Foraging for Cèpes

Three years ago when I first met our neighbours, Monsieur and Madame M, I had found out that each autumn they head down to some woods south of us to search for cèpes.   The first autumn, I felt it would be too forward to ask if I could tag along, the second was too dry, and the third saw such fierce competition among the foragers that some cars shoved others off the country road.

Since being a mycophagist from an early age, finding cèpes places high on my bucket list.  So when I recently got a phone call from an excited Madame M that her godson has spotted the first cèpes fruiting near his farm, I was very happy.  I was instructed to bring a cap to protect my hair from the spider webs strung along the trees, a walking stick, and galoshes.  They warned me we may not find any.  I now know they didn't have the heart to tell me I would be the one not to find any.

A recipe of Madame Ms:  sauteed cèpes 

The next afternoon saw us packing their car with our stuff and persons, and off we drove to the Dordogne border.  We went to the godson's farm to let him know we would be going through their woods.  Though the French highly regard politeness and being bien élevé, I suspect the real reason of notifying Phillippe is that the time for cèpes foraging overlaps with the hunting season. It's being responsible to know who is wandering about your property.

Monsieur M and Phillippe roam the farm each morning looking for game

We stood talking all together in the farm's courtyard listening to Phillippe, a beau gosse if I have ever saw one--tall with a ready, infectious smile and thick black hair.  He was clad in knee-high boots the colour of which matched his wavy locks.  Caspar, a young Golden Retriever, pranced about.

Some of the farm buildings, the courtyard is off to the left.

Though quite physically imposing, Phillippe kept his gaze down while softly telling us that spotting cèpes is in the eyes.  With a quick, upward glance, he said, and I have the eyes.  We then bundled back into the car and went to the wooded area.

I love forests with their dappled shade, sheltering canopy, and sweetish smell of damp decay.  This one contained many chestnut trees, and their hairy, broken capsules were strewn all over the forest floor like bizarre, little wigs.  Monsieur M said that there is always food to be had here: mushrooms, game, and nuts.  We started out all together, but gradually we lost track of each other for long periods of time. 

Every once in a while, one of my companions would surface and show me their finds.

After harvesting by twisting and pulling, the bottoms can be shaved clean with a knife

They would always yell across the forest, Rien?  And I would always have to reply, Rien.   You see, apparently I don't have the eyes. Then they would wander off again, leaving me alone.  I didn't mind being alone, but I craved to be told a specific technique how to spot brown-capped mushrooms which are mostly buried under brown leaves.  So I would ask each time one of my group popped into sight, so how are you finding all of these cèpes?  The reply was always it is in the eyes.

I asked if mice were taking bites out of the mushrooms, but the answer was slugs.  Then off they would go again, leaving me to ruffle the leaves with my walking stick, looking for cèpes in vain.

A bit discouraged, I went back to the car and found no one there so I returned to the forest.  This time I found boletes, but not cèpes; these had yellow tubes/pores instead of white.  I also found extremely hard and woody shelf mushrooms.

A colander for mice?

More time passed than I must have realised.  I heard someone shouting my name and one of my companions appeared.  They thought I had gotten lost.  A shouting volley then began, alerting the rest of them that I was found and the search was off.  We returned to Phillippe's farm, and I got to see the rabbits, goats, and ducks.

Caspar really warmed to me.  He followed me around as I took photos and sporadically would stand up, facing me with his paws resting on my shoulders.  He was such a darling and tried to enter the back seat of the car with me just before we left.  I wondered what Dayo would think of his smell on me.

Monsieur and Madame M let me off in front of my home, and as we unpacked the trunk, I was given a generous amount of mushrooms from their large basket. Still miffed that I was unable to find any cèpes, I suggested perhaps one needs to spot a gently rounded mound of leaves, shaped so because a big mushroom is in the process of raising them.  No, said Monsieur M, it could just as well be a log.  There it is then, I am none the wiser.

Madame M put up some conserves the next day.

She gave me a simple recipe for my fresh cèpes and instructed me to wipe them clean with a moist cloth which is the preferred way to wash mushrooms in general or else they get waterlogged.

Dirty cèpes

Clean cèpes

Gather together butter or olive oil, fleur de sel, black pepper grinder, and minced, flat-leaf parsley/garlic. Slice the mushrooms.

Saute them in the butter or olive oil for about ten minutes.  A few minutes before finishing cooking, toss in the garlic, and just before taking them off the heat, add the parsley and freshly ground pepper,  giving it all a stir. Sprinkle on the fleur de sel.  Their meaty taste with a nutty undertone and silky texture was certainly pleasing, but it's their freshness that bowled me over.  Dried cèpes, however, have their uses with their intense flavour,  and they feature often in many of my recipes. 

Back at the potager, Dayo was doing his own foraging in the wild area of our garden--a mountain of brambles covering a big cherry tree stump--which I keep for small wildlife.

He was so intent on exploring, he paid me no mind.  Perhaps he caught a whiff of Caspar?  He then disappeared out of sight.

À la prochaine!

How to Make Roasted Broccoli Parmesan Béchamel Soup

This comforting, earthy soup with its warming, full-bodied cayenne pepper/garlic-infused Béchamel sauce will lessen the gloom of shortened days and chase away autumnal chills.

When harvesting broccoli, I cut the stalks on the diagonal so rain can run off the remaining stalk to prevent rotting.  Smaller heads of broccoli will continue to form lower down on the stalk for a continued harvest.

