Bonjour,

Dinner with Karen and Jacques was a real highlight for us. We started at 6:00pm and didn’t finish until 11:40pm…and we loved every minute of it. Most of the meal was homemade including many of the drinks. All the food and drinks were delicious. But mostly, it was a long leisurely meal with fun people talking about everything from our food and drinks to the French Resistance during World War II. We covered it all solving almost all of the world’s problems and had a great time doing it.

1. Jacques started the evening off by popping the cork on a bottle of champagne. He mentioned that it was a dry champagne. I would never complain but I’m not a fan of dry champagne. But Jacques said that since it was dry, he was going to fix it up a bit. I had no idea what that meant. Jacques first poured a small portion of Crème de Violet in our glasses and then filled them with the champagne. The crème de violet countered the dryness and, voila, I’m now ready for dry champagne. Jacques noted our enthusiasm and opened a second bottle. And this was one thing that I loved about the French. They weren’t “purists” about these things. Three times on our trip, including in restaurants, someone mixed in something for a drink (wine or champagne) that we normally don’t drink mixed with other things. To go along with our champagne, Jacques and Karen served us three kinds of cold-smoked fish that Jacques had caught and smoked, homemade sausages, local cheese, and cheese scones.

2. Somewhere between hors d’oeuvres and dinner, we played a game of Pétanque. It is similar to Bocce where the goal is to throw hollow metal balls as close as possible to a small wooden ball called a cochonnet or jack, while standing inside a circle with both feet on the ground. The game is normally played on hard dirt or gravel. We played on Jacques driveway…in fading light and with plenty to drink. I don’t know why all the arguing in this photo, I still had one shot…and after that shot, there was nothing left to argue about.

3. Dinner was fondue made with four different cheeses and mushrooms that Jacques had gathered in the woods. We dipped in fresh bread on our skewers as you can see Karen doing in the photo. An interesting note about wild mushrooms in France: you can take them to your local pharmacist who will identify them for you as edible or poisonous. That seems like an excellent idea.

4. Drinking accompanied every stage of the evening including a few stages where that was mostly what we were doing, along with talking. We started with champagne, then wines, and eventually unlabeled wines, followed by brandies, then essences such as cherry, apricot, and pear – all from his garden, then some 21 year-old Santa Domingo rum, and finally, a series of Scottish malt whiskeys from Karen’s family. I’m not sure when in the evening that it was that I took this photo, but you get the idea. It was a night to remember.

5. Dessert came next and it was also very delicious. Jacques apologized that the ice cream was not homemade, but it was very good. We had caramel salt and myrtle and vanilla ice cream. Excellent. At some point (11:40), Jacques said it was time to collect the glasses. It sounded like a good idea and I was sure that it was time. But I was a little embarrassed when I started to shove my glasses across the table to Jacques. Personally, I could have just used one glass for the whole evening – and it would have been less embarrassing. But it was the end to one great evening in our lives.

Voila,

Bill