When the harvest ends

Vendanges is coming to an end, the pickers are leaving, and our beautiful region is falling quiet again.

The presses (pressoir) are falling silent. These enormous 12,000 kg pneumatic presses at Champagne Bonet will be completely cleaned and shut down until next year.

But the process isn’t finished, as the juice extracted from the grapes must now be turned into wine, the first stage of its transformation into Champagne. The juice is rich and sugary, bursting with fruit, but it’s sensible not to drink too much of it, because it’s not very friendly on your tummy!

Champagne bonet produce juice on an industrial scale, to be shipped to one of the big houses in Épernay, and the scale is truly magnificent.

But they also make their own, more artisan Champagnes, and some wines in another part of their domaine.

This smaller production begins with a focus on quality, with a selection process that allows only the best grapes through.

Small, temperature controlled vats see the first fermentation begin, whilst new oak casks will carry a small proportion of the wine for careful blending later into their fine champagne range.

It’s an amazing sight to see, and we never turn down an opportunity to visit a Champagne house. There’s still so much to learn.

A grand Day out

After three years in France I still don’t have my permanent social security number, so some French friends of ours kindly offered to support us on another visit to the CPAM office, where my paperwork is being processed.

We decided to get there early, and luckily did not have to wait too long before we were able to see someone. This someone though immediately tried to send us away, as we had not made an appointment. For the last 3 years, that has never been an issue, but next week they are changing the system and appointments (RDV) are required. Our friend JM carefully explained our situation in French, and advised the lady of the name of the gentleman who had been dealing with our case previously. Although she wasn’t keen to pursue it, she kindly went into the back offices to see if there was anything that could be done. Thankfully, the chap was there and he agreed to meet with us.

We were now further than we’d ever been before, as we were invited into a room around the back of the reception desks. After a lot of chatter, and tapping on the keyboard, he said he may have good news. Apparently it was my birth certificate that was the problem, as it is one of the long versions, larger than A4, and it had not all been scanned. It seemed this was what had held up my application. I’m sure that was one of many reasons, but it was perhaps the last one…maybe. There was a lot more tapping of computer keys, and then he stated, in almost perfect English, “You now have your permanent number”. Wow! Such a small thing you would think, but it’s taken three years to get this far

He printed off the confirmation and explained what would happen next. We needed to be patient for a few weeks more, when he would call us to tell me my code to access the Ameli.fr website so that I can set up my actual carte vitale. So let’s be patient and see what happens. Hoorah for JM!

It was such a gorgeous day, and now we were also all relieved that things were moving ahead, so we headed into Troyes city centre for a wander around the shops, have a delicious coffee and a super delicious lunch to celebrate.

All in all a grand day out.

Apple pie

I was given some more apples this week from a friend. I shared some of my plums and plum jam for quite a lot of apples, about three bags of them.

I’ve been able to cut some up to freeze them uncooked, to make some apple pie or tarte tatin another time. I’ve also made some plum and apple jam, which is a gorgeous red colour. Hilda, my mother in law, gave me this idea. The apples give it a tartness, which I love and also some structure. I used equal quantities of plum to apples.

I’ve also cooked some apples down and frozen them, ready for some winter apple crumbles.

The last thing I’d like to make is some apple jelly, which I shall try and do tomorrow. It’s not something I’ve done before, so we’ll have to see how it turns out.

Well oiled

We took a walk around the village this afternoon, where vendanges is in full swing and it’s great to see the activity.

There is a pressoir in the centre of the village, and we were invited in to see the two new presses which had been installed. The grapes are loaded from a platform into the top of each of the pneumatic presses. A balloon inside carefully expands and presses the juice from the grapes.

The juice is first rested in tanks, to get rid of any initial, settling sediment, then pumped into the vats to ferment.

The grape skins and stalks are collected in hoppers, and then sent away to be made into alcohol for other uses, such as medicines or cosmetics.

The boxes, used to collect the grapes and to fill the presses, all get washed and stacked, ready to be taken back up to the vineyard.

It’s all a very well oiled machine.

Planting

We’d been out for lunch, and when we got home Brian suggested we plant the plants I’d bought recently, and also a couple I’d been given. It was due to rain later, so an ideal time to get them in.

I knew where I needed them to go. I want to create a border, or bed of plants, to the left of the path as you walk up to the pool. I’d like to include some aromatics, as I thought this would be lovely as you brush past them.

We laid them out, giving them plenty of room for growth. At this stage I’m leaving the grass in place, I will see how this goes over the next 6 months. At the top of the slope I’ve included a curry plant, which apparently loves a dry sandy soil. Fingers crossed this will like where I’ve put it.

As we’d had lunch out, we didn’t need a big meal for supper, so enjoyed a nice glass of Rully with some delicious cheeses.

Lavender

If you’ve visited our home, you will definitely have noticed the sweet smell of lavender as you arrive in the garden, it thrives in our dry, hot courtyard.

I always like to leave it until the very last moment to cut the flowers, getting the most out of them before they go to seed at the end of summer. With the onset of some rain forecast though, I encouraged Brian to help me cut some of it.

