A great fountain in Aix that had a special golden light as the sun set.

Peach Melba (Poached peaches with raspberry sauce.)

Sometimes the best tasting recipes are the simplest. I find this especially true with French recipes-just a few ingredients but, oh, so special. At a recent dinner with a French couple I decided to have Peach Melba for dessert. The French aren’t huge at giving compliments but this dessert sure got them. They said that the best dessert on a hot summer night is one with fruit. I wish I had remembered to take a photo as it is a truly lovely dessert.

Peach Melba

4 cups water
1/4 cup sugar
1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise
3 large peaches
For the raspberry sauce:
1 pound fresh or frozen raspberries
1 Tab. lemon juice
3 Tab. sugar
3 Tab raspberry liquer (optional)
vamilla ice cream, to serve
mint leaves, to decorate

In a saucepan large enough to hold the peach halves in a single layer, combine the water, sugar and vanilla bean. Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring occasionally to dissolve the sugar.
Cut the peach in half and twist the halves to separate them and remove the peach pits. Add the peach halves to the poaching syrup, cut side down, adding more water if needed to cover the fruit. Press a piece of was paper against the surface of the syrup, reduce the heat to medium-low, then cover and simmer for 15 minutes until tender. Remove the pan from the heat and let the peaches cool in the syruph. (I didn’t have wax paper. In fact I can’t remember the last time I did, so I just used foil.)
Remove the peaches from the syrup and peel off the skins. Place on several thicknesses of paper towels to drain. Then chill.
Put the raspberries, lemon juice and sugar in a food processor and process for 1 minute with metal blade. Press the liquid through a fine strainer into a small bowl. Add liquer and chill.
To serve, place a peach half, cut side up on a dessert plates, fill with a scoop of vanill ice cream and spoon the raspberry sauce over the ice cream. Decorate with mint leaves.

It is a great looking dessert with the bright red sauce flowing over the ice cream and the orange tinged peach. So nice when it is hot and a really lovely mix of flavors.

Castle in Tarascon on the banks of the Rhone.

Tarascon, a city lying on the Rhone River in western Provence, is the home of a fun festival celebrating two occurences at once with a lively parade ending at the lovely Hotel de Ville.
According to legend, Saint Martha, in the year 48, travelled up the Rhone and arriving at Tarascon, found that the villagers were being terrorized by a "dragon" from the river. They begged Saint Martha to rid them of this monster. Miraculously tamed by the Saint, the animal was delivered to the crowd and stoned to death. Every year for centuries, Tarascon has celebrated this victory during the Fetes de la Tarasque instituted by King Rene in 1474. The Tarasque is depicted being dragged along by the triumphant Chevaliers, known and Tarascaires.

A sculpture of Saint Martha in the local church.

In the crypt of the church is the mausoleum of Saint Martha from the 4th century

Mausoleum of Saint Martha

Model of the “monster”, Tarasque.

Tarasque being pushed down the street, wildly from side to side, and, hopefully, you won’t get knocked over as it looked rather out of control.

The parade also celebrated Tartarin of Tarascon from the works of Alphonse Daudet, a loud and boastful braggart, who brags about being a hunter. Forced to leave for Africa, he returns to Tarascon, telling tales of his extraordinary expoits with great triumph.

Here he is, having just stepped off a boat on the river amid much gun fire with his friends.

Many participants in lovely costumes who also did dances as they marched in the parade.

I especially liked the group of men with their “horses”.

At the end of the parade, Tartarin gave a speech from the balcony of the Hotel de Ville.

Another great festival celebrated not only all over France but all of Europe as well is the celebration of St Jean Day. Originally it was a pagan festival to celebrate the summer soltice but has now become a religious festival which celebrates St Jean, or John the Baptist, whose birthday falls on the same day. Fires are lit all over Europe and, as they burn down, dances are done around the bonfire and some brave people jump over the fire to bring good luck, fertility or marriage into their lives.
I attended the St Jean festival in Aix. It was very well done and enjoyable to watch. A flame was actually carried in Olympic Games fashion from Catelonia, Spain.

