Heralds of love – or death – or Autumn ?

Our friend and neighbour Claire came round recently with a basket of wild mushrooms which she and her brother had collected from the forest above the village. They were slaty-grey tubes, almost black, and mixed with bits of leaf, bark and vibrant green moss.

“They’re ‘Trompettes de la mort’”, announced Claire, but just in case we were worried about such an alarming name she assured us that she and her brother, an expert in identifying wild mushrooms, had eaten some the day before. She was living proof that they were the real McCoy. To the untrained English ear the rather sinister name could be mistaken for ‘Trompettes de l’amour’ and maybe this is a more appropriate name for such a precious gift. I was very touched not only that she should be so generous in sharing them with us but also that she’d tried them first before giving some to us!

The next day I sorted out some of the trompettes from the moss, bark and leaves and gave them a quick wash and dry in the salad spinner. Purists would probably be horrified by this but they needed a light wash to get rid of the smaller bits of the forest floor and I couldn’t think of a better way of drying them. Once I’d done that I sautéed a couple of shallots in some butter and added the mushrooms, but as I was lightly turning them in the butter over a low heat I spotted an ominous small grey blob and had to remove the whole lot from the pan very quickly.

Ten minutes later, I’d inspected each trumpet and cooking continued. The moral of the story so far is that the fine tubes of the trumpets make great hiding places for little slugs so if you don’t want to make your guests really think you’re trying to poison them, slit each one open and inspect very carefully.

I kept all this hidden from Jonathan – quite an achievement given that while all this was going on he was with me in the kitchen making his speciality omelettes to go with the mushrooms.

I was very surprised that he’d been so enthusiastic when Claire came bearing her gift as up to now he’d been adamant that any fungus which didn’t come from a supermarket was by definition a toadstool. So I knew any additional protein in his lunch would cause a wobble which might wipe any wild food off the menu for ever.

Once this little hurdle had been overcome I stirred the now-certified-vegetarian trumpets lightly in the butter for a few minutes before adding chopped parsley.

After our lunch, I thought about what to do with the rest of the lovely trompettes. Googling ‘preserving wild mushrooms’ gave me a few options and I decided that of these, open-freezing (sans limaces) gave me the most flexibility for their future use (and also gave me the chance to try out the nifty little tray which came with our new fridge-freezer).

This googling revealed some other useful information about trompettes de la mort. According to l’internaute.com they should start appearing in October and are at their best in November and December. So in this year of decidedly weird weather maybe they’re really trumpeting that Autumn is here.

Jonathan’s a champion….. and Sarah reaches the play-offs

After weeks of rain, the sun finally came out so everyone was in a party mood for the village’s 14^th July celebrations.

Being a small village of around 200 people, the day’s events are far from elaborate and hardly vary from year to year, but this simplicity, and the opportunity the activities present for meeting old and new friends makes them very enjoyable.

Everything starts at 11.00 with a brief ceremony at the war memorial, this year in the presence of some of the local pompiers in their ceremonial uniforms complete with silver helmets as well as the marching band from the next village. This was followed by kir and brioche in the village hall after which all the sensible French people retire for a leisurely family lunch. We, on the other hand, went for a bike ride.

The main activities start in the late afternoon – fishing games and a merry-go-round for the children, a mobile rifle range and, of course a bar, for the adults. Most attention, though, focuses on the two skittles alleys, one run by members of the town council and the other by the sports and leisure committee. The former is free and everyone can have one attempt to win a prize. Mind you, there’s no ‘run’ as such on this one – it’s set up on the road so the rough surface and patches of gravel add an element of surprise to the trajectory of the rough wooden balls. The committee’s alley is more sophisticated – it has a reasonably smooth wooden run and a rickety metal chute down which the balls are returned for the next player’s turn. There’s a charge for playing skittles on this one with the euros not used for the attractive prizes going into the sports and leisure funds.

Jonathan spent quite a long time studying tactics before attempting either of the runs himself. ‘Make your balls go diagonally’ he told me after watching one villager powering his shots arrow-straight along the wooden run and right between the skittles, ‘that way you’re more likely to knock down several with one ball’. As anyone who’s ever seen me play skittles at the Elephant and Castle will know, this sounds remarkably hopeful, so I was very surprised when towards the end of the afternoon one of the village councillors asked me to have another go at the ‘free’ alley. It turns out I was in the ladies’ third place playoffs! I got through the first round but inevitably got beaten by Mme Hargé who has much more experience!

