Chicken for Dinner - Again

Bresse chicken, the best in the world

Cees accuses the English of being boring eaters, he says that they always serve chicken. I must admit it, give me a nice piece of chicken and I am a very happy bunny and actually I do notice that when we eat with English friends or relations we do seem to be served chicken on the majority of occasions. But chicken is so nice and versatile isn’t it?

I have recipe books just dedicated to chicken recipes and I have a large ring binder just full of them as well. I could find a different way to cook or serve the stuff every day of the year if I were allowed. Which makes it all the more surprising when I eat at someone’s house and I taste chicken done in a way I have never tasted before. That was just what happened on my “early birthday”.

On that occasion, I was served chicken which was absolutely divine. I have finally received the recipe, which has winged its way down the wires (or was it WiFi) from the far reaches of the North American coast. So a big thank you to Ricki who sent me the recipe and an even bigger thank you to Simone the originator. And here it is:

Last night's dinner, yummy

Chicken with balsamic vinegar sauce

4 chicken breasts
Flour with salt & pepper added
1 ½ Tbs butter
1 ½ Tbs olive oil
3 – 4 finely chopped shallots
50 ml balsamic vinegar
50ml chicken stock
1 Tbs butter

Coat the chicken with the flour/salt/pepper mix.
Fry the floured chicken gently in the first lot of butter and the olive oil until done.
Remove and set aside.
Add the shallots to the frying pan and sauté for a few minutes.
Add the vinegar and stock to the shallots and reduce by half.
Add the second lot of butter and allow to melt.
Either add the chicken pieces back to the pan to coat in the sauce, or serve the sauce over chicken when it is on each plate.

After that, does anyone dare tell me chicken is boring?…


For information on some lovely holiday accommodation in Burgundy not far from the home of the Bresse chicken click here.

Roman Holiday

The two of us at the Colesseum

We have just taken some “time out” to have a holiday for ourselves - not very easy to find the time, when you rent out holiday accommodation yourself. We decided to get away from it all and off we went, to Rome. Neither of us had ever been there and after our experience with the horrible people we met when we had a holiday in Florence a number of years ago, it has taken me some courage to go back to Italy, but well, Rome is Rome and it has to be seen doesn't it?

So we booked our flight and flew from Lyon to the Eternal City.  It was fantastic.

Our stay started with the excitement of actually seeing the Pope and not on some distant balcony either, he was zipping round St Peter’s Square on a modern day Ben Hur chariot. We had no idea he would be there, which made it all the more fun.

Franky on his chariot

We “did” all the sights you could imagine, the Colosseum, the Forums, Palatine Hill, St Peter’s Basilica, the Sistine chapel and of course the Mouth of Truth, not that I queued up to get my photo taken - superstitious moi? We walked our socks off, from one end of town to the other, from the Spanish Steps to St Paul Outside the Walls, from the Trivi fountain to Trastevere. Everything was wonderful, the weather, the city, the food and the people.

The Mouth of Truth, without my hand in it!

We were totally exhausted at the end of each day as we wended our weary way back to the flat we had rented. Fortunately we were near some super little restaurants, serving great Italian food, so we didn’t have too far to go out in the evening.

I may not have thrown a coin in the Trevi fountain, but you never know, maybe we will go back one day.


For information on our holiday accommodation about an hour's flight from Rome click here.

Fighting the anarchists

The biggest most onerous responsibility of being the head of the “commission des hébergeurs, commerçants et artisans d’art” committee, for the local tourist office, is running the committee meetings, which can best be described as a very French, anarchistic get-together.

My first experience of this type of approach to holding a meeting, left me shell-shocked. The noise, the chatter, the seemingly endless discussion of one subject and the dismissal of others for no apparent reason, the constant jumping from one subject to another and then back again, agenda what’s that? Sure we have a list of items to be discussed, but don’t let that confuse you or hold back the flow, it is only written for… what’s it for anyway?

Ok I’ll admit it, I didn’t really understand what job I was taking on when I started. Basically I knew we organise the yearly trip to visit various establishments of our members (B&Bs, gîtes, artisan’s studios etc), we also organise the welcome drinks for the tourists in July and August, as well as organising a show of local arts and crafts. Back in The Netherlands, I ran an engineering department of more than a hundred burly men and a budget of millions, how difficult could a little job like this be? I hadn’t bargained on the French way of doing things.