The jogger enters the square carrying the flame. It is then used to light candles inside lanterns of people representing other cities around the area. A representative from Spain was also there and gave a short speech.

A small procession of some of the participants in the festival. With the celebration of the summer soltice, there is a focus on wheat and the hope for a good harvest at the end of the summer.

Could this be Cezanne? They are celebrating the anniversary of his 100th birthday in Aix this summer.

A performance celebrating wheat and its harvesting was then done on the Rotunde, the location of a huge, gorgeous fountain in the center of a round about. It was so nice to be able to stand there without traffic roaring around. These children are spreading the seeds of wheat.

A dance done by what looked like professional dancers-they had bells around their ankles.

An intricate dance done with arches of wheat and flowers.

One end of the wreaths were put into one pot and then they circled around in dance.

I didn’t get any more good photos as dark decended. A bonfire was lit and more dancing occured. It was all, in a word, charming.

Our Santalina is blooming with little yellow flowers, the Lavender with lovely purple flowers and our garden is alive with the buzzing and the business of insects. I often sit outside and just watch this private little world and I often think of my Aunt Lois who told me that if she could contact me after she died it would be through butterflies. I don’t know if she has but I always think of her as I watch the activity in the garden. I wrote this little fable for my grandchildren. Of course, butterflies aren’t all female and the bees aren’t males, but it works for me.

A French Garden Fable

My story of the butterfly and the bee is similar to the grasshopper and the ant. The butterfly is a princess, Princess Priscilla, who only gets out of bed when the sun is well up as she was up late at a ball the night before. She doesn’t hurry to the garden but takes her time powdering her nose and deciding which hair style will look the best with her tiara. She then picks out her most beautiful gown in a breathtaking color to wear(and matching shoes) for the day where, flitting and twirling around above the flowers, sometimes exchanging a merry pirouette with a friend, she will look her best. She only stops dancing to sip herbal tea from the cup of a flower, with honey of course, from time to time to quench her thirst and perhaps have a nibble of a lavender cookie. Her only aim in life is to look pretty and enjoy life.
Burt, the business bee, is dressed in a stripped business suit with a tightly tied serious tie around his neck and a shiny bowler hat on his head. If he owned a company it would rival Microsoft, but his work is making honey. The word of the day, every day, for him is work and he is up out of bed and hard at work as soon as the sun comes up. No time to dawdle around doing any dances. “We have to gather nectar to make honey for our hive.” If he stops to do a dance with another bee, it could mean the hive wouldn’t have enough honey for them all. He looks at the butterfly princess with a frown. “What a waste of time,” he thinks. “The next thing you know, they will let those girly butterflies play golf at the country club.” Nothing can tempt him away from the job at hand.
The butterfly has a shorter time on earth than the bee. Maybe this has given her the desire to love life, laugh and to dance because she doesn’t have to worry about surviving the winter.

Nothing Can Capture Your Heart Like a Melody Can…Isn’t this a great line? It comes from an old album by Abba, the popular singing group from the 70’s. Like many people, I rediscovered them when I saw the musical, Mama Mia. I have a little IPod that I’ve copied music to, including the sound tract of Mama Mia. Every morning I get my rapidly expanding butt out to walk and the only way I can stand it is to listen to music. I often sing along with the music and have had heads suddenly pop up from behind a hedge to see who is making that racket.
There is a huge mountain behind me, part of the Luberon Mountain range, and I chug up it huffing and puffing. The best part is turning around and heading downhill back to our home. Then I have more breath for singing.

“Thank you for the music, the song I’m singing.
Thanks for all the joy you’re bringing,
Who can live without it? I ask in all honesty
What would life be- without a song or a dance what are we?
So I say, Thank you for the music,
(here I throw my arms wide)
For giving it to meeeeeeee!”

This is when I get surprised from behind by one of the many bikers on the road who give me a curious look-this loony singer walking down the hill.

