But before that, we had breakfast to tackle. Amazing how Julia, our hostess, made bread and jam into an art form. Of course, bread means a fresh flaky croissant, crusty baguette and a couple of other rustic chewy baked goods. Any resemblance between what you take off the shelf at the local super and the apple and 3 peppers jam, or mulberry, or spiced pear jam, or sour marmalade, or crystallized, unheated honey, or, or, or...is in name only. Fresh coffee, of course, real hot chocolate for Phil, of course, fresh squeezed pink grapefruit juice...not gourmet but simply perfect. We spotted small containers of fresh yoghurt and 3 types of home made muesli to go with it, but, honestly, we were too well fed with the other stuff to even contemplate it.
The weather was overcast above the heavy fog. Mid March is still winter, so we worried a bit that there might be some rain. The day would remain cool, but without precipitation.
So off we went, to the hamlet of Tonnere and the local market. The place was quaint enough, in an average French country-side sort of way, but nothing that would have me rushing back for a second visit. The market was a bit underwhelming too, in keeping with what you might really expect in such a small place. We noticed that all over the place people were handing out flyers. Seemed strange until someone explained that there were municipal elections today. There was also a blood drive. Makes me wonder who were the bigger blood-suckers...the para-medic teams on hand waiting for blood donors, or the local politicians. Interesting what the villagers would answer.
Chablis is one of France's and perhaps the world's most famous white wines. It's a very good chardonnay by any other name. And we were certainly going to taste some. But not at 10 a.m. In order to get a feel of the terroir, we decided we would go for a nice 5 km walk through the vines, forests and hills of the area. The local tourism office gave us a map and assured us that all we had to do was follow the yellow markings. Ha, we thought, a French Mr. Shvil Painter. If we so often miss the white, blue and orange markings of the Israel National Trail (http://shvil-yisrael.blogspot.co.il/) then why wouldn't we miss the simple yellow markings of Chablis. And sure enough, we don't know how, we don't know why, but we missed the markers and walked our own route. The big difference between being lost and not knowing where the designated route is, is that here in Chablis we could almost always see the village, or at least knew exactly where it was, When we get lost here in Israel we get LOST.
On a marked route or not, it was very beautiful. We've seen over both our trips to France lot's of Monet landscapes. Finally we were walking through one. We climbed hills, walked between rows of dormant grape vines and had the town of Chablis in sight, perched on a hill a few kilometres away. We passed here and there a few workers, doing whatever they had to do in late winter between the rows. We skirted forests and then passed through others. The planned 5 km walk stretched into 2 1/2 hours of strolling, probably closer to 10 km, and it was great. Need I mention that life is tough, but...?
By the time we got back to Chablis, we were famished. a rare and unfortunate event in our journeys. Chablis might be reasonably famous, but it is not blessed with an abundance of restaurants. We stumbled upon a restaurant that seemed just perfect. A menu for a reasonable price offering local fare. We entered, climbed the stairs into the small brasserie and saw 8 full tables and one, lone table for four in the middle. Ah, we thought, the food gods are smiling upon us. But alas, no. The waitress informed us that without a booking it was not possible and that lone teasing table was booked for 15 minutes time. She gave us the name of another restaurant, a ten minute walk away. It too was full and had a 45 minute wait. We were getting past famished and didn't like the idea of hanging out another 45 minutes. After wandering around looking for almost anything that wasn't offering just sandwiches and pizza, Phil discovered Hotel de la Poste. Even though rule no. 1 of restaurant choosing is never go to a place that is empty, especially when every other restaurant in the vicinity is full, we were so hungry and so bereft of choices, we decided to give it a go.
Things didn't auger too well when it took the waitress 10 minutes to acknowledge that we were in the restaurant and a further 15 minutes to take our order. She seemed much more interested in talking to a young lad at the bar, that she was tending. It took 10 minutes for Phil's Cola Zero to travel the 5 metres from the bar to the table. A land speed record.
Once she took the order it took a further 20 minutes for the first courses to come out. I remind you, the restaurant was empty, bar one deranged looking woman seated at the back of the dining room. When Garry took a trip to the bathroom, he noticed that our waitress who doubled as a bartender, tripled as a dishwasher. We were quite convinced she quaded as a cook. Grim. Very Grim.
My snail soup was quite reasonable and Yoni's plate of charcruterie was great, if great means ducking out to the local supermarket and buying the cheapest pre-packaged brands you can find. Just goes to prove that poor quality sausage meat can be found everywhere, even in France. He ate it grumpily, because he was hungry. So far, so bad and Yoni's mood was starting to reflect the grave state of affairs. After a further wait, the mains came out. The only bit of almost encouraging news was that when Phil went out back in order to empty his Cola Zero bladder, he saw a cook in the kitchen who wasn't our waitress. It was her pimply 15 year old younger brother. Our "it's a hard life" mantra was starting to take on literal connotations. Garry's pasta in roquefort was quite good, Phil's salmon certainly edible, my steak wasn't exactly Japanese kobe and the pepper sauce had a very large contribution from Mr. Knorr, but given my state of hunger, was acceptable, if no more than that. And then there was Yoni's fish. It was definitely fish, that's to say, it did once swim the seas. To what clan of sea creature it belonged we couldn't tell, and judging by the ammonia smell, forensic testing wouldn't succeed in identifying the genus. Between two layers of white smelly flesh was a row of membrane or cartilage , which led me to think that it was shark. When we described it to Stephane, our host, later in the evening, he confirmed that I wasn't too far wrong. He said it was ray, and I'll whittle that down to skate. Stephane also confirmed that it is indeed regarded as a local delicacy. Well a delicacy this dish wasn't. As Anakin took 3 films to fully embrace the Dark Side, it took Yoni a scant hour to go from humourosly grumpy to full on Dark Side. Move over Darth Vadar. Once we'd finished, all we wanted to do was get out, before Yoni whipped out his laser-saber and cut gaping holes in the waitress and her pubescent brother. We hadn't seen Yoni lose the plot like this for years, though to be honest, I can perfectly understand him. To be served sub standard food in downtown Carmiel, or Jersey City, I can somehow understand, but the one meal that we're going to eat in Chablis, you'd want something far better. Phil has his choosing rights revoked and will not be allowed to pick a restaurant at any time in the coming decade.
