Christmas leftovers



our Christmas tree



On Boxing Day--another sunny but freezingly cold day we had left overs for lunch. We always try not to have too much left over so that by the 26th everything has been eaten. Some years we mange this, other times we don't. This year we got it pretty much right.

The village butcher had supplied us with a 750g sanglier (mature wild boar) fillet. This gave us 4 portions; 2 for Christmas Day and 2 for Boxing Day. We did decide on the Calvados sauce.

We roasted the sanglier at 180 C for 45 mins in the oven. Then we swtitched the oven off but left it in for another 10 mins. I'd made a few incisions in the fillet and we stuffed them with slices of apple. We coated the fillet in olive oil, freshly ground black pepper, sea salt and a bit of garlic. Into the roasting tray went some water (sanglier is very lean) and oil, some cloves, a star anise, a bay leaf and some ground black pepper. While the fillet was in the oven we put the apple slices which were to go in the sauce in some lemon juice with a shot of calvados, and added a star anise and cloves.

I made the sauce while the fillet was resting. I sauteed off a large shalott in butter, added the apple slices, and a little bit of garlic, salt and pepper. Then I added the roasting juices minus the 'bits' (bay leaf, cloves etc) and a little bit of the liquid which the apple slices had been in. Once it was all reduced I added a very healthy slug of Calvados and flambeed off the alcohol. I finished it with some cream. We had shredded sauteed Savoy cabbage with lardons (bacon bits) as veg.

Tinka sleeping off the sanglier

The wild boar was lovely--very soft meat more the colour of beef than of pork with a distinctive flavour. The sauce went very well with it. We certainly enjoyed it all second time round at lunch on Boxing Day. We even gave the cats a tiny tidbit each...  



No photos of the food sadly. We were so involved in getting it all cooked that we'd eaten it before we realised we'd forgotten...

1st Christmas at Charnizay

Yesterday we had snow but it didn't really lie. Just the odd powdering here and there. Still it added nicely to the Christmas Eve feel.



seafood platter



In the afternoon friends dropped by to wish us a Good Christmas and we sat round the woodburner and drank mulled cider (recipe from Susan & Simon at 'Days on the Claise') which was lovely.

Christmas Eve dinner

Then having brought in more wood we settled down for Christmas Eve. We'd decided to have seafood as an easy but festive meal, made even better with a bottle of Savennieres. We'd decided to go for langustines, large prawns and crab claws. It was great fun sitting in front of the fire, Kate Rusby's CD 'Sweet Bells' in the background and our 2 cats watching our every move in case tidbits dropped their way. Messy food is always satisfying to eat!

Now on Christmas Day the sun is streaming into the house. It is bitterly cold outside. Soon we'll be off into the kitchen to prepare fillet of wild boar, not sure yet if the sauce will be Calvados or Port based ... we'll see. We are having Savoy cabbage with bacon to go with it.

An excellent 1st Christmas at Charnizay.


  

Christmas shopping



Wednesday we went up to Loches to do our bit of Christmas shopping. The hypermarkets (superstores) like SuperU and LeClerc have been decorated for a couple of weeks and have special displays and yes, there is Christmas music piped through the tannoy systems but somehow it is all far less frenetic than in the UK--or so it seems to us. 

Loches decorations

At this time of year our local Sainsbury's where we lived in Suffolk would be heaving--morning, noon or night. There would be relentless 'pushing' of 'things for Christmas', a forest of trolleys in every aisle piled high with enough food to feed a Roman army for a month; long waits at the tills with rumblings of 'queue rage' and signs informing cutomers that yes, the store would be open on Boxing Day.

At SuperU there was an 'animator', a sort of in-house MC onthe tannoy who chattered on in a one-sided conversation with himself about the fantastic special offers. As we came in he was having one about individual mini tagines--special offer on a set of 4. But when we got to the checkout it was no more, nor less busy than normal; there were no extra tills open. Yes the checkout people were wearing santa hats; but they seem to wear these everywhere. A sort of universal retail Christmas 'signature'. We loaded up our shopping including some nice wines to go with Christmas food and went into Loches proper.



musical logs



The market was in full swing, friendly, not frenetic despite much trade at the fish stalls to buy oysters and other delicacies for the festive season. There were signs to remind people that the Saturday market would be held a day earlier on Friday the 24th due to Christmas and that the same would happen for the New Year. We shopped for ingredients for our Christmas Eve & Christmas Day dinners. Christmas Eve will be seafood : langoustines, large crevettes(prawns) and crab claws; neither of us is too keen on oysters. Christmas day will be marcassin (young wild boar), parsnips--to be roasted with honey and herbs and savoy cabbage with lardons (bacon). Not sure about dessert yet. Clutching our goodies we walked back to the car; with no signs of Christmas stress.