Some photos of an interesting village deep in lavender country called Simaine de la Rotund:

A Transhumance Festival is a great way to look at life as it was in times past, something that most festivals in France do. My husband and I made the trip deep into Lavender country to the village of Riez to observe the transhumance, when sheep (and goats and cows in some areas) are moved from lower country up into the mountains passing through villages on the way. Nowadays, due to heavy traffic and cities not wanting sheep passing through their streets, sheep are transported up to the fields of the mountains with huge trucks. I saw one the other day stuffed with sheep and little lambs in a container at the very bottom.
Times have changed in the containment of sheep in fields as well. At one time a shepherd and his dog had to watch over the flock at all times. Now there are fences that are charged with a light electrical current and one of the flock wears a special collar that keeps it and the others from trying to leave the area.
The Transhumance in Riez is mostly a tourist happening, I would guess, but rather thrilling nonetheless. The bells of the church ring out at 10:30 and shortly afterwards a shepherd and his dog make their way down the street followed by hundreds of sheep. The sheep huddle together, not moving onto the sidewalks, afraid of the people lined up to see them. After they have gone through the village, they end up in a field on the other side of the village with old Roman columns eagerly eating the fresh grass.

The shepherd leading his flock into the village.

All of the sheep were marked with a painted green C on their backs. I think this ram-the only one in the flock-didn’t like the color as he had the paint all over his horns and face.

Riez has a wonderful little market going on on Sundays selling articles from Provence, such as lavender oil and soap and olive oil. There were also some men from the Alps playing their long horns and then some women dressed in traditional costumes did some dancing to flutes and drums. It was a delightful look at a part of life now gone but not forgotten.

The men playing their Alpine horns, the Alphorn.

The women dancing.

A look at a lavender field. The lavender is just starting to bloom. It will be a couple of weeks before it is fully alive with its divine fragrance and color.

The dirt finally had all settled and it was time to cover the horrible grass with large tile. I had wanted to use these large flat stones that I have seen around yards in Provence but they turned out to be very expensive so we went with regular sqaure tiles. I was also thinking of matching the tile already on our porch but Mrs. M., the lady who helped us with the landscaping, said we should go with a lighter color matching the pool’s edging. After she saw the finished work she said it was ok, as long as we were happy, whatever that meant. The man who did the work actually worked on his week vacation. He usually does something with large machines. He is a dark mahagony color due to his time in the sun and when he started in the mornings had on a t-shirt, hat and shorts. By noon he was in a bathing suit, and by the afternoon, the bathing suit had been turned into a bikini and a thong. Kind of yucky to look out there and see his butt and I was afraid to take a photo and have him turn around and see me doing so. In any case, he did a good job and we are happy with the results. Probably in January we will put in a little cabana.

One view of the tile.

The view from up above. The square area to the left is where the cabana will be. Note the bushes covered with yellow flowers, genet. It blooms in late spring and has an incredible odor rather like Jasmine. When you walk outside the air is filled with the fragrance.

The Swimming Pool is the title of a rather steamy French movie. Alot of it is in English so you don’t have to spend your time reading subtitles. There is nudity and sex as there often is in French films and it gives you a look at some wonderful Provencal scenery.
So, as we were building our house, we also installed a swimming pool-no nudity or sex involved. It was a frustrating as building a house, really, with people not showing up to do work and some things having to be done over. In the end we got our pool. It was built with elevated walls that had to be surrounded by dirt to make it level with the house and we had to wait two years before we could do anything with the area around the pool as we had to wait for everything to settle. We have finally just finished putting in tile-they don’t do kool decking here as in the States that I have seen. I thought I would post photos of the whole process. It was interesting to go back and look at our yard as we landscaped it over two years. We really have done alot. We also have alot left to do.

The hole for the deep end was dug. There also had to be two support beams put in on the end so the pool wouldn’t slide down the hill.

Shape of pool made and lined with gravel.

The sides of the pool put in.

View from the shallow end.

Another view.

Finally they filled it all in with dirt.

We fill the pool with water.

