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Tomatoes, tomatoes, tomatoes – updated

Why, hello there! I know that I have been a bit absent as of late. Oh gosh, it is Summeritis and I have it bad. Plus, I also took an extra day or two off to celebrate the fact that I made it another year and can now wear the ripe ol’ age (or young, depending on how you look at it) of 46 on my shoulder. Yes, I had a lovely day because I know that you will ask. And I am sending out a sincere thank you as well to those of you that sent me such kind and thoughtful wishes via the internet(s). 

But what was that I was saying about ripe? Because if you are talking about tomatoes we have a whole lot of that around here. As in oodles…

…of different sizes shapes and textures.
Now. I tried to tell Remi that planting 22 pieds for just the two of us was a bit ridiculous but of course he just looked at me and nodded, then planted them anyway!
But amazingly, we haven’t yet reached the “take my tomatoes please” level of overload where we are handing them out to all and sundry (save for certain of our neighbors 😉 despite the numbers that have been rolling in steadily. 

And the reason behind that is simply because we love eating them so much! Breakfast, lunch and dinner, it’s all good.
Exhibit A: I think that we have well established that while a foodie, I am even more of a Food-E. If you don’t know what I am talking about well then click: http://lostinarles.blogspot.fr/2013/10/food-e.html. I love that post if I may say so myself. What I am not so proud to admit, is that laziness can slide into obsessiveness mighty quickly. If something is delicious and of the smack your forehead “why didn’t I think of that before variety” I won’t be able to stop making it. Case in point? See above. You are looking grilled baguette topped with whipped feta (feta, cream cheese, maybe a splash of crème fraiche, a pinch of garlic powder and herbs de Provence), those ‘matoes and a pinch of salt. Try and you will be addicted too. I’m sorry/not sorry.

Looking for something more old-school? How about this uber (no, not Uber) traditional Provençal tart? I had forgotten about its existence until the lovely Madame L in the village told me that she was serving it for a luncheon. Well, if it is elegant enough for her…you know the rest. Let’s get started shall we? As I have said before, I buy ready-made pastry crust because a) I live in France and b) as we have already established, I am lazy. I like this best with a pâte brisèe or short pastry crust. Butter up your dish (yes, butter) roll out your dough and pre-bake for a few minutes at 200°C or 400°F. Remove and nap a goodly layer of Dijon mustard. I use Maille Fin Gourmets because it is fabulous and has a bit of whole grains in it which helps give the tart bite (or you could just make up your own combo of regular/whole grain Dijon but I am sorry kids, that bright yellow stuff just won’t cut it here). Then shred a fair amount of emmenthal over the mustard, keeping in mind that this is a tart and not a pizza, which can be very hard for me to do. Then top with the star of the show, your hopefully ready to burst sunshine on a plate tomatoes, add a bit of black olives and maybe a crushed garlic clove in the center – top with some herbs de Provence and cook until the tomatoes get a touch brown which doesn’t take long, say twenty minutes or so. 
Is the above description too rambly for you? Would you like to make your own crust based on a Dorie Greenspan recipe? Then by all means please go visit my friend, the lovely Ann Mah, who recently did her own take on this exact same recipe which makes me look like a copy-cat plus as a bonus on the there is an excellent recipe for “Ratatouillaise” on the home page by our mutual friend, the gorgeous Kristin Espinasse!

