Oh, dear me.
Well, here is the deal. Last night, while watching the municipal election results roll in from around France, I was pacing the room violently, sloshing the red wine in my glass as I did so, until worked up to a fuming pitch, I swore to myself that I was going to write a tirade of a post today.
And yet, I just can’t quite do it. Not yet, at least.
Am I angry/afraid/appalled that the extreme right Front National party made such a large advance over their numbers from four years ago? Indeed I am. So much so that I find myself slightly stunned and waiting eagerly for next Sunday to arrive for the final round of voting with a desperate hope for a “Say it isn’t so” moment.
Here in Arles, Herve Schiavetti, the current mayor, has the lead but with only 38% of the vote, while the FN candidate has a whopping 24%. Really? In Arles? Such a second place status was rampant, especially in the South of France and in nearby towns like Avignon, Saint-Gilles, Tarascon and Beaucaire, the FN so far has the lead often with just shy of the 50% needed to have won in the first round.
So, for lunch today, I knew just what to make. It is one of my favorite winter into spring salads but is also quite bitter. Parfait.
Endive, beet and blue salad
for 2 people (any more and you might have political disputes)
3 heads of endive, sliced into rounds and sliced in two
Top with:
cooked beets, diced
sprinkling of dried cranberries and/or golden raisins
a sliced apple for crunch
ample amounts of crumbled good blue cheese (I used a bleu d’Auvergne)
sliced nuts on top
Sweet mustard vinaigrette
2 soup spoons of Dijon mustard
2 soup spoons of a sweet vinegar
(I used a mix of crème de noix – aka nuts – and balsamic with lavender honey)
4 soup spoons of good olive oil
salt, pepper and herbes de Provence to taste
Whisk the mustard and vinegar together then add in the olive oil by two’s, adjust to your preferred consistency and taste.
To read an article in the New York Times on this subject (not the salad): please click here.
For those of you wishing to learn more about the background of the Front National party, please click here (and don’t miss the founder’s denial of the Holocaust and the current interest in deporting unemployed immigrants…*cough cough*)
To read a previous post that speaks of this party, please click here.
As for Ben and Kipling?
They have both made their point of view clear: “Wake me when it’s over.”
Just to balance out the amertume?
Here is the beautiful opening to the new collaboration between Bonobo and Late Night tales. The entire album is just wonderful…
Have a great week everyone…
PS. Thank you all so very, very much for your overwhelming response via comments and emails about Remi’s first story in National Geographic magazine. We both are extremely moved and grateful.
You sound like I often find myself on election nights here. Politics do have a way of getting under one's skin, don't they? Love the looks of the salad – I've just purchased two packets of beet seeds and hope this year to grow my own! (Ha! I am much better at packing suitcases, than gardening . . .or understanding politics!) hugs to you – J.
Wake me up when it's over…who cares? The best attitude we could learn from your clever dogs they rather enjoy
"Late night tales"…and politic is always the folk. Enjoy your NG success, your beautiful salad and wine. Cheers, dear Heather.
Grrrrr – sorry that politics has you down but glad that it inspired this incredible looking salad!! Of course I side with the puppies, but I also feel your pain! Thank you for your wonderful pics/words; I will send some good vibes to France…(I'm serious).
Ben & Kipling have the right idea, don't they?
I'm not sure to say "I'm sure you've seen" or "I hope you haven't seen" about the page one of Flemish leading paper, a photo shopped photo of President and Mrs Obama, lower half of their faces as baboons, on the eve of his visit to Brussels. Disagree with his policies, expected, healthy debate. Picturing any person as a baboon: ignorant: a Black person – racism; one of the smartest, best educated head of state on eve of visit to one's country: screaming ignorance, paranoia, hate, prejudice that goes so far deeper than word "prejudice." It's all related – this, FN. I think we need to stay sane, enjoy pleasure of good food and orchids, love and art, so we have the strength to not let our various places, towns, countries being taken over by these cunning, dangerous fanatics. Hey, If I can do it, anyone can. I live in Florida!
I haven't found National Geo yet!!!!!!!STill searching…….and when I do you will hear me SQUEAL with DELIGHT!
I do not even listen anymore to the politics…………BUT that salad looks delicious!I will be arriving with CHERI who commented above me!I agree with her……………people just do not THINK!
Ben & Kipling……..so debonair and darling!Too bad they couldn't rule FRANCE!
XOXOX
I supposed with the recent terrorist attacks around the world, and stories in Britain of female mutilation, a movement to the far right is predictable however uncomfortable. We can always pray that the pendulum will soon swing back to center. On a happier note – how goes the house hunting?
I'm coming to your house for the salad and to take up arms against the FN, hehe, it's also scary in many places in the U.S., very hard to believe in this day and age but then again humans use only a small part of their brain….
All one can do is to fight for worthy causes and try to keep the light lit a little bit longer.
P.S. just for the record, and in the interests of maintaining a complete racial profile of your fans (who knows when this might be requested of you)?….
Herve's 1/4 Jewish (completely Jewish,. I suppose, by some standards, since it's through his mother's mother, et al). Ironically enough, the Jewish portion of his "bloodline" is the only genuinely French bit of him; the rest is entirely Russian&Irish political emigres from 1920 or so (they all married-into and settled in Tours).
We don't spend a lot of our time wondering over and over again why Marie Le Pen never invites us over for a cook-out in her backyard. At least I'm a blonde, blue-eyed, 20th generation Epicopalian…..you'd think that would gain us SOME sort of credit/entree with the FN…….but no.
Ooooops…I forgot for a moment…..we're also homosexualists. I guess we'll just stay where we are, then.
Best of luck to all of us,
David Terry