I have struggled to keep the committee meetings on track and to guide them to a meaningful conclusion. Having watched others, I notice that they cope very badly too, so at least I am not alone. But the other day I was at a meeting where one woman seemed to have her mob relatively under control. Apart from being able to speak French better than me, what did she do that was different? Here’s the secret - she bribed them all with chocolate. Brilliant! So this week, in an attempt to get things running more smoothly than usual, I baked some biscuits and do you know what? It worked! They were too busy eating to notice that I was sticking to the agenda and we were finished on time as well. It looks like that’s how it going to be from now on.

For those interested, I made some walnut and raisin cookies - using local ingredients of course - and very nice they were too.

Walnut and raisin cookies

8 oz softened butter
6oz soft brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
6.5oz flour
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
3.5 oz raisins
2oz chopped walnuts

Pre-heat the oven to 190 Celsius.
Cream the butter and brown sugar. Then add the egg and vanilla and mix together thoroughly. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, cinnamon, baking powder and salt. Then add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients whilst mixing. Stirred in the raisins and walnuts.

Drop teaspoon-fulls of the dough on to an oven sheet lined with baking paper, make sure the blobs are at least a couple of inches apart otherwise they will all merge into one great big blob. Bake for about 10 minutes until brown at the edges and cooked right through. Leave them on the sheet to cool for a few minutes, then transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.


For holiday accommodation in walnut country click here.

Walk through the vineyards

Vous êtes ici

This Sunday will see the annual Cormatin Randonnée. Unfortunately due to other commitments, we will miss it this year, but it did get me thinking of the last organised walk we went on. Back at the beginning of July, we took part in the a “balade gourmand” in Ladoix, a wine village not far from Beaune.

Maybe the intention of the walkers in Ladoix is not quite the same as those in Cormatin as the object is not necessarily to go for a walk, it is more about tasting the grand crus, premier crus and other exceptional wines that make this area famous.

Charcuterie and premier cru

The organisation is also on a different scale, Cormatin will order about 50 baguettes and will use up about a dozen or so bottles of wine whilst in Ladoix, to feed the three and a half thousand walkers, they got through 1700 baguettes and 3000 bottles of wine!

So what was it all about? Basically a course of about 5 – 6 km is set out amongst the vines starting and ending in Ladoix. After being issued with your straw hat and glass carrying pounch, you move from one feeding and drinking post to the next eating courses of a meal and tasting the wines appropriate to that dish.

Cheese and grand cru

We started with aperitifs of gougères and kir in the village and then moved on to the first course which was a plate of cold meats and pâtés accompanied by white wines. The fish dish was next (I managed to get a plate of salad - it pays to have a cute foreign accent at these events) with some quite superb white wines. Then on to the main course, boeuf bourginon and rôstis and a number of very good red wines. On the way to our cheese course, there was pink champagne - now what is that doing in Burgundy? we all wondered.

To accompany the cheese we had some of the best red wines of the day, then on to dessert and crément and coffee. What a marathon, it was a good job we went by bus! The trick is to just taste the wine, pace yourself and choose which wines to taste carefully - if you tried them all you’d be legless before the main course. To help, you are given a little book at the start of the walk listing all the wines. Next year I will study the book beforehand and target the right pourers, if you just queue up not knowing what you are doing, you can miss out on some beauties.

So as autumn sets in, I can look back on a beautiful, sunny day in the vineyards of Burgundy, doing what the French do best. What better way to spend a summer Sunday could there possibly be?

Straw hats in the vineyard

For information about our holiday accommodation in Burgundy, not very far from some excellent vineyards click here.

We just popped into the Taizé shop and what did we find?

Vases in Taizé

I love the shop in Taizé, full of their beautiful pottery. Having said that, now is not actually a very good time to go, the stocks are low and the queues can be long, but I can’t resist a look every now and then.

I saw this stand of lovely vases, such beautiful glazes and designs. A lovely addition to any living room I would have thought.