Now, I hope you will forgive me if that sounds a little name-droppy. Come on, you know I am not like that! Geez. Ok, just for today because it is going to continue: next up, on the “how to use up crates of tomatoes” menu is an obvious one, tomato sauce! And I first realized the difference in roasting my tomatoes after making this super easy soup from the truly gorgeous and very funny Sharon Santoni. It rolls out kinda like this: Cover a roasting pan in two tablespoons or cuilière à soupe of olive oil. Sprinkle on top of the oil, a generous shake of herbs de Provence, coarse sea salt, a bit of sugar (half of a teaspoon) and four or so crushed and chopped garlic cloves. Warm up the oven to 200°C or 400°F (I honestly seem to cook everything at this temperature, do you?). Core and cut in two your tomatoes. Place them cut side down and roast them until the skin starts to peel away, say forty minutes. Let them cool and remove the skins (as I am impatient, I never wait long enough and so burn my fingertips). Put the tomatoes in a food processor with a steel blade and pulse, throw the garlic in and add the juicy olive oil in by batch to get it to the right consistency and voila. It really is that easy and is of course, better the next day. If I can actually stop eating all of the tomatoes in sight, I hope to freeze this as winter is right around the corner, my friends! (Please oh please oh please let this heatwave end.) 
So, that just leaves gazpacho, right? Right. But. You see I gave my “recipe” – that is as equally long-winded and vague as the others here – to my divinely beautiful friend Ellie (last name drop ever, I swear!) at Have Some Decorum for her scheduled post on the subject but she up and decided to write a very moving tribute for her daughter’s 20th birthday instead. The nerve! So I will just have to update the link when she posts. * Because I am pretty proud of my gazpacho. And apparently, Remi is pretty proud of his. You see, in our house I make all of the soups, pizzas, pastas, hummus/spreads, apéro tastiness and Remi cooks….everything else. It isn’t so confusing that, is it? And yet, Mr. “Anything you can do I can do Better” has decided to step in on my gazpacho game, upping the ante. Then of course, I have to do the same in riposte. Welcome to the Gazpacho Wars. 
Well, it may not be pretty but I will admit one thing, it is a mighty great way of using up the ultimate cure of Summeritis: tomatoes, tomatoes, tomatoes. 
*Done! You can find it and some truly phenomenal other gazapachos (cucumber wasabi anyone?) by clicking Here. 

And speaking of udpates…I know that a lot of you were interested in my friend Anthony’s incredibly charming house that was for sale? Well, as I am superstitious I wanted to wait until it was a done deal but I am happy to say that it has been sold. Remi and I visited to say, “au revoir” to it the other day and it wasn’t without sadness for I really do adore that house. But I can’t wait to share with you his newest project, hopefully next month. But’s lets just say as a teaser that onwards and upwards most certainly applies…

And since you have been kind enough to come back for this update (a new post tomorrow!), I wanted to thank you by sharing one of the great all time classics, played on repeat at our house during warm summer evenings or anytime of year:

I had a lot of fun putting this post together for you. 
As always, thank you SO much for being here and for the insightful comments on my previous post.
Bon appetite! 

Contrasts in Provence, Part 3

I had something else entirely planned for today but thought it appropriate to share something with you instead. One of the things that I have always tried to do consciously here was to share the good along with the “bad”about my life in Provence. This post will be leaning towards the latter, possibly, so if that is not your cup of tea I understand and will look forward to seeing you at the beginning of next week…



To say that I have a temper, well…it isn’t an understatement but it isn’t something that defines me either. Not these days…although when I was younger I used to point to the color of my hair in explanation. Such a redhead. But if you do push me over a certain line on certain subjects, I will explode.

When you live in a big city such as Paris or New York, there is always a cushion of anonymity in your daily interactions. Even in Arles, there is such an enormous influx of tourists that it took years for folks in our neighborhood to really pin us down. Not so here, in this tiny village that is very proud of being “off the map.”

I have never lived before in such an environment, having grown up either in the country or smallish towns or big cities but a village is an entirely different animal, one where I will call out “Bless you” thinking that Remi has sneezed only for him to call up, “It wasn’t me!” Oops. “It takes a village…” Yes, it can, when everyone sees eye to eye. But when things devolve into petty differences, they can quickly escalate into disproportional arguments. Especially when you are the new kids in town.

We are extremely fortunate in that the neighbors en face or across from us are discreet. Mr. M, the retired coiffeur, is barely at home and is delightful when he is. The other house that overlooks our courtyard is lived in by an elderly man and his son, who, since they don’t have a landline, talks on his cell phone outside in order for the signal to pass. It echoes like a rocket chamber and we hear every word. We have been patient – save for on one of our first nights at this house when he sat on our front steps to talk – but it is tiresome.

Yesterday evening, after a nearly two hour long phone call spoken at high volume, Remi stuck his head out of our gate and politely asked if he could keep it down a bit. Fifteen minutes later, our bell rings and the young neighbor is back with his visiting twin brother. Remi is a Libra and a champion diplomat. I sensed already that the brothers were looking for trouble and so, confident in Remi and less so in my temper, I receded into the house as it was time to open up the shutters and windows after a long, hot day.

