« Balades matinales »

Okay, I admit it: I am a fair-weather walker. Since mid-January, my husband has conscientiously devoted an hour before breakfast to exploring Bédoin and its environs—be it dark, cold, or sprinkling rain. During that time, I have either been sleeping, checking email, or working on my blog. But, I am happy to report, I have turned over a new leaf since spring has arrived…well, make that since last Wednesday, when I began accompanying Ray on his constitutional. Early morning is, I must say, a very pleasant time of the day. At seven or so, the sun is just starting to peep over the top of the mountain and the town is coming to life. Les boulangers have been up early, of course, and the air is filled with the aroma of freshly baked bread. Ladies at the tabacs and the men at the boucherie are ready for business and some people open the volets (“shutters”) of their houses as we start out on our walk.

In his three months discovering Bédoin, Ray has established a number of hour-long circuits, so he usually chooses our morning route. An in-town itinerary might include a climb to the church, followed by a descent toward the town pool and trailer campsite, past a working farm, and the loop back past la gare routière (really just a covered area to wait for the intercity bus) to get back home. The farm, which has obviously been around for quite awhile, is not at all far from downtown. We can hear its cacophony of sounds—from the donkeys, sheep, roosters, and cow bells—long before we catch sight of the crazy jumble of old and new machinery and buildings on its property. Mornings or otherwise, we have seen very few wild animals on our walks, just a couple of rabbits, none of the squirrels found almost everywhere in the U. S.

Because of the size of Bédoin, it doesn’t take more than five minutes for us to get to the countryside if we choose to do an out-of-town loop. Everything is so green right now; sweet-smelling genêt and lilacs are flowering as are the irises and poppies that once fascinated Van Gogh and Monet. Our trip might include going east on the route de Flassan where we get a great view of the entire escarpment of Mont Ventoux. After about one kilometer we reach the field which holds the evening marché agricole (a mostly-bio ["organic"] farmers' market) and the morning vide-grenier (literally “empty-attic”—a kind of yard sale). Saturday we even stopped by to see what the six or seven individuals who had set up by eight a.m. had emptied out of their attics. As in any type of outdoor sale, there was a real hodge-podge of items: books, records (we’re talking 45s and 78s here), toys, dishes, glassware, pictures, old ads, light fixtures, etc. A Breton-born man was selling everything from African-looking masks to a small carved wooden box to be used for jewelry or as furniture in a child’s doll house. One woman from Carpentras explained that she needed to get rid of a lot of belongings since she and her husband were moving into a small apartment; she had some lovely linens that tempted me but the prices of over fifty euros for each set were too high. Heading back, we took a left off the main road and passed through an area of beautiful homes my husband refers to as “the suburbs.”

Once back on the main street, we stop by a bakery, either Lou Cigalou (provençal for la cigale, "ciccada"--a symbol of Provence) or Olivero, to pick up a bread or croissants and then on to the tabac for the newspaper, noting the temperature outside an agence immobilière (“real estate agency”) as we go. While I can’t guarantee that I will be as steadfast as my husband in my commitment to the morning walk, I have really enjoyed it so far.

Just for Fun

For a village of three thousand people, Bédoin has much to offer inhabitants and visitors alike. Its small downtown includes two grocery stores and several shops; the surrounding countryside, filled with la grande forêt communale, vineyards, and cherry orchards, is beautiful indeed. But in terms of diversion, there's really not much for people to do. Naturally, one finds both a boule court and a small stadium, de rigueur for a country of bocce ball- and soccer-loving people. Otherwise, besides a few restaurants, cafés, and bars, places of entertainment are at a minimum. No movie theater, no concert hall, not even a large park. Next to the post office, however, in what looks like a relatively new structure, stands the two-story Centre Culturel, which as its name suggests, serves as the focal point for nearly all cultural activities in town.

The cultural center houses the offices and most of the activities of la Maison des Jeunes et de la Culture. In a nation-wide movement instituted after World War II, MJCs were created throughout France to promote the arts and to serve as a kind of youth club. For seventeen euros a year, villageois can become members of the local MJC, entitling young and old to free courses, such as aide aux devoirs (“homework help”) and alphabétisation (“learning to read”); a supplementary fee is charged for physical activities--Pilates, Taekwondo, yoga, and the like--and dance classes in modern jazz, salsa, and hip-hop. Language courses (in italien, anglais, and français for newcomers to the area) are available as are lessons in music, informatique (“computer science”), and les arts plastiques (“fine arts”)--dessin (“drawing”), peinture (“painting”), and poterie (“pottery”). On Friday nights there is a cinéval, open to the public, which offers first-run movies for a small fee. Recently, Volt was featured for kids followed by Gran Torino for adults.