But it was the pictures on the wall at the end of the room that caught my eye.

At the moment there is an exhibition of Brother Stephen’s work which is entitled quite simply “Circle Colours”. Brother Stephen trained as an artist before he joined the community back in the early ‘80s and since joining the brothers, he has concentrated on enamelwork and decorations for the church and external Taizé events.

His work on display in this special exhibition, is inspired by a passage from the bible - Ecclesiastes (3:11):

“God has made everything suitable for its time; moreover he has put a sense of past and future into their minds, yet they cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.” 

Much like a circle, which is “a figure of unity, wholeness, infinity. Without beginning or end, without any side or angle.” I find it an interesting and original interpretation of a piece of scripture, but even if you don’t go along with that, it is certainly a fascinating set of pictures.

Some of Brother Stephen's circles

For accommodation near Taizé click here.

A round tower and unseen churches

The round tower

Last weekend hosted the annual heritage days that we look forward to every year. For one weekend a year, state owned museums are free, most other museums operate on a reduced price entry but, the fact that there are several places that only open on these two days a year or, as in the case of one of our targets, only open for one morning, is of most interest to us.

Cees had been pouring over the lists of places to be open this weekend for a number of weeks and had come up with a long list of things to be seen. Difficult choices had to be made and in the end we concentrated on the Cluny and Mâcon areas on Saturday and Sunday was in the Brionnais. It would take a novel as long as the Lord of the Rings to describe all we saw, suffice to say, we were exhausted by the end of the weekend, so I will restrict myself to the highlights.

Hotel de Monnaie

Saturday morning we were thrilled to get into the round tower in Cluny. This is one of the remaining towers of the fortifications around the abbey. After a long morning of visits, it was already 11 o’clock when we arrived and as it was only open in the morning, we didn’t have too much time to spare. We rather stupidly started by the tower itself outside the abbey walls. Obviously, for medieval security reasons, there was no door (duh..) but where was the entrance then? The problem is that the old abbey is now split over three sites, the National Stud, the ENSAM (a sort of engineers’ university) and the state-owned part of the abbey site open to the public. We guessed that the tower would be either in the ENSAM or the National Stud, so off we went to the Stud entrance - no not there. We then went to each of the ENSAM entrances - no not there either. By which time it was getting dangerously close to lunchtime and the closure of the tower for at least one year and possibly for ever. Finally at the entrance to the abbey we were told, yes, we could get to the tower that way and we booked ourselves on to the last visit. The tower is actually in the ENSAM in amongst the workshops, but the abbey had permission for visitors to gain access for the morning and we had to march at high speed to meet out visit time slot.

Made for little people

I won’t say the tower was a must-see, the view isn’t all that great, but the fact that it is not normally open to the public, made it a very special visit. While in Cluny, we managed to get into the Hotel de Monnaie, also not normally open to the public and that was well worth it. Check out the door custom made for me!

Baugy church's stunning decorations

During the weekend, we finally managed to see the insides of a number if churches we have visited many times. Sunday’s gem was just one of those churches - Baugy in the Brionnais. The church was beautifully restored and we were lucky enough to meet a couple of the team who had done the work. They explained the problems they had encountered during the long restoration period and the difficult decisions they had had to make. If a wall has medieval frescoes under 19th century decoration, both of historical interest, which one do you “save”? Check out the photo to see what they did.

All in all, a most enjoyable weekend and I am looking forward to next year’s treats - Cees is already busy planning our wish-list.

For holiday accommodation, near to a host of interetsing sites, open almost all year click here.

Birthday in a bird park

Birthday picnic

My birthday started grey and rainy, but we went out any way. After all we are Northern Europeans, we can cope with cold, wet and windy!

No sooner had we entered the Beaujolais than the sun came out. So a picnic by a lake was called for. Then it was onwards to the bird park we had tried to visit back in August. Back then it was just too busy and quite frankly I wasn't so keen on waiting nearly an hour to get in, then to pay almost 30 Euros just to see a couple of parrots.

Cacophony of  colours

But it is now September and the park was bound to be quieter without all those families. Besides we did have that card from the bank offering us a reduced price entry - so what more of a push do you need? We were not disappointed.