My instinct was right and I heard the brothers voices rising despite Remi’s insistently calm tone. He would later tell me that threats were involved, directly and indirectly, all because we had asked him to speak more quietly! But no, it wasn’t about that finally, not really. It was about the fact that we aren’t from here. For as I reached the top floor windows I heard one of them declare that they were pur race or pure blood of long date from this village, implying that they could do what they wanted.

Am I proud that I came downstairs at a run and shouting? No, I am not. But I can’t abide by such language, especially in a country which was controlled by Hitler not so very long ago. I made my point that while a foreigner I had every right to live here despite that the village had voted Front National in the past elections. “Je suis FN!” the twin brother responded, “I belong to the Front National!” I told him that I didn’t doubt it and then finally respected Remi’s heed for my swift return indoors. Amazingly to me, Remi was able to forge a verbal bridge and the brothers left him with a handshake. But I was still shaking with rage.

And yes, as Remi would later wisely say, a confrontation between us has been long in coming. The tension started on that night a year ago. Their family has never returned our “Bonjour” so I have stopped trying. There are others in the village that are cold to us, making it clear that we are unwelcome – and my strong reaction undoubtedly came off a recent series of rebuttals – but happily, there are many, many more that are kind – the amazing folks at our local garden being just one example. But still, last night’s interaction made me well aware that there is an undercurrent to keep in mind and a balance to be found. I doubt we will have any other such interlocutions with the twins as in the South people explode once and since we didn’t retreat, it will be dropped and we will politely ignore each other.

So, all of this is to express as I have said before, it isn’t always La Vie en Rose when one lives overseas as an expat, even in such a gloriously beautiful region as Provence. It is a learning process. And while I don’t regret sticking up for my (very American) ideals, I still have much to learn.

I have written a few other posts in this series, some having to do with the FN, some not.

If interested you can find them at:
http://lostinarles.blogspot.fr/2014/05/walking-blind.html
http://lostinarles.blogspot.fr/2014/03/contrasts-in-provence.html
and
http://lostinarles.blogspot.fr/2014/04/contrasts-in-provence-part-two.html

Have a wonderful weekend…

…and may the light shine bright for you wherever you are.

Avignon, misc.

“In Paris one quarrels, in Avignon one kills.”
Victor Hugo

The essence of Avignon has remained somewhat illusive to me. It can be quite stunning, magnifique even and yet, after many visits, I am still searching to define so much of its personality. There is a rigidity in the architecture that is so different from the Italian softness of Aix or the olé rondeur of Arles. And the energy can be sharp and static. It’s intention is not set out to charm as those other two A-named cities that close le triangle doré do but rather to impress. And that is deeply imbedded in its history.

The major shift for Avignon came in 1303 when, amidst chaos and confusion in Rome,  a Frenchman – Clement V – was named pope (there is a question of bribery having been involved), one that included transferring the seat of the Papacy to a safer place. The Angevin Counts of Provence, who were papal allies, were quick to welcome the new pope to the city of Avignon. When Clement V died, he was immediately replaced by the vote of French cardinals, who continued the tradition of embracing a French pope and distancing the power of Rome. These successive popes built palaces upon palaces as the strength of their power took hold to create the Palais des Papes, a residence which was confirmed in 1348 when the Papacy bought the town of Avignon outright from Jeanne I of Naples, an Angevin Countess of Provence who was given 80,000 florins for the sale along with an absolution for her possible involvement in the murder of her husband.

So was Avignon built on blood? You could say that and certainly the years of the Avignon Papacy were considered a dark time. With the residency came money and with the money, especially in the hands of extremely lenient popes, came quite a lot of trouble. As the great poet Petrarch declared, “Avignon is the hell of living people, the thoroughfare of vice, the sewers of the earth…Prostitutes swarm on the papal beds.” Under papal tolerance it was known as a ville ouvert or “open town” that would welcome outcasts such as criminals and heretics. That stance formally remains today and one can come across some fairly shady characters while strolling the rue de la Republique.

In 1377, Italy was finally able to bring about the return of the Papacy to Rome and as the seventh Avignon pope died while there, he was replaced by an Italian one. This created an enormous rift, called the Western or Second Great Schism, as the French cardinals immediately elected an antipope to rule in Avignon as well. This feud continued until 1403 when the French people sided with Rome and sent an army to send the antipope packing. Cardinal legates from Rome guided the city – still with a very lax hand – for the next three and a half centuries until the French Revolution, which was, unsurprisingly, especially brutal in Avignon.