Apparently, various groups can rent out or at least reserve space at the Centre Culturel for their particular functions. We first went there right after our arrival in mid-January for le club de Ventoux’s annual Loto (“Bingo”) party. The large downstairs conference room was absolutely packed that Sunday afternoon with people hoping to win prizes and most likely just for something to do on a cold winter day. On another occasion in early April we attended a free lecture on Le Patrimoine industriel du Comtat Venaissin, about the area’s industrial heritage. The two young female presenters, probably graduate students, discussed many different topics in their two-hour talk: des moulins (“mills”), la soie (“silk”), le sable (“sand”), and le plâtre (“plaster”), among others. I was truly surprised at the large turnout (over twenty-five people) and that snacks and glasses of wine were served at the end.

Bédoin’s bibliothèque municipale is also located on the second floor of the Centre. The library, which is open five days per week, for an average of about three hours per day, has a tiny collection of books and magazines, but the librarian is proud that the people of the village have an actual reference room and not just a visiting bibliobus as in some other communities. She guaranteed us, too, that a sort of interlibrary loan system exists so that books could be ordered from other collections in the Vaucluse. Le Centre Culturel serves an important function as a gathering space in the community.

Une Pizza ou Un Sandwich?

Let’s face it: of all of the people in l’Union Européenne, the French probably have the reputation for consuming the weirdest foods. Who else is known to eat such vast quantities of smelly cheese or escargots ("snails"), for example? (Around 20,000 tons a year of the latter according to some estimates.) While I am personally a huge fan of both, I realize that some readers have very disgusted looks on their faces at this point. A few years ago, my husband and I led a small group of college students to Paris and Beaune for their first trip abroad. For the most part, everyone in the group joined right in trying different dishes, like salads garnished with gésiers (gizzards) or chèvre chaud (warm goat-milk cheese--pictured). But one young woman stuck to her ingrained habits of eating only cereal and pasta, which became the running joke of the trip: “Jessica won’t eat THAT!”

Yet French restauranteurs attempt to cater to the tourist trade, at least somewhat. Here in Bédoin, where there are several campsites and, since the beginning of April, swarms of vacationers from Belgium, the U.K., Germany, and the like, the local sandwich shop and pizzerias do their best to accommodate the visitors' fast food needs. Point Cuisson, which was principally a not very good boulangerie-pâtisserie ("bakery and pastry shop") until about month ago, had a change of owners and with that a change of menu. They now serve, among other things, des ailes de poulet (“chicken wings”) and des donuts! While I have never tried either, I feel confident that they are à la française and not how they are chez nous; how could they be otherwise? The shop offers a fairly large selection of sandwiches, too, including one called un sandwich américain: a burger, all right, but on a baguette with French fries inside. The rest of the menu is devoted to French favorites, like croque-monsieur (a type of grilled ham and cheese sandwich) and one Provençal specialty which I particularly like: un pan bagnat, a tunafish sandwich on a baguette with a vinaigrette sauce, hardboiled eggs, and des anchois ("anchovies"). Delicious, but hardly your typical lunch at Subway.

The same is true for pizzas. Unless you live in Paris or another grande ville and have a Pizza Hut or Dominos nearby, you’re just not going to find thick crust pizza with tomato sauce and all of the customary toppings on it. Still, I’ll bet that even these American chains have made concessions to their overseas locations, as they should. So, here at Pizza Phil or at Pizza Paradiso, you’ll find roquefort or chèvre cheese (again) as well as mozzarella under toppings such as artichokes, eggplant, ratatouille, anchovies, or seafood. In terms of sausage, the choices might include merguez (Algerian), figatelli (Corsican), or chorizo (Spanish) instead of pepperoni. My final piece of advice is what I always tell my students. “France isn’t the U.S.: it’s different; that’s why we go there.” As I recall, even Jessica tried a little taste of cheese.

