebrated the Epiphany. It is celebrated here with a Galette des Rois. Ah the Galette des Rois. Flakey pastry with almond paste filling. Good baker, good galette. And with a feve ( feve is a type of bean, but now it is a fancy little token).

This last month I was privileged with tasting a gevrey wine at least 115 yrs old, at least. All it states on the

bottle is marriage of M and M 1896 ( names hard to read). So was it 2 years old at the wedding feast or more?
It had been opened two weeks before, so it had deteriorated some; but after the acid taste...there it was, long lasting in the mouth - was the taste of Chambertin! Absolutely AMAZING. What an experience!!!!!!!! And below is a photo.
Only living here does one get an experience like this ( or if you have millions and can buy anything you want).

Very old wine

I took some photos one sunny day walking around Brochon. Sometimes the light in the evening here in the winter months is absolutely gorgeous (opening photo). It takes on an intense golden tone. Love it. These others however were taken in the other direction, and did not get the setting sun's gold tones.

Château Stephen Liégeard -1895

Eglise Saint- Symphorien XI century

Great example of a Burgundian roof- Brochon

Time of year that the vines are cut back and the cut branches are burned. Note the burning barrels. The work in the vines never ends. If all the cutting is done and the serments are all burned, then some vignerons are able to get some time off in February. What hard work, but the results-ahhh! Last summer I bought a bottle of wine from this vineyard back of our house. Have to try some day. The vineyard is Craite Paille, but the name (lieu dit-place called) is not used on the wine labels.

Working on the vines behind out house

Vines in Brochon

On Friday we went to Beaune for lunch. We took the train so we both could have wine with lunch. It is only a 20 minute train ride to Beaune. We ate lunch at the Caveau des Arches. What a wonderful lunch. The food was perfect (I have scallops with risotto for my main plate...it was heavenly-and sinful at the same time-so rich). A nice white wine from St Aubin, and it was a perfect meal (Keith had fish). Needed to walk a little after a lunch like that!! We had time before the next train back to Gevrey, so we walked around Beaune a little. And the sun was out now and then!
This week-end is the Saint-Vincent celebration ( patron saint of the vines). This year it is in Beaune, Nuits-Saint-Georges and Dijon. It is spread between the 3 villes to celebrate (and enlist more signatures) for the "Climats de Bourgogne" ... 50,000 signatures needed to apply for UNESCO( if you know french and want to apply to here: http://www.climats-bourgogne.com/fr/#/RejoindreLeComite). I should go and take some photos, but on Friday, Beaune had not done any fancy decorating for the event. A few signs up pointing the directions for wine tastings, somewhat surprising. I had thought they would have some decorations around the city.  But tourists will come and the tourists will drink.

Old Lavoir ( place to wash cloths)- on the right-Note that it is covered. 

Another Burgundian roof - Beaune

one of the towers in the ramparts of Beaune

This Sunday here in Gevrey is also the day that Saint-Vincent is celebrated. At 11am there was the mass. We went up to the church just after 11:30 so I could take photos of the statue of Saint-Vincent and the parade. The crowd started to gather (all those who did not go to mass) and wait for everyone to leave church. The noon bells rang and my feet were frozen. Finally they emerged from the church carrying Saint-Vincent. There was a small parade in a grand circle ( more or less around the block). Then all into cars to be continued in Brochon. The vigneron who keeps Saint-Vincent for the year invites everyone for a glass to celebrate ( a kir). So we followed and had our glass of Kir and sang the ban bourgognon. Below are a few photos.

Outside the Church with the statue

Gevrey's Saint-Vincent

Vigneron decorated _ outside his cave

OK I am going to try to load a short video of the parade just outside the cave of the vigneron in Brochon, with the band playing.  Tell me if it does not open well. This is the first time I have tried this. It is short, a small taste of life in a small village. For those who have been here, it is next or behind the SuperU (grocer).

                 

RECIPE OF THE MONTH

Chicken Soup

France is a nation of soups.  It is a cold day here in Gevrey and I was outside taking photos of the Saint-Vincent festivities. So I thought hot soup sounded like a good idea for tonight. Chicken soup is anything you want it to be...and can be used to to get rid of some leftovers. This is my version of chicken soup with left over Roasted Chicken. 