But of course, that is just one side of the story. The Avignon popes also brought the finest Medieval artists over from Siena to paint the palaces and the remaining masterworks can now be seen at the Musée du Petit Palais. Many great businesses were established under its financial blessings, such as some of the earliest printing houses in the South of France and the city remains a boon to that industry. In 1946, French actor Jean Villar formed the Avignon Festival of Theatre and Film, the greatest in all of Provence which attracts visitors from all over the world. It was named the European City of Culture in 2000 and it is home to several UNESCO World Heritage sites.

Add to all of that gorgeous southern sun breaking over the ancient stones, an active café society topped off with the kick of the mistral winds rolling down the bordering Rhone and you have something…a little mysterious and more than enough to give a feeling of je ne sais quoi, to add the miscellaneous chasing on the heels of Avignon.


Rediscovering the taste of things

Also known as…”Oh mon Dieu, what on earth are they are selling us at the supermarket?”
Behold Exhibition A, above. Now…let’s see if you can guess which of these tomatoes was bought – in season no less – and which one was grown in our garden…Exactly.
Yes, our little garden specimen is not bright red (a good thing as it is a noire de Crimée or a “black” heirloom tomato), it is kind of scrappy looking and has some stretch marks along the top…but what about on the inside? Just to be sure, let’s try the specimen on the right. Hmmm, a distinct flavor of…watery…air?
Above are the basics of what we are growing in our garden, along with snappy salads, a failed attempt at resuscitating moved wild strawberries, not so hot red peppers and radishes that pack lightning heat. We are learning that not everything grows perfectly in this silty soil of Provence but if they do, well then look out – it is like tiger-taming. 
When there has been a “first” harvest of something, Remi and I would celebrate the moment by having a dégustation and then stare it each other, wide-eyed with wonder while slowly savoring each bite. Then we would blurt out, every single time: “But this doesn’t taste anything at all like what we have been eating! C’est fou! Not even close!”
The tomatoes burst in our mouths like the friendliest version of the sun imaginable (and will get their own post with recettes next week), the zucchini is so dense that it could pass for steak, our neighbors shallots are smoky not stinging, the cucumbers have a sweet perfume and aren’t watery in the least, the purple eggplants have made a convert out of Remi as they aren’t even remotely bitter, let alone the white eggplants which make us feel like we are dining out at a Michelin one-star and the potatoes which demand to be the star of the show, never again to be relegated to the role of lumpy side-dish.
Those of you that grow vegetables have most likely stopped reading by now. You know all of this and secretly shake your heads at the rest of us poor fools. But what about those of you who have never had a garden? 
Like…us? This is our first attempt at gardening ever. We were uncertain as we have killed many a houseplant in our years together but, as I have mentioned, there is a lovely little community of fellow gardeners who kindly keep us on track. And truly, as the rental of the land is only 20 Euros for the entire year, we thought, “What the hay, let’s give it a go.” Certainly, it is a lot of work but of the kind that wipes away any troubling worries in the process and the bounty just keeps on coming. We are hooked. 
And we are also convinced that it is wonderful for our health too. Because even if you can afford to buy organic at Whole Foods or any big producer, many grow their goods with hothouse techniques – yep, even here in France, land of non-genetically modified, non-hormone injected and non-cloned foods (don’t even get me started on the recent lobbyist bought insanities in the House of Representatives). But here is my question: while the jury is still out regarding whether heating foods in plastic can cause cancerogens in the body – isn’t food grown under plastic basically subjugated to the same effect? Or worse? If anyone out there knows the answer to that question, please speak up. But the theory seems plausible to me…
…as does reaping all of the “extra” benefits of growing your own. Such as discovering that you magically happen to have five fleurs des courgettes that have blossomed on the same evening and that if you stuff them with ricotta then bake them with a thin paint of egg yolk and a sprinkling of bread crumbs, you automatically have at hand the perfect apéro item for two.
It’s enough to start me off on the path of rediscovery all over again…

