Beaujolais Nouveau Etc

Autumn Colour

The defining characteristics of autumn, for me, are what is all around now. The vines have turned colour and so have the deciduous trees, about half the trees in the area: maples, poplars, lime and plane trees. The shades vary from light yellow to dark brown and there's even some red, vines of I don't know which variety. The other major change is the smell of wood smoke, the smoke spiralling lazily from numerous chimneys. It reminds me always of Afghanistan, northern India and Kashmir. The Clean Air Act largely did away with this in England and, anyway, the normal household fuel years ago was coal or coke. Here wood stoves are prevalent and, in this area at any rate, seem to have little affect on air quality. So I can enjoy the smell.

Beaujolais Nouveau

Beaujolais nouveau arrived here on the 15^th, as no doubt to many other places, the big celebration being a two-day junket in Lyon. I know it is traditional to celebrate it but I find it rather strange that an area so proud of its Côtes du Rhone should celebrate a wine from southern Burgundy. I wonder if they do that in Bordeaux, Burgundy's arch rival?

Anyway, Patrique and Valérie at the Bar du Pont took the initiative to arrange a Beaujolais nouveau evening, making tapas to go with the wine. I thought the wine was much better than previous Beaujolais nouveaus I have tasted, with a fuller flavour and longer after-taste. My earlier experiences had convinced me that the tradition was a lot of fuss about nothing. It seems that weather conditions dictated that the wine was long on quality but short on quantity this year, with a harvest 50% below last year's. It used to be said in England that more Beaujolais was drunk there than was produced in Burgundy so that will probably be even more the case this year. One thing I found out that I didn't know was that 60% of the Beaujolais produced is drunk as Beaujolais nouveau. That must be good for the producers' cash flow.

So, I spent an enjoyable evening in the Bar du Pont with Daniel, Claudine and others. Claudine is still annoyed that I agreed to let the Mairie copy my website but I think I can convince her that it frees us to develop it in other interesting ways.

Gégérines

Gégérines are apparently a type of very hard squash that grow locally and are essentially inedible. Inedible to you and me, that is; to the French they are simply a challenge. I seem to remember remarking before that the French could probably make an interesting sauce for cardboard; so it is with gégérines. Claudine has promised me a jar of gégérine jam, a former local speciality, when she has finished making it. Why it is no longer seen around much is no doubt due to its preparation. Apparently the squash has to be pulverised and boiled for a couple of hours four times over before it can be made into jam. To warrant that amount of effort it must taste good.