Cup of frog stock, monsieur?

This morning came way too soon, since we’d been up so late last night. But we had our breakfast and were ready to cook at 9:30. I was a little nervous, because I don’t do much cooking, but I was determined to use the Sami method and say “oui” to anything. Dave trimmed the boeuf for the bourguignon for quite some time, while I peeled pears and took the leaves off of parsley. Then they asked if I wanted to do the fish, which I totally did not, but I said yes anyway. I got the hang of pulling the bones out with the pliers, but I made a total hash of removing the skin. Fortunately the fish was for the mousseline, so it didn’t matter what it looked like. I redeemed myself by cleaning the live langoustines like a pro. They are like very small lobsters, so they didn’t scare me. I also did good piping of the mousseline into the tins.

Langostines with Patrick and Nicole

We cooked for two hours, then had some Pouilly-fuisse (local Chardonnay, a favorite of mine, as much fun to drink as it is to say), and a little free time until lunch, which started with a salad with poulpe (octopus), then the mousseline with the most wonderful sauce, and then a fig bread pudding the Cedric had made with figs from his own trees, served with pineapple sorbet. And, of course, more wine. Then we had a short break before heading out for wine tasting. Also Patrick told is to bring our laundry to the front desk & they would take care of it, so that was good.

The hotel has a nice 8 passenger Renault which is exactly the right size for our group. And the drive was a good chance for a nap for me, although I did miss some spectacular scenery, Dave tells me. But imagine how delightful to fall asleep in Macon and wake up in Beaujolais! We stopped at a vineyard on top of a hill with a wonderful small chapel. The vines were very interesting – big trunks, but only a couple of feet tall, and not trellised – they looked kind of like grape tree bonsais. Also they had grapes on them – not dense enough to harvest, but an awful lot to leave hanging. It’s a mystery.

We piled back in the car – Dave, Nicole and I get the way back seat because we’re the youngest, although we’re almost 30 years older than Nicole. Our next stop was back in Burgundy, at Domaine Luquet in Fuisse. Cedric worked with Lorraine to say “Foo-eee-zay”, not “Fwee-zay”, and she worked with him on how to say “wacko”. Both sides were very funny. D.L. was great, especially when they opened the door and there were the familiar steel tanks, oak barrels, and bottling line. Of course all chardonnay was originally fermented and aged in oak because they didn’t have stainless steel, but now that they do most producers make it that way. We tasted several of their chardonnays, and also a cremant, which is a sparkling wine made in the traditional method, and a slightly sweet wine which they were able to make for 3 years (2010-2012) because the wine government forgot to put a cap on the amount of residual sugar. The “controllee” in AOC is very strong in France, and if you don’t follow all the rules exactly (including how the vines are trellised or not) then you can’t say your wine is a Pouilly-Fuisse (or whatever), you have to call it table wine and of course then you can’t sell it for as much. Add in the different labeling and record keeping if you want to export to other countries, and you have a full time job doing paperwork for 1.5 people.

We didn’t buy any wine because we still have much schlepping left, but pretty much everyone else did. Then it was back in the van for more driving through gorgeous scenery. I stayed awake this time. We go back to the Hostellerie around 6, and I took my phone and pod out to practice Feeling on the front patio. I’ve forgotten giant chunks of it and it felt weird being out there in the main drag, but I’m not sure where else to go. Suddenly the whole thing about teaching on the cruise is looking like a bad idea – if I don’t practice I forget everything, and unless we stand the bed on its end our room is too small. I’ll figure something out.

I did a little blogging and then a quick showerbath (remember, there’s no bath curtain) and then down to dinner. Tonight’s entrée, frogs’ legs, had many people worried but they were delicious. Before dinner Lorraine was joking with Patrick that she wanted a Chateau d’Yquem sauterne with dinner (given the amount of foie gras we’re eating, we should be drinking sauternes with every meal) and he got her back by going down to the cellar and bringing up a bottle – 400 euros! But then he got a bottle of Cadillac (ca-di-yac) for the table, which is the same grape as Sauterne but on the wrong side of the river. It was very, very good. Other highlights from dinner included chicken sliders (with foie gras), the aforementioned frogs legs, the cheese course (especially the Époisses de Bourgogne, a wonderful soft cheese I first had at a Scott Paul tasting in Carton). Also fun is helping Cedric with his English, talking about the differences betwee terrible and terrifying, and awesome and awful. These are hard things for non-English speakers. Cedric is a fan of horror movies, and coined the phrase terroriffic for something that is scary and fantastic at the same time. Tonight Patrick also told us about what it was like when they bought the hotel 11 years ago, and the renovations, and the part where they had the kitchen in a tent in the front courtyard. It’s quite a story.

This morning when we made langostines we only used the tails, but the whole rest of the creature was sautéed and then pureed and strained to make the most delicious sauce. So at dinner we got to wondering what they do with the rest of the frog, since it would be wasteful to jut use the legs. Do they saute them and make stock? We’ve decided we’re going to go into the frog soup business – we’ll call it Nicolette’s Frog Stock. Sounds yummy, eh? Who’s coming over for a nice bowl when we get back?

I can’t end without devoting a paragraph to two special things. One of them is a person, my uncle David, who in Florida this spring taught me to tie my shoes by going around the loop backwards. We call this “The Uncle David Method”, and it means that we almost never have to stop and retie our shoes. This sounds like a small thing, but when you’re walking as much as we have been the past week and a half it is huge. The second thing is a thing, it is the pears poached in red wine and served chilled with red current sorbet and whipped cream that we had for dessert tonight, which was the best dessert ever.

We start cooking again tomorrow at 9:30. Be ready!