INGREDIENTS Left over chicken -from Roasted Chicken 1-2 carrots cut in small circles or half  circles (spoon size morsels) 1 branch of celery chopped 1 large onion chopped 1 Tablespoon olive oil 12 green beans cut into 1/2 inch pieces 2 tomato cubed (or a can of diced tomatoes) 3 medium potatoes cubed 1 Tablespoon parsley chopped fine 2 sprigs Thyme 1 bay leaf 2 chicken bouillon cubes** 1 small branch celery chopped into small pieces 6 cups water Salt and pepper to taste * You can add other vegetables also, be creative. Add some peas, or zucchini, or yellow summer squash. Or add rice instead of potatoes or use pasta noodles. Also  use what herbs or flavorings you like. Try something...today I added a tsp of cumin. ** Taste, depends on the broth you recoup from cooking the chicken

PREPARATION 1. Clean chicken and cut into petite morsels. Place in a bowl. 2. In large stove top pot, saute the onion and celery in olive oil 3. Add the drippings from the left over chicken** 4. Add 6 cups of water and chicken broth cubes. 5. Bring to a boil. Add thyme and bay leaf 6. Add cut chicken and cook over medium heat for 30 minutes. 7. Add all the vegetables and simmer another 30 minutes. This should reduce the liquid by about one third. 8. Taste and add salt and pepper to taste [this will depend on the saltiness of the bouillon cubes ]

Dec 2011

Dec 2010 Strasbourg...The white "moon" may be a rain drop

Happy Holidays

This is indeed a Merry Christmas for us.

Towards the end of October, the doctor had found a tumor on Keith's kidney. Two days later he had an appointment with the head of the department of Urology at the University hospital. Surgery was scheduled to remove Keith's right kidney on the 21st of November. It was a malignant tumor. Our emotions have been up and down and all over the place, as you can imagine, and it was all happening so fast.
He had the surgery, and we were assured that all went well. It was complicated and took 4 hours, but they said they got it all. Keith was in the hospital for one week, the care was excellent. He has been home three weeks and recovering. A bit impatient at times, and not happy by all the rain we have been getting ( not as easy for his little walk each day).
Today he had a return appointment. They removed all of the tumor (and all of the right kidney too). It had not metastasized, which is good. Today we were told that there is no reason for further treatment (yeah), just follow-up scans and blood tests. He will be followed closely.
So, I have been here taking care of Keith, and have not taken many photos, or done much else. I did go for a walk one day and took photos of some of the businesses near the train station. This is to document Gevrey, and not very interesting photos to post.
We did have a day of snow, Dec 19th. I woke up and all was white. Today it is raining again!

Dawn (aube) on the 19th of Dec-backyard

Why is it so dark?

As the sun shown on the Côte -again backyard. The sun did come out on the 19th!

As far as a Blog goes, it has been fairly boring month to write about.

I have to write about the show last night. It was young children in a cooking competition. There were 8 children to start. The first challenge: they all had the same box of ingredients, which included fois gras. They had to cook the fois gras and plate it, with the use of any of the other ingredients in their box. They all knew what to do!! Incredible. Two 11 year olds were finalist, a boy and a girl. They had to cook a dinner for 10 people with venison as the main ingredient.. The dinners prepared and plated by these two 11 year olds were amazing! They had the look of a Michelin three star restaurant! The little girl made cannelles with her mashed potatoes (using two spoons, make in the form of an oval) And the jury was blown away with the quality of the cooking. So I am certain that the future is there for France to continue to have outstanding cooking in the future.

Been making some soups for lunch though. So for this months recipe, lentil soup, quick and easy. Not really 3 star, but quick and easy.

Have a great holiday season.

Recipe of the month
Lentil Soup ( very easy-vegetarian or not)
Ingredients

• 8 oz prepared lentil
• 1 onion-chopped fine
• 1 cube of broth (1 cup) chicken or vegetable
• 1 tablespoon oil
• optional- cubed ham

I can buy lentils in a can that have carrots added, but not much else.

You can use dry lentils too, then add one carrot diced small (to cook fast)

PREPARATION

1. Saute onion in the oil
2. Add the lentils
3. Add the broth
4. Cook for 5 minutes ( if using dry lentils, add a little more broth and cook for 30 minutes)
5. If you add ham, add it at the end and warm another minute.

That is all. It is healthy and hardy winter soup in minutes.