Maurice trying the pool out and looking at the view.

I just add this because I thought it was interesting that this guy could take a nap after lunch anywhere. I think the workers got up really early to make the trip up to our house.

More to follow.

Decorating in not my gift. I know what I like when I see it, I love looking at decorating magazines, I tear out pictures of rooms that I like and, still, my house never looks like anything I imagine. We started with all white walls except for the kitchen and the living room which are a pale yellow. After Maurice’s son told us that our home looked like a museum-the little sh*t- I decided I needed to add a little more color to the walls here and there. I would, of course, do much more if we had unlimited money, but such is not the case, so I do things here and there as money, and my energy level, is available.
The first wall I painted was in our dining room. I bought some special powder mined from the area around the neat little village of Roussillon from which ochre color first came, mixed it with a product they also sold there and dabbed it on a wall with a sponge. It was screamingly bright gold and I wasn’t sure I liked it but it certainly brightened up the place and I like it now.

Here it is. It is actually a little lighter than this photo shows. I have a mirror on the floor leaning against the wall waiting either to be hung or placed on top of a piece of furniture, if we ever find one. I see photos all of the time in magazines of paintings leaning against walls so I figure I am right in style.
Next was the bathroom. Well, actually it is just a little room with a toilet and small sink called a water closet in England. Here in France they often have the toilet in a separate little room. The main problem, from my point of view, is that there isn’t a vent for heating or cooling in there and it can get chilly in the winter. There is a window if you should want to ventilate. Anyway, I decided I should add some color here. I used the method of crumbling up sheets of tissue paper, smoothing them out, and then painting the wall, placing the tissue paper on the painted portion and then painting on top of that. It looks rather cool, like leather, but you can see the lines where the pieces meet. I later read about tearing the paper into pieces and gluing them to the wall and then painting. I think that might have been more interesting but, oh well.

So here it is. I thought the color was way too powerful-I tend to be cautious and meek when painting walls-but I like it now. We had to add the yellow tile above the sink. Below the sink are ugly bare pipes so I painted them blue as well. I need to add another coat of paint but ran out. Paint costs a fortune here so I don’t know if I will. I also found out, after I painted one whole wall, that I was supposed to have added water to the paint-lack of communication from Maurice and my lack of French and not reading directions.
So, I’ve used up my decorating energy-and money-for now. My next step is getting more curtains in the living room and adding some color with valences but I’m not sure when that will be.

Cherry Clafoutis

It is cherry season here in Provence and I love it, cherries being one of my favorite fruits. We have a neighbor with two huge cherry trees and every summer he begs us to come over and pick cherries as he can’t use them all. We, of course, accept his offer. This is the first time I can actually eat all of the cherries I want. I eat so many that I make myself sick. We come home with bags so full of the fruit that the ones on the bottom get smashed.
So, what to do with all of those cherries? A friend was here last year and made duck breast with cherry sauce which was great and easy so I did that again this summer. I must say that it is an extremely messy meal to make. Duck has a huge amount of fat and makes a big mess of the stove and cherries, oh my. I learned to wear rubber gloves so I don’t have purple fingers and nails, to wear an apron so I don’t stain whatever I am wearing and to put the bowl and pits in the sink and do the whole operation there as the juice gets everywhere.
I used this to pit the cherries, a handy little devise, but it only get the pits out about 50% of the time and I have to manually get the pit out.

I filled a bowl with the cherries. I did a much larger bowl a few days earlier to make cherry jam but I decided to make a simple dessert called:

Cherry Clafoutis

Which turns out to be a kind of pudding.
The ingredients:
1 pound ripe cherries
2 Tbsp Kirch or lemon juice-I used orange liquor
1 Tbsp sugar
3 Tbsp flour
3 Tbsp sugar
3/4 cup milk
2 eggs
grated zest of 1/2 lemon
1/4 tsp vanilla extract