Forget just a couple of parrots, this is chock a block full of all the birds you could ever imagine and many, many that you could not.

The park itself was laid out very well, lots of space to see the birds and (almost) all of them were close enough to touch. We went from one area to another, just wondering at the amazing specimens they had on show. Including an aviary with lorikeets that you could feed with nectar and they would land on your hands and arms. Not being so brave, I just went into the non-feeding section and took photos!

Mid-afternoon we made it to the highlight of the park - the flying show. And wow, was that a show. The birds flew so low over your head you could almost feel their wings brushing your hair.

Serene swimmer

Fantasitc flyer

I have taken so many photos, it was impossible to choose the ones I wanted to put in this post, so these ones here are just a taster and if you want to see more, here is a link to a photo album with my top 40 piccies.

The day culminated with our friends from Guitares en Cormatinois, the local guitar festival we help organise. They even sang happy birthday to me! What more can you ask of your birthday?

Panorama of flamingos

For information on holiday accommodation not so far from the bird park in Villars les Dombes click here.

My birthday comes early this year.

My birthday cake

On Friday we went round to some friends for dinner, we had a lovely evening chatting on their balcony watching the Ameugny world go by. It was the farewell dinner with our American friends who come and stay for a few weeks every year to visit Taizé and generally enjoy Burgundian life. When we sat down to dinner, there was an early birthday card there for me, I was thrilled that they had remembered.

Dinner started with a delicious chicken dish, which I totally forgot to ask the recipe of, silly me, if you read this Ricki, please? I’ll give you and Simone full credit for it ! But for me the pièce de résistance was the dessert. A gooey chocolate cake was brought into the room, decked with candles and everyone sang Happy Birthday. The first time I have had a cake in years. There were three candles (for those who read this regularly they will know that I am from a year zero – I forget which one), they were red, white and blue to the match the red, white and blue nationalities sitting round a table in red, white and blue France.

What is he doing in Oregon?

Thank you David and Ricki for a lovely pre-birthday party and here’s one last photo. Who is that guy standing in front of Mount Hood I wonder? A future blog will reveal all…


Want to celebrate your birthday in our holiday accommodation near Ameugny? Click here for more details.

Evening Classes

Forum des Associations - Cluny Abbey

When we first arrived here, we were baffled as to how to find information about evening classes or clubs. There seemed to be no rhyme or reason to how things operate. In fact, evening classes as such just don’t exist. You can’t go to the local library and get a list of what’s being taught and when and when you ask the neighbours about classes, you are met with blank looks. Things are different in France and it has taken us some years to sort out how to find the information we have been looking for.

Virtually all (what I would call in English, English) “evening classes” are run by small associations. So for instance, if you want to learn a language you find a language association and see what languages they offer, if they don’t offer the one you want to learn, you look for another language association based in a different town. If you want to learn Judo, you look for a judo association, karate – a karate association, tai-chi – a tai-chi association, lacework – a lacework association, flower arranging, cookery, art classes etc etc etc the list goes on.

You find flyers for these associations around the place, mostly by accident, at this time of year, but the biggest way of finding classes, is by word of mouth, which is what makes finding what you are actually looking for, very difficult indeed.

La Spirale d'or - Tai-chi club

The last couple of years we have noticed that in Cluny they have a Forum des Associations on one Saturday morning a year. All the associations set up stall in the cloister of the abbey and you can browse around to see what Cluny has to offer, from archery to theatre groups, from patchwork to ji-jutsu, from a brass band to a moneyless exchange system. All manner of things in fact.

I’ve signed up for tai-chi again this year and I am giving the moneyless exchange system a go - who knows what that will entail. It looks like I’ll be working for griottes (morello cherries) when I get started, hopefully they’re not real ones - I’m not too partial to fruit. I’ll keep you posted on my earnings when I find out how it all works.

Another advantage to the Forum des Associations is that you can sneak into the abbey for free, if you know the way. Now would we do that?

For information on our holiday accommodation still paid for in Euros click here.