November

Gevrey-Vines and the Côte (the vines of Clos de St Jacques)

Short Blog this month. I had started this note on hosting a dinner a few weeks ago, and that is going to be it for this month. There are other photos at the bottom too.


Having guests to dinner
Although there are informal dinners, most dinners here follow a more formal path.
Sharing food with friends is more than a 30 minute sit down.

To prepare a meal, first I make up my menu. What to serve for hors d'oeuvres, entree, principle plate, cheese course and dessert. Either plan the food and then the wine, or plan the wine and then the food. It must be a good marriage of the wine and food.

Now the shopping. I shop differently too. We do not have a butcher here in Gevrey, so I do buy my meat from the grocer. We do have a once a week market, so I could buy it there if having dinner on a Friday night. That said, I prefer to buy my vegetables in the market or at a store that specializes in fresh vegetables. Always local and always in season.
Cheese from the cheese store, wine from a good winery ( although it is probably been purchased at another time and is in our cave), and fresh bread from the bakery ( and which bakery is also important). So I make the rounds.
This is so different from my shopping in the US. One stop shop, and I bought everything. I had started to use Whole Foods when we lived in Minneapolis, they had a good cheese selection, and of course a good selection of other fresh food. And of course coming from Minnesota, wine always had to be bought at the Liquor Store.
Here one shop-stop is also possible, the big grocer has everything, including wine. But the quality is better at the bakery for instance than at the Super Marché ( here it is the Super U). Although it is a little more time spent making the rounds, I am satisfied with the quality and enjoy doing it.
The cultural importance of food is so different here. Not large quantities, but it is the quality that is so highly rated. Of course there are bad restaurants and bad cooks, no different than anywhere else. But food is so much part of the social experience. Lunches or dinners with friends can last anywhere from " hours to 12 hours( it is the large lunch that can last 12 hours).
I have taken photos this month, of fog (we had two weeks of nothing but  FOG) and of sun and of villages. I am leaving it here with the photos to follow.

Château of Gevrey in the fog with the vines

Church in Gevrey...in the fog

Building in Nuits St.Georges. Taken from the car
 while I waited for the red light. Kind of fun...

Near Villars Fountaine ..in the FOG

Messanges

Beaune, taken again from the car(blurred foreground)..workers in the vines

Sunny day at last, and mushrooms all over

house in gevrey...original was sharp? why isn't this one?

Sunny fall day, vines of Gevrey

Same day, more vines



Gevrey in the late afternoon

October 2011

Gevrey

It is a cloudy grey day here in Gevrey. Just had a little mist fall around lunch time. Last night was the time to turn the clocks back one hour. It will take a day or so to change my internal clock. I can easily go through the house and put all of our clocks to the right time, but it takes a little more to change my head.

Not a lot to say this month, but plenty busy. I took photos, so more of the story in photos than words.

Entrance to the spring

My History/Heritage club ( Histoire et Patrimoine) picked another spring (source) to clean this year. It is located in the Combe Lavaux which is nowt a nature reserve. So we had to wait for the right time to go in and tramp around, so we would not kill certain plants that bloom in the summer. Two of the employees that work for the Reserve came with us. The entrance was totally overgrown with vines.  Actually there are two entrances. The first path was overgrown also. Then you arrive at a circular clearing, that is full of water in the summer. Since it had been dry during the month of September, it had grass and was muddy.
We were told to start at the first entrance and clear a path 2 meters wide. There were about 12 of us, plus the two young men in charge of our group. When this was cleared, we started on the path to the spring.
We worked steady for about 3 hours. Hacking away, cutting, and hauling all of the debris out to the truck.

The spring path

After we finished clearing it out ( we started at 9am) we went over to the hunters cabin for our lunch (picnic). Everyone brought food and something extra to share. So in good french style we started with some Crémant and apertifs ( I made a "cake"-french apertif with ham and olives and cheese)...and there were gougeres and other snacks. Then we sat down to lunch with our sandwiches and all  of the salads that had been prepared and were passed around, and of course...wine. Then on to the cheese plate with bread and a nice Gevrey-Chambertin rouge, and then followed by many, many desserts ( apple tart, chocolate tart, chocolate cake, caramel chocolate tart, and some healthy clementines too)!!! A typical french picnic.

The muddy clearing

I returned home at 4 in the afternoon. I was tired, full to the brim, and very content. It was a fun day, even though it started to rain during lunch, we were nice and dry and having a good time.

