Day 6: Sarlot

The Legacy of the Fountains
When our friends bought two fountains- one in copper, and the other in porcelain- from a French man’s antique store in Sarlot during a previous trip with us, they likely expected to be placing them within the garden of their home within the standard 6-8 weeks. 9 years later, delayed by the stricter shipping regulations that followed 9/11, the fountains are still in France, crated and cornered in the basement of the same store. Our task for the day is to get these fountains home.

With my GPS and Debbie’s memory we match the logo on their business card to a sign on a building, and I explain to the store owner, who seems to take me seriously when he is not flirting with me, that it is absolutely necessary that these fountains fly to California. Eventually, it is decided that the fountains will be shipped in plastic (a new strategy) at the start of September.
Sarlot is slick yellow from the cobble stone ground to the tiled roofs of the buildings. Vacationers collect souvenirs for family at home. Together and separately they write, read, talk, listen, smoke and stare from beneath the shelters of bistro marquis.

Debbie, Amelia and I lunch at a Crêperie, and dessert is luxurious. Furnished in a thin cake skin, our coffee ice cream with candied espresso beans is flambéed with Cognac, dressed with Chantilly cream, and laced with a deep dark chocolate sauce.
Needless to say, we swarmed.

Day 3-4: La Bruyere, Approximately

Debbie drools over these gorgeous plates

Day 3

It is our first morning at La Bruyere and we are eager to assemble a breakfast from choice samplings of market goods: foie gras, sticky prune jam, fresh sausages, tartelettes aux pommes from the patisserie, and blushing nectarines. We’re in Issigeac, a tiny medieval village not far from our La Bruyere farmhouse. A procession of bagpipers, fiddlers and drummers all in timely garb make Issigeac an apparition of relict life that parades amidst modern audiences. If staying in a remote, 500 year-old farmhouse- where the only computer, an ancient PC model in three parts, sits uselessly under plastic sheets- is a lesson in living slowly, then a visit to Issigeac is like trial time-travel.

Day 4

Today we go to Duras, another of half a dozen charming French villages surrounding La Bruyere. The market here resembles that of Issigeac. Though it is smaller it offers similar wares of cheerful fruits and artisan crafts. We lunch on the terrace of an alley bistro, nestled behind a vendor of French linens. We loved our salad- a plate of spirited greens, bordered by fat tomatoes, adorned with walnuts and four pieces of chèvre toast, and drizzled by a sweet and creamy dressing. Bewitched by the duck entree and the accordion accompaniment of street musicians, we head home to work up an appetite for our four-course dinner reservation with one-woman kitchen, Madame Montier.

That Night…

The three hour meal unfolds in a way that is uniquely French. Our amuse-bouche (‘mouth-fun’, a bite-size appetizer that traditionally opens a multi-course French meal) is a grouping of six small quiche paired with a kir appertif, a local white Bordeaux embellished with creme de cassis. The first course, foie gras de canard plated aside bright strawberries, peaches and a sweet onion confit is Debbie’s favorite. The foie sits atop fresh bread and it’s piqued with a kernel of sea salt. We love the sassy fennel and cumin flavors, and the sweet Monbazillac sauterne that enhances the savory foie. A delicious duck salad precedes our entree of tender fowl with three sauces aside. Then, a course devoted entirely to cheeses showcases at least a dozen hard and soft rounds- roquefort, tomme des pyrenees, chevre, epoisse, bleu, and a local walnut cheese made by nuns, to name a few. The cheeses are paired with a Bordeaux from Monbazillac, and followed by a digestif- a cognac for Nicole and an Armargnac for Debbie. Throughout, we are encouraged to eat slowly, as the French do. We spend almost three hours swapping bites and stories. Our waiter, Madame’s son, leaves the course-paired wine bottles on our table to enjoy at our pace, and to explore our own pairing tastes. We leave after cake and creme brulée, helplessly plumped and prepared for a long night’s rest.

Tomorrow we head to Sarlot to retrieve a set of fountains bought by friends almost ten years ago…

Where we are today….

www.psrt.com/labruyere

Day 1: “No Pasa Nada”

La Carniceria

Abril from Argentina

La Familia

A Spanish Welcome

A very patient Mercedes picks us up from the airport, never letting on that she has been waiting for all of the four hours that our plane was delayed in New York. We follow her to a tiny car and pack ourselves inside, moving lethargically to her chorus: “No pasa nada”. The Barcelona-native, after losing a parking pass, hitting a curb and trying to run down a barricade gives us a brief tour of Las Ramblas.
In Tordera we are fed immediately. Maria, our Spanish Grandmother, prattling off in Catalonian as we sit at her kitchen table, coaxes our appetites with her hospitality. Her sentiment needs no translation- grandmothering is a universal language. We help ourselves to her fried chicken, scalloped potatoes, and zucchini soup, taking seconds and thirds from a communal plate in the tradition of the Spanish kitchen.
The secrets of Tordera are hidden behind the metal screens that secure the peach-colored buildings with burnt-orange roofs and don’t open until after la siesta. From the local carniceria we buy jamon serano, mortadella with green olives, chorizo, and fuet (a regional delicacy in the style of salami). In la panaderia Maria finds a French round loaf, and with these we head to Maria-Gracia’s house for tapas, a picinic-style meal designed to beat the heat of the kitchen during hot Spanish summers. The bread is sliced, tomato-rubbed and topped with meat and cheese varieties, and our hosts serve us Bordeaux, a special treat from their recent trip to our own La Bruyere. This is followed by a dessert wine, sauternes, to complement a selection of small Tordera pastries. The night’s entertainment is found in countless misinterpretations as we struggle to find words of a common language for our dinner conversation.

Late that night, we leave Mariagracia’s to lay horizontal for the first time since departure, anticipating the wine-tasting at the end of our drive through the narrow rues of Cerbère and Banyules.

Day Zero: A Tentative Itinerary

Three Weeks Ago:
It’s ten minutes before noon in Eugene, Oregon. I am leaving my apartment for another class in intensive French grammar, holding a fist full of change for another pesto bagel from the campus cafe, when my phone rings.

“So…I have some interesting news…” It’s my Aunt Debbie, and she is being elusive and her tone is playful.  I have no idea where this is going.

“Good interesting or bad interesting?” I ask.
“Oh…I think you’ll enjoy this…”

Ten minutes later I hang up the phone. Bearing with me the news that I will be accompaning Debbie to France and Spain for two weeks, I find suddenly that the nuances of my summer class and campus dining have become infinately more bearable. Quaint, even.

In the spare moments of our busy days since this afternoon we have been planning the trip.   As of yet, we will stay in Tordera,  in the home of Maria Castilla Altea, a surrogate grandmother to Debbie’s kids. Then we will seek out the eccentricities of Cerbere, a small train town on the Catalonian Coast.   From there we head to La Bruyere in Bordeaux where we will be experimenting with market-fresh foods and wine pairings.   We hope to make it to San Sebastian and Bilboa before heading back to Barcelona for our final days.  Now, as we sit in the JFK airport next to dozens of other Barcenola-bound travelers, we await a feast for our mouths and our hearts.