Correction to my previous post

Belleville

It has been pointed out to me by two avid readers, that neither Jean Paul II nor Mother Teresa are in fact saints yet.  Jean Paul should make it this October or next April according to different sources, but as yet, Mother Teresa has a way to go.  Whilst she has been beatified, for her to be up for canonisation, a second miracle still has been attributed to her intervention.  So there remains the question, what is a statue of her doing in the church in Belleville, if she isn’t actually a saint?  I can feel another blog coming on..

A day out in the Beaujolais

Mother Teresa

It was a glorious day and so we set off into the Beaujolais on yet another Romanesque church hunt. While Cees photographs every Romanesque, pseudo-Romanesque, neo-Romanesque and non-Romanesque feature that a church has to offer, I get to sit around and look at bits and pieces. The saints in French churches particularly fascinate me. When I first arrived, I could hardly name any of them, but over the years I have come to recognise all the common ones, St Joan of Arc, St Anthony, St Joseph, St Curé, St Teresa and I can now tell the difference between St Michael and St George - pretty tricky as they are both normally killing dragons.

I have taken loads of photos of them over the years, partly as a record of some of the nicer examples, but partly to log who I have actually seen. It is not often these day that I get to see a statue of a saint that I have never seen before, but this trip was one of those occasions. I was completely amazed at this statue, I recognised her from the other end of the church, one of the most “modern” or should I say “new” saints there is. There she was, next door to her namesake, Mother Teresa herself complete with her iconic poor sisters of Calcutta style sari. It has got me wondering when I will see my first St John Paul II.

Clochmerle pressoir

After that bit of saint hunting, we headed off into the Beaujolais hills looking for a picnic spot. We saw a sign to Vaux-en-Beaujolais and decided to visit the town. This town is famous for being the real-life version of the fictional town Clochemerle. Having said that, why any town would want to associate itself with a pissoire (urinal) is beyond me. Anyway, when we got there, we headed for the church to see the (in)famous pissoire. We searched all round the building, there were talking flower pots (I kid you not) and a pressoire (wine press) covered in flowers but not a pissoire in sight. I was beginning to wonder if I had misinterpreted the story, maybe it was an argument over the village pressoire and not pissoire that the book was about, but I was sure I was right.

Clochmerle Pissoire

I was beginning to feel a little let down by the town’s hype when we stumbled upon the pissoire itself, conventiently located next to some picnic tables where we duly had our lunch, with a beautiful view of the pissoire on one side and a more beautiful view over the Beaujolais hills and vineyards on the other. The only thing missing was a bottle of wine to wash down our mousse de vollaile, rosette and brie de Meaux, maybe next time…

 
For information on our holiday accommodation, not far from the Beaujolais click here.

Train spotting

We were up at the crack of dawn Sunday morning and we went off to a railway bridge in Rully. We were going train spotting. When we arrived and before I could get my camera out a TGV went past, blast missed it. Then a goods train came past, which I dutifully photographed. But that was not why we were here.

We were on a steam mission.

Since The Mistral 241P-17 had had her accident a couple of years ago, we thought we would never see a steam train on the rails round here again. But this year she is up and back in business and Sunday morning was the day that she passed near to us. Although I had my doubts when the alarm went off at 06.30, when we heard her toot in the distance, I knew it would be worth it and it was.

The stretch where we waited was long and straight, to give us a good view of her arriving. We saw the smoke a good 2 or 3 minutes before we could see any semblance of a train and then she arrived.

I had forgotten just how exciting steam trains are, they are not machines at all, they are magnificent living creatures, puffing out smoke and fire. I had set the camera on multi-shot, but I must admit I bottled out that the last minute and jumped back when she went right under the bridge, so there is no photo of the cloud that engulfed us as she thundered underneath. And that was it - with a cloud of smoke there she was - gone - on her way to the Jura.

I must be a bit of an anorak because I will certainly be back next year if she is passing.







For a website about holiday accommodation near a place where a steam train can be seen from time to time click here.

Fame at last - well almost

What's that?

As regular readers of my blog will know, I have almost been on TV a number of times since we have come to live in France. Although I appreciate that this is a lot nearer than most people get to being on TV, it has somewhat disappointed me that it has always been “almost”. But now I know why. They have been saving me for the BIG ONE.