The Lady from SATESE



This morning we stayed at home as we were expecting the lady from SATESE. SATESE is the organisation which oversees and approves the installation of fosses. They make sure everything is done to the norms and regulations. She's visited us before to check that the filter bed was in order before it was re-covered by the topsoil but this was the final visit for the formal 'seal of approval'.



bird watching

While waiting for her to arrive we re-stocked the suet balls in the maple 'bush'. It was once a tree but has been coppiced by the previous owners so is now more of a bush. We have a continuous to-ing and fro-ing of blue tits and great tits. Robins and other birds pick up the crumbs on the ground below.

Obviously with 2 cats there is quite a bit of interest in the feeding birds. However, both cats seem to focus on the mice and vole population--bad news for them, but good news for the birds. Shadow is what one would call 'a good mouser'. He can easily bring in 2 a day. They are always dead and he doesn't play with them; he eats them, hardly ever leaving a trace. You just hear him 'crunch'. We've cut down on his cat food a bit as he is becoming rather too 'well fed'. Most we've had in a day is 6. Can't say we like it, but it is his nature to hunt and there are zillions of mices out there.



blue tit in maple 'bush'

Katinka, being younger, isn't as profficient. Quite often they are still alive. When this happens we liberate the mouse or vole and tuck it into a pail in an old towel. We leave it in peace and quiet for an hour or so. If they survive, we let them go free--which is 70% of the time. 

  

Madame from SATESE arrived just before noon. Armed with a large jerry can of water she opened up  the 'regard' (viewing hole I suppose in English) in the septic tank where the pipe carries the water out to the filter bed. Then she went to the filter bed and opened up the 1st 'regard' there. Coming back to the septic tank 'regard' she poured the water in and ran quickly--well as quickly as you can in sticky clay soil--to the filter bed regard to see if the water had flowed down the pipe correctly. 'C'est bien' she said. The correct incline had been achieved on the pipes, making sure gravity caused the water to flow down to the filter bed.

So next week we will recieve a certificate which states that our fosse septique has been properly installed and meets the required regulations.



butter wouldn't melt.....



Stacking wood

Last Sunday we went to a Christmans market at Ferriere Larcon, our first in France. We were curious to see what it would be like. We'd been to Ferriere Larcon before to look round the church, and part of the draw of the market was that it was held in, and around the church. The church is well worth a visit, Romanesque in style, it was, according to village records, probably built by the Templars. We had a good look round, there was a very nice smellies stand and a chap selling lovely glassware. We bought a pot of rillettes (potted pork) and enjoyed a vin chaud (mulled wine).



Christmas Market at Ferriere Larcon

Yesterday we meant to go to the market at the chateau La Celle Guenand to pick up some Christmas goodies and have an opportunity to look round the chateau as well.

Christmas lights in Charnizay



Events however over took us. For some time we'd been trying to get wood delivered and after a few leads fell through we found a supplier, right here on our doorstep in the village. Murphy's Law I suppose. Anyway on Friday we found out that the wood would be delivered about 10:30 am the next morning, i.e. Saturday. Great! we said. What wood we had was getting very low--we'd 'inherited' an elderly collapsed pile with the purchase of the house.

10:45 a tractor with trailor arrived with our 6 cubic meters of wood neatly cut into 50 cm buches (logs) followed by the usual little white van--containing the support team of 2 chaps and a young lad. 6 cubic meters is a lot of wood! In fact it was a full trailor. We'd worked out where we wanted it and they very neatly dumped it on the right spot. It was cold with a knifing wind but we'd checked the weather reports and meteo France showed rain for Sunday and Monday. So we had to grit our teeth and get the wood sorted into a proper woodpile and covered with a bache(tarp) straight away. 



woodpiles

 2 1/2 hrs later all the wood was either stacked into a woodpile covered by tarps or in our woodshed.  Feeling pretty shattered we tottered into the house for coffee and a de-frost. We just had enough energy to light the woodburner and collapse on the sofa with our mugs of coffee feeling reasonably pleased with ourselves. We never did make it to La Celle Guenand. We'll go next year if they hold one again.

And today? As I write this the sky is largely blue, the sun is shining and it is still cold and windy but no rain.....

PS It started raining about 16:30 so we are feeling glad we made the effort.