I like to use the hand shears to cut big bunches, which I then lay into a plastic tray. In a week or two most of the seeds will have already dropped off, making it easier to finish off removing them, before collecting them all to use in lavender bags.

Relaxing

I often get asked about blogging every day, ‘Is it difficult to find something to write about?’, ‘How do you find time?’, ‘Who takes the photographs?’. Well I have to say the last few days have been a bit difficult, I think I’d just got a bit tired. We’ve had the end of the canicule (heatwave), which I think actually took it out of both Brian and I.

So we decided to take a few days out of the calendar, relaxing at home, peppered with some glorious days out and meals with friends. We’ve also managed to enjoy the experience of vendanges, with invitations to some of the pressoirs where we’ve been able to see first hand how different producers have honed slightly different methods and processes to harvest and press their grapes. We’ve experienced the amazing atmosphere’s amongst the owners and workers, and how they keep each other motivated, all wanting to pick good grapes, and beat their daily bests. Then sharing their meals together, tired and exhausted, but clean after a refreshing dip in the river or a hot shower and, still jovial, ready to start it all again tomorrow.

It’s such a beautiful time of year.

I’m now feeling more refreshed and motivated to finish off the posts I’ve been writing the last few days. I will be posting them over the weekend.

One of the reasons, very early on, as to why I chose to write a daily blog was to capture our story of moving to France and setting up the chambre d’hôte, along with capturing our daily life. When taking a moment to take stock, and look back at what we’ve achieved, and what our daily life is now like, it makes us realise how far we have come.

Keep your cool

We were trying to stay cool today, as temperatures are starting to peak again. Our guests had all left, so we stripped the rooms, I popped the washing on, and then made us a couple of jambon beurres to have for a late lunch before heading up to the pool.

The Jambon beurre is one of the wonderful staples of France, available almost everywhere, and easy to make, it certainly goes down well in the shade in the garden on a hot day.

Simply red

I’d managed to buy some dahlias today at the market. I chose a beautiful bouquet of mixed colours, although I actually arranged them in their individual colours, as it seemed less fussy. I put the orange ones upstairs, and kept the pinks and reds downstairs.

They look gorgeous arranged in a selection of different little vases around the house.

I cut a few vine leaves to add to the vase on the table, along with a few late lavender flowers.

I’d also popped a few in the hallway. This jug is an old one from Brian’s mum, I love the straight shape and the little emblem on the front.

I find keeping the colours the same works well, although sometimes I’m daring and will go for a clash of colours.

I’ve kept things very simple for the red dahlias, and placed them as single stems in 3 separate vases, which are themselves an eclectic mix. The red on the bottles helps to pull the colourings together.

I did think about growing dahlias next year, but I was told they are very water thirsty, which goes against my plan, so I don’t think I will.

Perfect timing

We woke up to the most gorgeous blue sky, it’s going to be another hot day. In fact, it’s been a couple of hot weeks, all over Europe I believe. For the grape pickers, who cut every bunch of grapes by hand here in Champagne, it makes for a hard days work.

The whole workforce starts early in the morning, trying to get a few early hours in before the heat of the sun bears down on them. With our windows flung wide open to let in the cool air at night, we can hear them preparing for their day as early as 4am. Last night we could hear the tractors clearing off the leaves from the vines, they do this by blowing directed air onto them, exposing the fruit so it can be easily and quickly picked.

Boxes are delivered across the vineyards by tractors , and distributed between the vines. They are left ready to be filled with buckets of cut grapes. When complete, just one of these boxes weighs 40kgs. A real team effort, and a well planned operation.

It’s then a matter of moving the now 40kg boxes, onto the back of the tractors , which will take them to the presses, to press them as quickly as possible from the time they are picked - simply perfect timing.

It’s all hot, tiring work, performed with a wonderful spirit, and a lot of organisation. It’s a marvellous thing to be able to see, and hear happening around you. With the hot weather set to break on Tuesday, with heavy rains forecast, it’s a rush to the finishing line.

Right time, right place

We nipped out this morning to take some photos of the harvest, as there’s a lot of activity all along our little valley. We’d stopped just on a ridge where I could pull off the road and Brian had a prime view of the workers.

Just as I’d turned the car round and switched the engine off to wait for him, I could hear a jet approaching. I peered through the windscreen and saw it swoosh overhead, with a rather thunderous roar. We often see them pass over as I believe we are on a training route.

When Brian jumped back in the car, I exclaimed “Did you get any good piccies? Would have been nice to have captured one of the fighter jet”. He turned the camera to me and showed me what he’d achieved.

“Wow hun, that’s amazing!”

A coupe

What better way to kick off the start of harvest than lunch out at the ‘café de l’halles’ in Bar-sur-Seine, and of course a coupe of Champagne.

I enjoyed a very delicious meal of roasted pork and haricots verts, whilst Brian had an onglet steak with fries. We then couldn’t resist a very chocolatey eclair for dessert. Why not?

Three per hectare

Up to 20,000 people come to the Aube vineyards to work on the harvest. There is nearly 120,000 for the whole of the Champagne region. With around 8,000 hectares of vines in the Aube (just over 34,000 for Champagne as a whole) that works out to around three grape pickers per hectare.