French « Borne »

Upon hearing the word borne, some Americans would immediately think of the French card game Mille_Bornes. Like competitors in a road race, players attempt to be the first to cover a certain distance, usually a thousand kilometers, or perhaps miles in the English version. Cards marked from 25 to 200 kilometers in some of the earlier editions of the game showed an outline of the stone or cement bornes routières (sometimes called bornes kilométriques) or “distance markers” which used to be quite common along French highways. The old bornes seem to be disappearing from the countryside, though, or at least changing form. Still, we have spotted different varieties of the markers both on and off the beaten path in Provence.



Traditional bornes--short, red or yellow on the top and white on the bottom, one might say "tombstone-like" structures--can sometimes be found in out-of-the-way places, like on small departmental roads leading into Bédoin. They often contain information not only about the distance to a given location, but the route number and altitude as well. Most of these are in quite poor condition and very often the distances indicated have become antiquated because of changes in the road systems. The latest renditions, which are metallic or plastic rectangles on metal posts, clearly lack the charm of conventional bornes.



Looking into the history of these markers, I expected to find that they dated from the era of the Roman Empire. In fact, there are vestiges of stone markers near old Roman roads in France. What surprised me was that the idea of using large stones as markers might be much older. Certain archeologists hypothesize that some of the thousands of prehistoric menhirs found on French soil today might have once served to indicate property lines (bornes limites des propriétés) or as directions to follow. At any rate there are perhaps hundreds of different styles of bornes in France today, some even commemorating events of the past. The town of Maisse, in the north, west of Fontainebleau, celebrated its liberation by American troops towards the end World War II by creating a specially designed borne.



Today, while tourists might never see an old distance marker on their travels through France, they do have the opportunity to buy plastic keychains or small replicas of traditional bornes as souvenirs. The word borne itself, meanwhile, has not disappeared. It has been adapted to meet the needs of the twenty-first century and has come to signify any average sized, round-topped machine, such as an ATM or an automatic ticket dispenser at the train station or airport.

The Many Sights of Avignon

« Sur le pont d’Avignon, l'on y danse, l'on y danse… » Just about anyone who has studied French has learned to sing this famous children’s song. From the high vantage point of the garden of le Rocher des Doms, tourists are afforded a fine view of what remains of le Pont Saint-Bénezet which stretches part way across the Rhone. There are also postcards, small music boxes, and other assorted souvenirs linked to the song for sale in many shops. But Avignon, la préfecture (or “the main city”) of the department of Vaucluse, has a long and rich history and much more to offer visitors than the simple sight of the bridge.

Another celebrated structure in Avignon is the imposing Palais des Papes. Since we had been to the papal palace in 2003, on this visit we opted for a guided tour from the office de tourisme which provided the historical background for this and other monuments. Because of wars in fourteenth-century Italy, this immense Gothic fortification was built near papal holdings in le Comtat Venaissin and came to serve as home to seven popes acknowledged by Rome and a few antipopes. Our guide told us about various power struggles between the kings of France, the popes, cardinals, and bishops (one anecdote even involving a king slapping a pope!). We visited a mansion built by a certain Cardinal Ceccano in Avignon in order to keep close ties to the pope. The fourteenth century building, which now serves as the city’s médiathèque, contains murals in remarkably good condition, adorned with symbols representing the cardinal and his family; the wood beams on the ceiling of his ceremonial room (chambre d'apparat) are painted en trompe-l'œil.

Our tour also took us to l’église Saint-Didier, where the guide explained how le style gothique méridional differed from the gothic style in other parts of France. While the creators of churches and cathedrals in the north used des vitraux (“stained glass windows”) to instruct the illiterate of the Middle Ages, in the south murals served the same purpose. In a side chapel she pointed out the differences in the postures, faces, and clothing in the renderings of the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalene. She also mentioned that, thanks to modern technology, great strides have been made in recovering murals from what seems like perfectly blank walls.





On our own later that day, we spent time walking around the city, doing a little shopping, and visiting the animated place de l’Horloge. One thing we especially enjoyed was our tour of le Musée Calvet—a beautiful hôtel particulier, an eighteenth century mansion considered to be un petit Versailles, which is now an art museum.

Bienvenue à la Cave Coopérative!

Although other regions might dispute the idea, Languedoc-Roussillon was apparently the first place to have a cooperative wine cellar in France. At the end of the nineteenth century a group of winemakers in a small town near Béziers decided to band together to save on the cost of facilities, equipment, and marketing. Since that time, about half of the country began developing caves, including Bédoin in 1924. While it may not be true in other parts of France, the cooperative here seems to be an important presence in town.


