We were rather chuffed to receive an invitation the other day to taste the new wine at our local vineyard, the
Domaine de La Garde. It took place in the wine making sheds and was organised and hosted by several generations of the family (the patron and chief
vigneron, Jean Jaques Bousquet, can be seen here in the centre of the picture). The old mother is just like a previous Director of Abbot Hall, but her teeth are even more challenging. She is completely incomprehensible, as is her husband, due to their very strong
Occitan accents. Despite the fact it must be pretty obvious we only get one word in ten, they are completely undeterred, and prattle on nineteen to the dozen.
Unlike Beaujolais (nouveau), the new Cahors and Coteaux du Quercy wines will not be drunk yet, and the better ones won't be bottled for a couple of years. The new wine had just finished its second fermentation and had not yet been blended. We were thus able to taste the individual
cepages in their raw state. There was Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and, of course, the local, much coveted Malbec (or Auxerrois as it is sometimes called locally). It was, indeed, pretty raw but that was no reason not to get well stuck in.
We seemed to be the only English there, but some of the locals seemed to be taking things quite seriously, There was lots of swishing round in the mouth, sharp intakes of breath and other strange facial contortions so beloved by wine connoisseurs. But somehow the French seem to appear less pretentious than the English when they take their wine seriously. Perhaps they are not quite so earnest And perhaps they take themselves less seriously.
We were surprised to see two unusually elegant ladies arrive (in the left of the photo above), and assumed they must be what passes for Cezac aristos. Actually they turned out to be Dutch.
One of the reasons (other than the opportunity of free wine) we went along was to see the demonstration of making
Pastis. This is a Quercy speciality which we had seen for sale in the markets. It generally sells for around 22 to 24 euros for one which would feed about eight people. It is a pudding (that much we had gathered), but we didn't really know what it was or why it was so outrageously expensive. Now we do.
It has nothing, apparently, to do with Pastis, the alcoholic aniseed drink, other than the word derives from an Occitan word meaning pastry (though what this has to do with the drink I have no idea). Pastis (the pudding) does have alcohol in it, but rum not Pastis - all very confusing.
The demonstration took place in the
vigneron's kitchen. I was intrigued to see that our's was not the only house in the locality with a bare light bulb dangling from a piece of wire (see circled bit in the photograph above). I noticed also that the wire had been rather cunningly looped round to reduce the likelihood of people banging their head on the bulb.
After rolling what started as quite a small ball of dough, it soon spread to become, first almost as big as the table, then bigger than the table. She teased and stretched the elasticated dough from underneath so it became bigger and bigger, and thinner and thinner.
Soon it was draped over the sides of the table and the audience began to wonder when they too would become enveloped in Pastis pastry. All of this took quite a long time, which is presumably one of the reasons it is so expensive.
Our Pastis cook then produced a very ancient (and rather grubby looking blow heater) which she propped up precariously against the rolling pin in order to dry the pastry. It looked as if at any minute the rattly old thing would tip over and set fire to the pastry, or possibly the table cloth and we would all be burnt to a cinder as the whole place went up in smoke (no running green men or fire exits here).
Before there was a chance for this to happen, however, the electrics blew. Again I was reminded of our own house, and again I was rather comforted to know we were not the only ones whose electrics blow if you turn on more than one appliance at a time.
It took quite a long time to sort out the problem despite the numerous offers of advice from the audience (I got the feeling that this might be quite a common problem in the commune of Cezac - and probably in most of
la France profonde).
Next a small girl was enlisted to paint oil on the now sail-like expanse of pastry. Unfortunately, such a small girl did not have long enough arms to reach very far across the pastry so she concentrated on one small area which soon became saturated in unsaturated sunflower oil. You will also notice that a few holes had started to appear round the edges. Our demonstrator kept assuring us these didn't really matter, but it was quite obvious to anyone with the most elementary understanding of physics that they did.
Then we were all invited to smell the heady aroma of the diced apples which had been soaked overnight in a concoction of rum, sugar and spices. They did look and smell delicious. And this is probably another reason why Pastis is so expensive.
Having scattered the apple evenly across the pastry, sugar was sprinkled all over, and yet another attempt was made to repair some of the holes (which we were again assured were "
pas grave").
Finally the whole ensemble started to be rolled up (notice how the holes now became a pain).
In order to roll the enormous spread all at once, our cook very skilfully lifted the tablecloth forcing the whole lot to roll slowly across the expanse of table.
Once this was done, the roll itself was rolled up and then placed flat in the dish ready for baking.
More oil, and into the oven at 180 degrees for an hour and a half - a real weight watcher's nemesis
And now for one I prepared earlier (see below). A much smaller version was brought out for us to try. But not before a syrup made from (more) rum and sugar was spooned with laudable generosity on the previously cooked Pastis.
The final version as it appears in the market (and the more discerning bakeries). We now know why it is so expensive. It takes over an hour to prepare (not counting the time peeling and cutting up the apples and soaking them overnight). It is then cooked for an hour and a half. You have, in the meantime, ruined a perfectly good tablecloth, blown the electrics in your house and very probably wrecked what was once a serviceable heater. Copious quantities of rum, oil and sugar have been used. And your stress levels have gone off the scale as more and more of those
putain des trous keep appearing in the pastry.
Pastis is certainly a great treat if it's a good one, but G and I did feel it might be a lot easier simply to buy a good tarte au pommes and wash it down with a few good swigs of rum.