This year, some of the producers have also chosen to take on a few extra workers to help keep the presses clear, to help the whole process flow more easily. It is always better to keep the grapes waiting on the vines than at the presses.

The workers are often regulars that are recruited every year, from all across Europe. However, recruitment does appear to be a little more difficult this year for the growers, so some are now using service companies to fill the need for them, after all there’s enough to do without the worry of finding enough workers!

the nude

L’est Éclair, which translates as ‘the lightning’, is our local weekly newspaper. It is a good source of what’s happening and what’s on in the area.

This weeks mini headlines, we thought, were particularly provocative - ‘a nude in the Camille-Claudel museum has been censored by instagram’ - that story definitely needs a read! It refers to an historical statue of a naked man that the museum posted with a short description, but Instagram got something in this story very wrong and decided it needed to be censored. Daft, but a great way of grabbing a headline for what we believe is a rather marvellous museum.

Then there’s the delightful story about how a Playmobil exhibition on Napoleon brought ‘wings’ to the little ‘Napoleon museum’ in Brienne-Le-Chateau, and doubled their visitor numbers this year. What a wonderful way to bring history to life for children.

How many?

Thought I’d share my little purchases from the vide grenier on Sunday. I was very pleased with our finds, the metal tray is already coming in handy up at the pool. I was very pleased with my 3 table cloths. The cream one fits the dining table perfectly, and I never seem to have too many. The retro one with flowers will be perfect as a breakfast tablecloth, very cheery. Add to that some homegrown veggies and a couple of books for Brian and it was quite a haul.

Dilemma

It’s going to be a beautiful week, although I realise not everyone will see these temperatures as beautiful. The forecasters are actually forecasting another heatwave for this year in Southern France. The high temperatures, into the 30’s, are very unusual for this time of year.

We have been on a hosepipe ban for most of the summer, so I try and save all my waste water – washing up water, or when I’m running a tap to get hot water – to use in the garden. Any water that I can use on my pots helps.

Because of these two hot spells, some industries across France have been told to reduce water consumption. I think that it’s not just an immediate request, but a long term project for France.

I’m thinking about what we can do for our bit, and maybe next year I need to be thinking of more drought tolerant planting. Although I have to say, with the rain we had last week, the garden is looking very lush.

À couper le souffle

Such an amazing sky this evening. I’d gone up to the pool this evening with Brian, he needed to close it up, so we went to sit up there for a little while. There was a beautiful gentle warm breeze, and the crickets were chirping their light evening song. As Brian looked up from the pool, he exclaimed “you must turn around and take a look at the sun set, it’s stunning”. We learnt a new saying earlier today, and it seemed very fitting. ‘À couper le souffle’ – breathtaking.

For some in the region vendanges starts tomorrow, let’s hope this is the glorious sign of a good one for all.

Take a guess?

We had a great time at the vintage aeroplane and car show. I was so glad we had the time to visit it, it’s just so wonderful seeing all the old planes. Their owners are justifiably very proud of their planes, and take such great care of them.

There was also a great display of cars, in fact, I think I’ve found my perfect car.

Can anyone guess what it is?

Rassemblement

Sunday morning, no lay in today. The last job we do before our guests arrive is hoover their rooms and the ground floor. Brian does the upstairs hallway and the rooms, whilst I do the lounge, entry hall and dining room. Thank goodness we have two hoovers.

We have a quick little breakfast, then we head into Bar-sur-Seine to buy bread for dinner and maybe drop into a vide grenier that is happening today. Ideally, what we really want to do is visit the vintage car and plane show in Celles-sur-Ource. We’ll have to see how much time we have left.

Mady morrison

We woke early this morning, because we wanted to get our jobs done so we could enjoy an afternoon relaxing by the pool.

First though I was keen to do our morning stretch with Mady Morrison. We’ve not been able to do this every morning through the summer, and I’ve really missed it, so I’m trying to ensure we now take 15 minutes each morning to do one of her stretch routines. It makes such a big difference to our day. This is the link to her ultimate morning stretch. I think the key is not to worry if you can’t do all of it, just do as much as you can, well that’s what we do. We really don’t look like she does doing it, and there’s often lots of moans and groans as well.

After our morning ritual we nipped out for a well deserved coffee and a bun, before picking up the chicken from the butchers and dropping into the Intermarché for some shopping. We have guests arriving tomorrow and I’ll be cooking Sunday dinner for table d’hôte.

Early afternoon, we headed up to the pool for a lazy afternoon soaking up the warmth of the day under the shade of the umbrella, and taking a dip in the pool to cool down.

I was drifting in and out of sleep, listening to the near silence of the village. There’s some children just in the background laughing and playing. It’s the last couple of days before rentré (back to school), and they are obviously making the most of it. Brian is starting to stir, I can hear him get up, starting to potter and do his ‘pool jobs’. He’d mentioned he wanted to top the pool up, and luckily we use water from our well so we don’t have an issue keeping it at the right level.

One more snooze before we head down for dinner I think.