La Cave VMV (les Vignerons du Mont Ventoux), along with the church, are among the first sights for visitors coming into Bédoin from Carpentras. Open every day of the week, with the obligatory break for lunch, the main building (or le caveau de dégustation) primarily serves as a place to taste and buy local wines. Wine is sold in bottles, for the most part, but there are boxes available, as well as a kind of “service station” area with pumps, where you can get large, plastic, recyclable containers to fill with VMV wine at a reduced price. Near the front of the caveau, there’s a small boutique which sells wine-related items like glasses, carafes, and corkscrews and Provençal products such as soaps, lotions, herbs, and chocolate. The caveau’s informative manager, Mireille, a smiling, middle-aged woman, is always ready to distribute substantial amounts of local wines and discuss them with anyone interested. We’ve learned quite a bit from her about the different soils in the area and the fact that the designation A.O.C. (appellation d’origine contrôlée) does not always indicate the best wines of a given region. Some local bio (“organic ”) producers, for example, do not have limitations on what grapes to use and irrigation controls which come with A.O.C. wines and their products are, at least to our tastes, superior.

Another thing which we really enjoy about la cave is the monthly soirées they hold on Friday nights. At the end January, for example, we attended their Découverte du Nouveau Millésime (“Discovery of the New Vintage”) party where they featured not only red, white, and rosé VMV wines but des omelettes aux truffes to accompany them. I couldn’t imagine an American wine store paying the price of all those eggs, not to mention the truffles, for twenty or so people. Earlier this month, la cave had another one of their special thematic events: la Chasse aux Trésors. Part of the evening was devoted to a "treasure hunt" to find hidden pictures of chickens and win chocolate bunnies for Easter. They also had tastings of bio wines and platters of cheese from La Fromagerie Vigier in Carpentras. The get-togethers at la cave are great, allowing us new taste experiences and the opportunity to meet people who live in and around Bédoin. This last time we were able to discuss cheese with Mme Claudine Vigier and her husband Roland Barthélémy, a well-known maître fromager ("master cheese seller") from Paris. La cave is one of the main centers of activity in the town.

L’Abbaye Notre-Dame de Sénanque

Last summer we saw a remarkable documentary called Into Great Silence which shows the daily life of a group of contemplative monks living in the French Alps near Grenoble. Just last week we were able to visit one of the contemporary monastères habités (“inhabited monasteries”) in France, l’Abbaye Notre-Dame de Sénanque. Located in an isolated valley of the Vaucluse just outside of Gordes, the Cistercian abbey is virtually surrounded by lavender fields which must be a beautiful sight in July when the flowers are in full bloom.

For six euros we took part in a guided tour of the buildings, which provided information on the history of the Cistercians and Sénanque as well as the architecture of the monastery. Our guide explained that in the eleventh century a Benedictine monk named Robert Molesme had become disillusioned with his order, which, in his eyes, had strayed from the rigor and simplicity espoused by Saint Benedict. The “reformed” Benedictines, including Molesme and several followers, moved to Cîteaux near Dijon and founded the first Cistercian abbey. The so-called moines blancs (because of the habit of undyed, white wool that they wear) believed in living a more austere existence of manual labor, self-denial, and prayer.

Named after la rivière Sénancole which runs through the property, l'Abbaye de Sénanque was founded in 1148 and reached its high point in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries when over a hundred monks ran four mills and worked many plots of land. Disbanded when the abbey was sold after the French Revolution and once again in 1904, monks have been living in the monastery since 1988, though they presently only have a community of six.

Considered an example of pure medieval Cistercian architecture, all of the rooms at Sénanque are beautiful in their simplicity. Apparently modeled on Roman building styles, the walls were built to a certain height, then sandbags and a wooden arch were put in place, to be removed once the bricks of the arch were complete. The guide pointed out that the individual stones are marked with the initials of their makers and that the 860-year-old construction has survived at least one earthquake. We visited several spaces in the monastery: le dortoir des moines, a large empty room where monks slept in their clothes on des paillasses (“straw mats”) on the floor, putting oiled papers on the windows when needed to keep out the mistral; the church, l’église abbatiale, whose only ornamentation is a statue of the Virgin Mary holding the Christ child; le chauffoir, a room formerly heated by wood where monks came to copy manuscripts; le cloître, the covered area around a courtyard which has a carving of the devil at the top of one of its columns to remind the monks that temptation is all around; la salle capitulaire, or chapter house, where monks come even today to hear the daily reading of la règle de Saint Benoît, the rule of St. Benedict. The guide said that the priests can at times parler mais pas bavarder, which means that they are permitted to speak, but not to carry on conversations. It was an awe-inspiring visit.