This Tuesday we had bagsied our seats at the restaurant La Petite Auberge just before they opened at 12.00 and we were just hovering around waiting, making sure no impudent tourist would steal "our" place on the terrace, when I saw a car coming up the main street, with a large blue blob on top of it. No sooner than I could think to myself “What’s that?” when I realised I had been Google mapped !

Fame at last?

Yes folks, when the new version of Cluny comes on-line on Street View, there I’ll be, staring at the camera like a dimwit. I’ll keep you posted.


For a look at the website, showing our property which can be seen on Google Street View (in the distance, because we are not actually on a proper street) click here.

Givers and takers

In our line of work you meet all sorts of people. The vast majority are very nice people, people we love to have here, people who are friendly and polite, fun and interesting. But sadly, every so often we have “takers”. Not only do they actually take our time and possessions, but they also take our energy as well. Constantly having to be aware that we mustn’t give even a teeny weenie bit, otherwise we will be taken for a very big ride. Every time I am surprised by these people, even though they make their intentions very clear from the start. We will say something like “Please don’t drive on to the campsite the ground it rather soft at the moment”  and that will be met with “I am only going to empty the car, then I will be off” and yet again, we know what we are in for - a week or so of “takers”. The slightest favour turns into a demand for more and more, spoilt little children who have never learned any manners or consideration for others, they take and take and take.

This last fortnight we have had such a couple on our site. We did them a favour when they first arrived. We do this sort of thing all the time, someone forgets to bring something with them, we lend them ours, someone has a problem with the car, we phone and translate so that the mechanic and visitor can communicate, and many small things inbetween.  We don’t expect anything in return, except a thank you and a little respect, we are after all just human. I won’t go into the gory details, but the favour we did this time was rather big and it actually cost us money, time and effort. Even so, we did it willingly and so we have given. On the return front, we did not even receive a thank you and I must say, even though it shouldn’t have, that did irritate me, as I said before, I'm only human. All the time they have been camping on our site, he has been very unpleasant, probably using his skills as a psychologist to manipulate us into getting what he wanted. I always thought that being a counsellor was a caring profession, I always thought that if you had your own practise you at least cared about other people, but in this case I have been very wrong.

Normally we would let it drop, life is too short to get wound up, but last night when they came to pay for their stay, we suggested that they should contribute to our expenses. Without even knowing how much we were suggesting, they refused point blank. Maybe they were afraid to ask how much it had cost, maybe they thought that for 7 Euros a night they were entitled to everything or maybe they just enjoyed the “taking”. Who knows what was going on in their minds.

This sorry episode ends here and now.  I am putting into practice something I was told a long time ago: "the events and people in your past can only affect you today, if you allow them to”. So Mr G K (no hyphen) H of somewhere near Rotterdam, to put an end to your taking from me, I give you the 20 Euros we were hoping you would reimburse us with. I hope that you set it aside to buy something that will give you pleasure, because I fear that all of the things you take from people like us, give you no pleasure at all. 

That's it - one taker sucessfully exorcised from my life.


For information on our campsite and gites, which are now restored to being full of lovely people, click here.

We have “weather” round here

I have often said that we have real weather here, no wishy-washy winters and summers for us, oh no, we have hot or we have cold, we have rain or we have dry, we have wind or we have wind still and last weekend we had the mother of all thunder storms.

This storm went on all day long and we had rain, after rain, after rain. In total we had 82mm or about 3 1/4 inches for you non-metrics. This is about one and a half times the amount of rain we should expect in either July or in August and all that within about twelve hours.

The wave of thunder storms that tore over the area could be seen in all directions and we were really lucky we were not right in the midst of any of them - Bissy sous Uxelles (a couple of villages down from us) was not so lucky. These pictures show you what happens to a church when it gets hit by lightning. The bell is still hanging on by a thread of burned out wood.

Before

After

After

On the map

The Office du Tourisme has just started giving away street maps of Cormatin and Saint Gengoux le National – although why anyone would need a map for these villages is a mystery that I won’t delve into.

And guess what?? We are on it !! OK, maybe not quite in the right position, but near enough to be famous.