Rough around the edges, part deux

I was sitting at a table amidst a group of smart, charming and interesting people. It was an introduction that had come about through this blog as a few of them read along. There was a surprising breeze on the outdoor terrace perched next to the Rhone in Arles. It played with the wisps of our hair and lifted the conversation to and fro. But honestly, I was talking a lot – quite the rarity as I have grown nervous in groups during recent years. I think it was born out of the delight and relief of being amidst people roughly my own age and culture (highly unusual), a kind of letting go, on top of the fact that I had already been talking for hours while giving one of my walks through Arles. Maybe it was the heat running over my forehead but I could hear my voice beside me as if the words were spooling outwards trying to catch the breeze. Or it could have been the rosé that was generously being poured. But there was a moment, just the tiniest of ones, when I happened to catch – literally – the glance out of the corner of an eye of one of my table-mates. And somehow I instinctively knew that it was – enfin – a recognition of something that they had been hoping to see in me, based on what is written here.

Those of you that have been reading a very long time know that I moved around quite a bit in childhood – every four years or so – and the result of that can be a push and pull within me of wanting very much to be liked or the reversal on a dime of “I don’t need anyone” (but you, Baby). Like a lot of people who lived through such moments of blur and constant newness, I adapted. But that left me a bit rough around the edges. I didn’t always know where the extension of me ended and where my absorbing the company around me began. That survival tactic ended quite abruptly – or so I thought – during my young adulthood, something that I wrote about a few years ago, hence this is a “part deux.”

But here is the thing. I recently reread that post – written in 2011 – and I have a different perspective on both it and myself now. Since then I have mused a ton about the shifting and shedding of personality. The cult of it too in our society. I thought that, especially in these past few years where so much has happened – where we have down-sized twice and moved out into the silence of the country – that I was stripped down to the bone, left with only the essentials. So much gone but also so much gained. What it might be like to be a white bird in the snow. But that side-glance was like a tiny prick in a balloon. Enough to let out the air but not to make it pop. I have been chewing on the questions it awoke in me ever since.

Who are we when we make our way through the world? Where does the how of it come from? I want to ask these questions again. Is that always an extension of our inner selves? I don’t know if it is. Or maybe it is for most people but not necessarily for an adapter like me. Actually, during that conversation at the table I told an anecdote about when I was an actress and not wanting to do film anymore after seeing my face during the rushes for the first time and thinking, “But that isn’t me, that face doesn’t represent at all what I feel.” That and I had a memory that floated down like a feather from nowhere last week. It was of the head costumer at the Yale School of Drama saying, “Well, it is for you because you are a girl that knows how to wear a gown.” Just that. And I haven’t been able to shake that sentence because he was right, I did. And I do? It certainly wouldn’t appear so as I am today in tank top and shorts, legs crossed at the angle of a number four. With all of the weight that I have gained in the past few years my body feels heavy. Quite masculine.

And where does that come from? Well, here is the answer I have from some of those questions – beyond the weight which is my own – I think it comes from Remi. Or, to be more precise, in my not, finally, being so reduced to the essential as I thought but – without thinking – picking up on his way of doing things, of moving, of expressing. Truly, when I had that thought earlier today I was like, “Oh come on, really?” but it makes sense and not just from a “couple who have been together forever” standpoint. Me, still a chameleon then, still adapting. Is that a bad thing? It hasn’t always been as that flexibility helped me be a decent storyteller. And while I have definitely become ultra aware of that roughness around the edges – certainly since that conversation – maybe I can use that to my advantage to make the changes that will make me feel…better. And then I can redefine that feeling as something more akin to…porous?

Remi and I will be celebrating a big anniversary (that I am quite proud of) in a few days and I have a birthday around the corner so I imagine this post is coming right out of that pressure of time passing and hoping to get some truth from it. I hope that doesn’t sound too pretentious, I don’t mean it to be. As I have been writing I have been trying to put these pieces together – not only for me but for you as well just in case it rings a bell. But does it? In reading the comments of that earlier post, it seems like this is an issue that most of you tidied up long ago. And while many of us have been writing about the changes to our appearance mid-life (can I begin to tell you how I loathe that phrase?) that isn’t really what I am trying to roast over the fire either. For me, it seems like I am not always connecting the dots between my inner and outer self. That is good to know. More to learn then and the best part is…as far my inner self is concerned? That feels mine and true and as solidly delineated as a child’s roughly shaped drawing of a heart.

Thank you for all of your wonderful wishes for La Contessa on my previous post…

to listen to:
Bon Weekend…

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