Flowers and Perfume

Springtime is beautiful in France. Vast fields of cérisiers (“cherry trees”) show off their puffy white blossoms. Natural scents from la glycine (“wisteria”) to le narcisse (“narcissus”) and other flowers perfume the Provençal air. What a wonderful background to the business of flowers, the well-known French perfume industry. On our recent trip to Grasse, we decided to look into one of the visites guidées gratuites (“free guided tours”) offered by the three companies still in operation in the city today: Fragonard, Galimard, or Molinard. The latter, a family-run business since 1849, appealed to us, so from the center of town, we took the free bus, called la farandole (or "conga"--we think because it has to snake around in kind of a dance) down the hill to the factory.

Our guide, Lorie, provided a lot of information, focusing on the history of the town and its perfume business. In the Middle Ages, tanneries and glove making formed the backbone of industry in Grasse. With the coming of the Italian Catherine de Médicis to the French throne in the sixteenth century, however, gloves makers searched for a way of offsetting the bad odor of the leather for members of the nobility. The idea was born of perfuming gloves, thus launching a new direction for workers in Grasse. By the time Louis XIV was in power in the 1600s, the town had become the world center of perfume manufacturing. Over the centuries, perfumers have attempted to allow for the demands of their public. In the 1920s, for example, women started cutting their hair, wearing pants, and smoking cigarettes. They desired a more masculine scent, like that of la verveine (“verbena”), as in Molinard's perfume, Habanita. These days Molinard tries to attract the young demographic with perfumes like La Souris Verte (a reference we found out to une chanson d’enfant, a children's song), which comes with a small stuffed green mouse on the top of the bottle. They also offer clients, for a fee of about 40 euros, the option to design their own fragrance.

One of the key players in the creation of perfume is le nez (literally “the nose”), the master perfumer, who often has the ability to distinguish 2000 or more scents. I was surprised to hear that very few women have this skill, given that women seem to have an acute sense of smell. Aromas can come from a variety of flowers, spices, roots, grasses, fruit, leaves, or herbs. By way of steam, solvent, or in the past enfleurage (using animal fats), according to the demands of the various sources, the essence (l’absolut) is extracted. As in the case of many fine wines, different components are then combined and the finished product must age. Lorie told us about the three notes that can be detected after applying perfume. The first whiff of it on the skin gives evidence of what is called des notes de tête (“head notes”); after about five minutes, we can sense des notes de cœur (“middle” or “heart notes”); after several hours what’s left is called des notes de fond (“base notes”). The enemies of perfume are heat, sun, and humidity which is why it should be stored with care.

The cost of perfume products depends on several factors, one being the amount of essence used. Eau de toilette contains only about 2% of essential oils, eau de cologne 4-6%, and le parfum has around 25% of l'absolut, which is why it commands such high prices. Another reason for the expense can be the container, which can account for up to 80% of the total cost. Molinard has a small museum (really several display cases) containing lovely 1930s Baccarat and Lalique crystal flacons à parfum among other items.

The entire industry in Grasse seems to have fallen on hard times. The three perfumeries that remain are no longer permitted to distill their product in the city because of pollution concerns and other perfume designers have moved on to other locales. Yet, it was interesting for us to understand the complicated process of turning flowers into perfume.

Discovering PACA

The region Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur, which includes six départements including le Vaucluse, extends from Orange, Avignon, and Arles in the west to the Alps and the Italian border in the east. Funny thing, though, about what actually constitutes la Côte d’Azur, or what we call the French Riviera. On the east, no problem: Menton which is situated right next to Italy. The westernmost point, however, seems to be somewhat in dispute. According to my research, either Théoule-sur-mer (just west of Cannes) or Hyères (east of Toulon) serves as the Riviera’s end point in the west. At any rate, last Friday we took off in a rental car to do a bit more exploring of “our” area.

The bright sunny day made it extremely enjoyable driving through small towns nestled in the mountain range of le Luberon before reaching our first destination, Lourmarin. The weekly marché was in full swing when we arrived in town, so we spent about a half-hour looking at books, clothes, and gift and food items for sale there. Lourmarin is very lovely, with its art galleries and nice shops—quite surprising for a town of less than 1200 people. We took advantage of the warm weather to find a spot outdoors at a café to have lunch, relax, and do some people-watching. Then we headed to the town cemetery to pay our respects at the grave of Camus.