For the a website showing holiday accommodation that is "on the map" click here.

Steam Day

I love steam engines, they live and breathe, not like something that runs on diesel, petrol or electricity which just chunters away and does it’s job either noisily or smellily or in total silence. Those modern impostors may be as efficient or even more efficient than their steam equivalent, but they are not “real”.


Every year there is a steam day in Digoin, a lovely little town who’s claim to fame is the bridge over the Loire which lets the Canal du Centre continue its path unhindered. That was just the other day and so off we went. We stopped in Salornay sur Guye at the butcher to get some delicious mousse de canard, dried sausage and salads and together with a baguette from La Delice de Cormatin our picnic was ready.


The bench on the canal bridge/aqueduct was just the place to eat our picnic and then we went on to the steam engines and we weren’t disappointed.

The pictures speak for themselves.

Just an aside, we were almost on TV again. This time the cameraman missed his chance to interview us, he possibly found the steam engines more interesting.


La Tuilerie Website

Restaurant Update

La Petite Auberge - Cluny

So much has changed on the restaurant/bar front this winter, I really thought it time I posted on my blog just what’s been going on.

La Petite Auberge and the Bosphore kebab restaurants in Cluny and the restaurant of Les Blés D’Or in Cormatin are all still in the same hands fortunately, so there is at least some stability in our lives ! But Café de la Poste and La Terasse in Cormatin and Café du Centre in Cluny have all changed hands and La Grange Finot in Bray has moved to Cluny under the new name of La Régalade.

La Terrasse - Cormatin

Firstly La Terasse. Sadly the previous owner has become too ill to carry on working and the restaurant/bar/café has been sold to a young local couple who are serving good “simple” French food. We have eaten there once and they were very welcoming, efficient and the food was very good indeed, for a reasonable price. The terrace has been full almost every day since they opened, so let’s hope it continues to be a success for them.

Café de la Poste - Cormatin

Café de la Poste, was always a bit of a mystery to us, was it a bar or a café, did it serve food or not? Well now it is very clear it is a bar/café and serves snack-like food. They have all the usual snacky kind of things, croque monsieur, frites, quiche, sandwiches etc and they even had “fish and chips” and although I can’t really comment (being allergic to fish) it looked pretty much like the real thing to me. The owner is the husband of the lady who runs the newsagent in town and he mans the bar with their numerous children. They are not truly up to speed as yet, they still have a few logistics problems to iron out. Who takes what order, at which counter are food and drinks orders accepted and who gets served first are issues they should address, as well as the general speed of service. But having said that, the food was good and the service very friendly and it is great to have a place where you can eat something that is not a full meal in town.

Café du Centre- Cluny

Café du Centre, Chez Sissis (Cluny) does appear to have changed hands, we noticed the changes just after Christmas and it seems a bit late now to ask the only remaining, original waitress after 7 months under the new regime. So I will go on gut feeling and say, they have new owners and if not new owners, they have changed their way of working and staff enough to give a noticeable new feeling to the place. The food is more restricted, but the quality is just as good. Instead of one plat du jour every day they have 4 per week, which, if you only want to eat there occasionally, gives ample choice. I do however, miss the opportunity to have one of their “tartes” or “salades” whenever I feel like it. The additional menu is restricted to croque monsieur/madame, steak or steak haché and possibly one or two other things, this is over and above the 4 entrées (which include salads) and the four main courses written up on the blackboards. We are getting used to it, but it isn’t quite the “same”.

La Régalade - Cluny

La Grange Finot in Bray, our favourite, special eating-out place closed early this year and we were very disappointed to see them go, although we knew Serge was opening up a restaurant in Cluny. We have eaten at his new restaurant La Régalade and the standard is certainly the same as before, although I get the feeling the choice is more limited. We were told he changes the menu every 10 days or so, so for that “special meal”, you don’t have to worry that you will have to eat the same thing every visit. The restaurant is certainly more cosy than at the old Grange Finot and we will be going there again, but we do miss having it next door.

So that’s the local restaurant gossip for the time being, there has been an "all change" in Chapaize too, but that will have to wait for another time !


For information about the holiday accommodation we have, very close to all these lovely restauarnts click here.