Pit the cherries-by the way, the French often don’t pit the cherries as they are supposed to add more flavor to the dessert but I find it a lot of work to eat it that way. Mix the cherries with the Kirsch and sugar and set aside for an hour. I only let it set about 30 minutes. Also the recipe called for a Tblsp of confectioner’s sugar which I didn’t have so I just used regular.
Prehaeat oven to 375 degrees. Butter a shallow ovenproof dish. The photo in my cookbook shows a cute oval dish but I only have a glass pie dish.
Sift the flour into a bowl (I never do this), add the sugar and slowly whisk in the milk until smoothly blended. Add the eggs, lemon zest, nutmeg and vanilla extract and whisk until well combined and smooth.
Scatter the cherries evenly in the baking dish.

Pour over the batter and bake for 40 to 45 minutes until set and puffed around the edges.

Before baking

After baking.

It is a very easy dessert to make and I love the combination of cherries, lemon zest and vanilla. I got compliments from some French people on this dessert so I guess I did it right.

There was a wonderful brocante in the Marais last week-end. I always see things that I love and want to buy but usually can’t afford them. It was a huge brocante spread out over several streets and it was a lovely day to be out in the sun looking at it all.

I especially liked this little statue but it was way out of my price range.

I didn’t even ask the price of this Louis Vuitton umbrella but I sure did like it.

Remember when suitcases were made of leather and had no wheels? Remember flying on a plane dressed up in your Sunday best, complete with hat and gloves? I do.

I wasn’t interested in these helmets but I like the humor of the display.

At last, something I can afford. These bowls are very collectable and in great colors.

The small arch du triumph at the entrance to the Tuleries Garden opposite the Louvre Pyramid. If you walk through the garden you reach Place de la Concorde. Keep walking and you are on the Champs Elysees and finally to the Arch du Triumph. They are all perfectly lined up. La Defense, a business complex, is also lined up with a modern Arch in a square shape.

Glimpses of the Eiffel Tower are everywhere in Paris. This one is from the Tuleries Garden.

A view of the Louvre Museum from the other side of the Petit Arch du Triumph.

Inside the Louvre is Winged Victory. I think the setting of this sculpture is the most breath-taking in the museum. I always picture Audrey Hepburn coming around the statue dress in a stunning red dress going down the stairs telling Fred Astaire to take her picture in the movie Daddy Longlegs.

There are always artists from a class on certain days copying masterpieces. This lady was one of the better ones I have seen.

On the second floor of the Richlieu wing is an interesting view of the Pyramid. In the summer you can sit out on the terrace.

I’m back. Sorry about the absence. Sometimes there are glitches that you can’t do anything about until the week-end is over.
Anyway, here are some photos of a great day I had in Paris.

One of the entrances to the Louvre Museum.

I love this view of the pyramid from the entrance leading into the square.

A view looking down into a courtyard which was covered when the pyramid was contstructed. The four figures were once around a fountain.

The fountains haven’t been working for over a year. Some of them still aren’t. I think the pyramid looks best when there is water is the ponds. The duck likes it too.

This is the view towards the Tuleries gardens with the pyramid at my back. The little hedge surrounds the top of the inverted pyramid of The Da Vinci Code fame.

Some more photos from my first sunny day in Paris.

A row of pots filled with lavender running down my favorite line of columns at Palais Royal.

They also had pots of various plants, mainly rose bushes, with close up photos of the flower.

Conceptual art in the Palais Royal. When I first saw it I didn’t like it, much like the pyramid at the Louvre, but I like it now, especially the way people interact with it.

One of the typical metro entrances seen in Paris.

It was finally sunny this morning in Paris-I’m here for a short visit-so I got out to take some photos.

Near the Louvre Museum is this view of the Garnier Opera House at the end of a boulevard-the kind that Hausmann, that great urban designer, was so fond of.

This is a metro entrance in Place Colette near the Palais Royal made of hand blown glass from Murano, Italy.

Close-up of the glass.

A restaurant on Place Colette that is a great place to sit in the sun.

They are celebrating flowers and gardens in Paris right now and my favorite fountains in Palais Royal are surrounded by flowers and lavender.