From there we hopped on l’Autoroute A8 heading east for la Côte d’Azur. After about a two-hour ride we got to Cabris, high in the mountains of les Alpes-Maritimes near Grasse. We had directions to our chambre d’hôte (“bed and breakfast”), of course, but still some detective work was needed to decipher the signs and arrive at the mountainside villa. It was fun walking around the small town, appreciating its views of le port and le phare (or “lighthouse”) of Antibes in the distance. We learned from the lady who owns the B & B that a home nearby, la Messuguière, used to welcome French intellectuals—such as Gide and Camus—to its quiet retreat and that Gide's daughter, Catherine, still lives in the town. There were actually a number of restaurants to choose from and we eventually settled on La Chèvre d’Or (“The Golden Goat”) for supper that night.

The next morning, despite the clouds, we were up early and headed off for Grasse and Vence: two working-class cities which proved to be largely disappointing. Luckily for us, other towns in the surrounding area had a lot more charm. It was enjoyable, for example, exploring the tiny streets of Châteauneuf de Grasse, even if our search for traces of Julia Child and Simone Beck were in vain. We were quite surprised to discover the attractive medieval village of Les Tourettes-sur-Loup, one of those small places where photo ops present themselves at every turn.  Sunday was the worst day of the weekend, rainy and cold, which cut short any plans for seeing the coast. Seems like everywhere we go, too, people tell us that the weather is never like this! Small comfort! We contented ourselves with une brocante (a type of flea market) in Carpentras on our way home.

All About Olives

The silvery green leaves of the olivier (“olive tree”) stay on its branches all year long and are easy to spot throughout the southern-most regions of France: Provence-Côte d’Azur and Languedoc-Roussillon. One sees the gnarled trunks of the low-cut trees lined up in groves, along the side of the autoroute, or in pots as ornamentals in people’s yards. Over a hundred different olive varieties exist and, while the trees generally take three decades to reach maturity, they can live as long as a thousand years! No wonder Van Gogh and other artists have made them the subject of many paintings.

According to what I’ve read, olives, along with grapes, were among the first cultivated crops. When you think about it, the two plants have a lot in common. Both can be grown simply for their fruit or the fruit can be crushed and made into a whole different product, i.e. olive oil and wine. The end results are affected by differences of varietal, the amount of sunshine, the soil and overall climate, when and how the crops are harvested, and, ultimately, the production methods.

Olives have to be harvested carefully and quickly, no matter if the fruit is intended to be consumed directly or to be used for olive oil. Hand-picking yields the best outcome, but olive branches are sometimes gently combed with a tool called une perche à peigne. It is important, however, that the fragile fruit doesn’t hit the ground, so a large net (un filet) is suspended or stretched out on the ground to cushion its fall. The most perfect specimens are treated with a kind of brine and later spiced in some way, with garlic, herbs, chili peppers, pimento, or anchovies, for example, eventually making their way to the dinner table. Others are transported to un moulin à huile, where they are ground and their oil is extracted. Even individuals having several trees in their yard can gather up 200 kilos of olives and have their own oil pressed at a mill.

Three countries in Europe presently account for 93% of the worldwide commercial production of olive oil: Spain, Italy, and Greece. France lags far behind in large part because of an event referred to as le grand gel, a frost in 1956 which reduced the number of French olive trees drastically from around 300,000 to about 70,000 today. Yet, French olive oil is considered one of the finest because of the types of olives grown here (which are not bitter), as well as the country’s strict standards. Eight areas have been classified as appellation d’origine contrôlée, insuring top quality. A woman selling oil at a marché in Lourmarin on Friday told us always to look for A.O.C. on the label, since certain producers "borrow" the big names such as Nyons in order to sell inferior products.

The French have several excellent recipes using olives. A couple of hors-d’œuvres ideas include a tasty spread for crackers or bread named tapenade which can be made with either green (unripe) or black (ripe) olives and cake aux olives. I never tried the latter, but it sounds delicious to me. As for main dishes, there are two recipes from Nice which both use the small, tart niçoise olive: the traditional salade niçoise and pissaladière, a kind of onion, olive, and anchovy pizza without tomato sauce. And with that I’ll say bon appétit!