It was time to distract ourselves with some of what Chablis is famous for - Chardonnay wine. We left the lunch "restaurant", walked 50 metres down the road and found "signe Chablis". We actually walked ten metres behind Yoni, for fear that the smoke emanating from his ears would lead to spontaneous combustion. (Maybe we were walking behind him out of fear. Full stop.)
In and around Chablis each grower has his own cave, or wine cellar\retail outlet. Signe Chablis does not represent one grower, but is a wine shop that has a wide range of Chablis and Auxerre wines and for very reasonable prices does tastings and explanations. Yoni, Garry and I wanted to taste some wine. Phil, who really doesn't drink (alcohol), found other ways to amuse himself on the streets of Chablis.
The Force was starting to conquer the Dark Side. When the shop owner, who spoke perfect English due to his being educated in England, offered a cheese platter to accompany the wines, Yoni had his smile back on his face. Phew!! The owner, a rather jolly giant, explained about the 4 different grades that made up the appellation; Petite Chablis, Chablis, Premier Crus and Grand Crus. The Petite Chablis was light and fruity, and each grade showed more depth and complexity. That's not to say that we necessarily preferred the Grand Cru. The three of us discussed which we preferred and why, in a very civilized manner, as is befitting the occasion. We asked questions about factors that made up the terrior, and the making of the different grades, including soil, position of the vines on the slope, whether they were on the windward or lee side of the slope and much more. The generous plate of 6 different soft cheeses and fantastic bread helped eradicate the memory of the worst meal we had ever had in France. We left the shop a lot happier, with a better taste in our mouth and more knowledgeable about Chablis wine than when we entered. You can't ask for much more than that, especially given the starting position. We decided we wanted to visit the cellar of a grower\producer, and entered one of the many that line Chablis's main street. Eager to show off our new found wine knowledge, we sipped a few different wines and bought a bottle of the one we agreed that we liked most, for Julia and Stephane. Once we were satisfied with our wine tastings, our attention turned to tart citron. Garry, having learnt his lesson from the previous days faux pas, allowed the lady in the patisserie to pack 3 tarts into a box and off we set, searching for the perfect spot to consume them. The river, more like a creek, in Chablis, looked just the place to walk by and soon enough we had left the environs of the village and were walking through the country, close to but not next the brook. A sign pointed to La maison du moulin des roches. My very limited French gave me maison = house and moulin=mill. I figured that if it's a mill it would be by the water. I may not be Einstein, but I got this one right. It's a lovely b+b, very light and airy. After seeing the house and being duly impressed by the place and the owner, our tart citrons were still beckoning to be eaten. Jean-Pierre and Marie had 4 wicker chairs on the balcony overlooking the creek. We had found the perfect spot to eat our tart citron.
With 2 walks, a bad lunch but good wine in our day's activities, we were ready for a bit of a shloof upon our return to our b+b. It was, after all, Saturday, the Sabbath, and we were on holiday.
Come dinner time, all roads led to Auxerre. We walked around the town a bit and found a nice restaurant that was very full, but not so full that it didn't have room for us. We were greeted by a smiling waitress who even managed to joke around a little with us, despite language differences. I think I said it on our previous trip to France, but will repeat it here. The French get a bad rap, principally from Englishmen who haven't forgotten the 100 years war in the 14 century. Almost without exception we've found them smiling and willing to help, despite our, or their, English. It helps, I'm sure, that we try to speak in what little French we know, but we haven't encountered any of the surliness or refusal to speak English that you hear so much about. Even the Parisians are generally ok, though a little less warm than their country cousins. Of course, the inhabitants of NYC are renowned for their lightness of heart and willingness to help, just like the inhabitants of many large cities in the world. Next time you're in France, smile to the person opposite you, address him\her with a "bon jour" and you will learn that the myth about the French is just that, a myth. (But don't push it, by taking a tart citron yourself from the display cabinet in a patisserie)
In any case, the restaurant with the nice waitress served good local tucker, though Phil almost missed his meal. He wanted to duck back to the car to get his jacket. 10 minutes later he slinked in, jacket-less and crestfallen that he couldn't find where the car was parked. At least he found his way back to the right restaurant. I have images of him still wandering around Auxerre, lost and dazed and increasing Auxerre's total yearly consumption of Cola Zero.
At day's end we could all be heard murmuring something about how tough life was.
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