Everyone working

Finally see the spring

Here it is DRY as a bone

One Sunday morning Dijon was having a different marché (market). It was to be produce directly from the farm. I decided to go in and see what they had to offer. I probably have mentioned that Dijon is under construction for the new tramway (to be finished the end of 2012). Below is a photo of the main road from the train station into Dijon. What a mess. Impossible to drive in Dijon, and not that easy to walk!!

all torn up for the new tram- train station at the end of the road

The market was OK, but small. Lots and lots of cheese, but we had some cheese at home. I was looking for fruits and vegetables, and unfortunately they did not have any.  But I walked around and took some photos as usual . I like horses. The horses in the photo are horses from the Auxois (oh swah- burgundian "x" is pronounced more like an "s"). Look at the size of those feet!!

Mosaic on the Post Office building 

I have always liked the post office building, and on this day I had my little camera with the zoom. I took a photo of the mosaic. Isn't he interesting. Remember the coq (rooster) is the symbol of France.

Art Nouveau

And next to the post office is a Art Deco or Art Nouveau building I have always liked. It is interesting to walk around on a Sunday morning because there is hardly anyone around. 

Again back to my club, we had a meeting about some changes that are going to be made on the Place de Chateau. So I snapped a couple of photos. Gorgeous fall day and I wanted to take advantage of the color and light.

chateau

Church in Gevrey

I am trying to get a photo of the interior of the church in Fixin, but it has been locked. So I took this photo of the church and it's bell tower. Note the great tiled roof in real Burgundian style.

St Martin in Fixin

That same Sunday I went to a recital in Magny lès Villers with Marie Thérèse. A woman from the area has studied opera and was putting on this recital...a debut of sorts. She has a strong voice, and maybe not ready for the Met yet, but surprisingly good. I was not sure what to expect, but ended up very pleased. She sang some of the opera favorites too. Small petite woman with a strong voice. The recital was in the small church of the village.

Panel at the front of the church

This last Sunday Keith thought we should go to Flavigny (where Chocolat was filmed). They were having a flea market and more. It was a spectacular day, so why not! Hmm, one reason, the crowds. Lots of other people had the same idea as us. The road leading into the village has no turnoffs. Traffic came almost to a stand still about 3 km from the village. No other choice but to sit and slowly move along at a snails pace. Some people pulled over and walked. They kept about even with our car and even gained a little. Parking was in a field outside of the village. We walked in only to find that the village was full of visitors...not much of a surprise after seeing the field full of cars...oh well. I took a few photos, and then we left for a nice drive through the countryside and home (Flavigny is about 1 hour from Gevrey).

Color of the village

some entertainment

looking at Flavigny from a distance

And what has Keith been up too. His has been restoring an old bicycle. He believes it is about 100 years old.
He took it out for a short ride the other day, now that it has wheels. However, this old bike has no brakes!!

Great job...isn't it. Looks spiffy

Happy Halloween

Recipe of the Month

I am going to cheat a little here. Since I mentioned preparing “cake”, I am going to repeat my recipe for cake. It is sooo..oo good though. Although I love to put lots and lots of things into my cake, it does make it hard to cut into slices. If I want to have nice slices, I cut back on all the added goodies ( i.e olives, peppers, ham…). You have to leave enough batter around to have clean cut slices. So pack it up and deal with it, or cut back by almost half.

INGREDIENTS

• 4 eggs
• 1 2/3 cups plain white flour
• 2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/3 cup olive oil
• 2 tablespoons butter, melted
• 3/4 cup cream or crème fraîche
• 1 1/2 cups pitted green olives or pitted black olives (chopped or whole)
• 1 1/2 cups gruyère or emmental cheese, grated, cubed or combination ( i.e.: 1 cup grated and 1 cup cut in cubes )
• 2 oz of chopped ham
• Salt & pepper 

PREPARATION

1. Heat oven to 400°F.
2. In a bowl beat the eggs until pale yellow and frothy.
3. Stir in flour, baking powder, olive oil, melted butter, and milk.
4. Chop the ham, cube the cheese and slice the olives.
5. Stir in ham, cheese, olives, salt and pepper to taste.
6. Pour into greased bread tin, loaf tin or cake pan (11 x 4 inches would be a good size).
7. Bake for about 50 minutes, or until golden brown. (check with knife, insert and done when knife comes out clean)