Jonathan was more successful – he won the men’s third place play-offs at the more sophisticated alley and he’s now the proud owner of an electric circular saw. He’s very happy he came third because he wanted the saw far more than an electric coolbox or a coffee machine which were the first and second prizes. He even got into the local paper with his fellow-winners, Francois (whose wife knocked me out) and Michel.

After all this excitement there was still the lantern procession to the fireworks to look forward to but there was enough time before it got dark for something to eat from the barbeque accompanied by champagne served in what looked like overgrown shot glasses at 2 Euros a go.

It was a balmy evening so it was inevitable that we returned to the outdoor bar after the fireworks. As we sipped more of that rather good Champagne we ruminated with Monique and Bernard; the English have their fireworks in November when they celebrate a revolution thwarted and a monarch safe and sound and the French celebrate the reverse at a much better time of the year. What does that say about our two great nations? And isn’t it a shame that there’s no longer a bar in the village!

Up to our necks in courgettes

May and June whizzed by and the poor blog has been neglected. It’s not that there isn’t lots to write about – rather that there aren’t enough hours in the day. Yet when our friends from England ask me what I do with my time, I struggle to come up with a credible answer. Whatever I am doing, it’s certainly not sitting on the terrace with a good book; I have less time for reading now than I did when I was a commuter!

The reality is that I’ve spent most of my time over the last month or so, whenever it’s not been raining and even sometimes when it has, either in the garden or at my vegetable plot. Whatever the venue, the agenda has been the same – waging war on the slugs and weeds which have been doing so well in the warm damp weather or planting the backlog of seedlings which have been growing faster than I’ve been able to keep up with them.

I’ve just about caught up now and we’re starting to see some results, mostly in the form of monster courgettes (in the picture that’s a dinner plate, not a saucer!). With all this rain it feels like a game of vegetable grandmother’s footsteps – no sooner do I turn my back than they grow another 5cm.

Given Jonathan declared early on in our relationship that he didn’t like courgettes, this has been a bit of a challenge! I daren’t tell him that there’s a very fine line between a large courgette and a small marrow, because while he will eat courgettes as long as they’re well disguised, he won’t allow even a molecule of marrow to pass his lips.

A couple of weeks ago I was able to give the odd monster or two away, but now everyone’s in the same boat (and if you don’t believe me, google ‘courgette glut’ for enlightenment); my neighbour declined my offer of some more courgettes at the bread van last Friday.

There’s nothing for it but to seek out every palatable courgette recipe I can find and then freeze the surplus!

If you’re in the same predicament, my list of courgette recipes from the past week or so (plus a few I’m planning) might give you some inspiration:

• Courgette and Brie soup (made with our local cheese, Langres, rather than Brie) from The new Covent Garden soup company’s (first) book of soups

• Antonio Carluccio’s Sedani (a type of pasta) with courgettes and walnuts from BBC.co.uk’s recipe section. This is a dream ticket recipe as it sorts out more than one glut – we’re still eating last year’s walnuts and this year’s are already swelling on the tree!

• Petites (that’s a joke) courgettes farcis from Joanne Harris and Fran Ward’s ‘The French Market’

• Courgette and cheese gratin from Marks and Spencer’s ‘France – the food and the lifestyle’

• Pretty much everything from the courgette section of Sarah Raven’s recent ‘Garden Cookbook’ (published just when I was in the direst need and my current favourite). We particularly like the courgette risotto, courgette and dill farfalle and the courgette and lemon salad.

• I never go for more than a few days without cooking something from Nigel Slater’s ‘The Kitchen Diaries’ and his zucchini cakes with dill and feta are especially good (though I sometimes use French ewe’s cheese rather than feta). I have no doubts about this being my desert island book!

• I’ve also designs on the courgette and tomato pie and the broad bean and courgette pasta sauce recipes from Anna Ross’ ‘Green Cuisine’. The latter of these is another dream ticket recipe as the broad bean pods are also looking rather threatening!

So bring on those broad beans!