After the broccoli was sowed and transplanted into a bed, I applied an organic, balanced fertiliser (NPK of 10-10-10) when the plants were about six inches high.  I could really see the difference in the size of the heads from last season.

Fertiliser is scratched into the soil around the plants with a cultivator

An important aspect of growing broccoli is checking routinely underneath leaves for egg deposits placed by white butterflies.  Three years ago, when I planted my first broccoli crop, I did not realise that the cloud of pretty, white butterflies hovering over the broccoli bed were carriers of eggs that would develop into devouring pests.  As with all crucifers, their growth can't be checked, that is, they need to be transplanted before they get cramped in their pots, get enough sunlight, to be fertilized, and to be watered or else they remain stunted.  Other veggies, like leeks, are more forgiving.

A clutch of yellow eggs

The main source of flowers in my autumn garden are these vivid, red chrysanthemums.

Dayo is spending more and more time indoors, but he still stays close to me.  When I am working in the kitchen, he hangs out in his box at one end of the long, food preparation table.

Is that butter for me?

OK, fine, be that way, I didn't really want any butter.

Are you sure that butter isn't for me?

Roasted Broccoli Parmesan Béchamel Soup
serves six

• Broccoli, chopped, 4-5 heads, about 8 cups*
• garlic, 3 fat cloves, lightly smashed, with skin mostly intact
• Vegetable broth, preferably homemade, 2 cups*
• Parmesan, a small rind
• Potatoes, two medium
• Olive Oil, extra virgin, several tbsps
• Red pepper flakes, just a few
• Salt and freshly ground pepper
• Parmesan, grated, 1 cup*
• Flour, white, 5 tbsps
• Butter, 4 tbsps
• milk, 1 1/2 cup* 

* American cup, 8 oz

Preheat oven at 350 degrees F.  Wash the broccoli well, and if home grown, hunt out little pests hidden in the florets.  Chop into large chunks.  The earthiness of this soup is accentuated by first oven roasting the broccoli.   This was my first time roasting broccoli.  I was encouraged to so by a friend who said roasting was the way to go when cooking cauliflower and broccoli.  She is so right.  I doubt I will ever boil broccoli again.

Place broccoli pieces on a shallow roasting pan and dribble the olive oil over them, mixing well while ensuring all the pieces are evenly coated.  Put into the oven and roast for about twenty minutes or until they are bright green and browned on their edges.  They do not need to be tender.

While they are roasting and filling up the kitchen with their robust fragrance, peel and chop the potatoes into small chunks and put them and the cheese rind along with the veggie broth into a pot.  Add the roasted broccoli when ready and cook until the veggies are very tender, about 15 minutes.  Remove the rind if desired--it can be cut into small pieces and eaten-- or it can be left in to be eventually blended.  I had forgotten to take mine out and was amazed that it became soft enough to get completely blended, imparting a wonderful depth of flavour.

Meanwhile make the Parmesan Béchamel infused with red pepper and garlic.  If this is your first time making this basic white sauce, be rest assured it is very doable.  I prefer using this sauce rather than just adding milk and cheese, because the binding of flour and butter ensures a stable mixture that will keep its integrity even when frozen or reheated, while the fat content of the Béchamel allows for the flavour of garlic and red pepper to be more fully absorbed than if it was just added to the soup pot. 

Béchamel sauce is a base for many dishes, so it is a good technique to master allowing many variations on a theme, like I have done with adding Parmesan, red pepper flakes, and garlic.   Have all the sauce ingredients prepared and near the stove:  butter, milk, flour, Parmesan, garlic, red pepper flakes.

Melt the butter in a medium saucepan over a medium low flame and gradually stir in the flour to make a roux.

Let the roux cook for a minute or so until smooth and to get rid of the taste of raw flour.  Slowly add the milk, pepper flakes, and garlic, all the while stirring.  Cook for about ten minutes until thickened.  Remove the garlic cloves.  If sufficiently softened and made mellow by cooking, mashed garlic is delicious on crackers/toast/bread.  A wire whisk will beat out any lumps.

Gradually add the grated cheese.

Let it melt completely while stirring. 

Blend the broccoli right in the pot with an immersion mixer or transfer to a standing blender.   Alternatively, you could also use a potato masher or large fork, but the texture will not be as smooth.

In order to ensure a smooth combination, add some of the broccoli soup into the Béchamel ladle by ladle, stirring well after each addition.

The Béchamel gradually will become much less thick.

Add the thinned Béchamel back into the soup pot and stir until well mixed.

Being a substantial soup, it does stand on its own, but of course it can be served with a good bread or croutons and crumbled bacon.

Bon appétit!

Creamy Tomato Soup with Edam and Rice...and autumn's footfall

The pleasure of melted cheese in a warming bowl of tomato soup rates way up there and dates from my childhood when my mother would top up a bowl of Campbell's tomato soup with Velveeta.  Quite awhile ago, the creation of this recipe was inspired by the necessity of counting pennies.  A source of discounted, gallon-sized cans of tomatoes in shrink-plastic packs of three became available.

A wall of them slowly grew in my tiny office.  It would take almost as much time for me to get one down from this metal barricade and out of the pack then actually making the soup! Now I use my own home-grown tomatoes which significantly improves the taste of this favourite.

There are several quarts of tomato soup concentrate made with produce from the garden already in the freezer.   To make this soup, I just defrost a container overnight.  Next day, I dilute with water to the thickness I want and beat in a cup of crème fraîche with a wire whisk.  Cooked rice, white or brown, and cubed Edam is added to the pot.  Edam has a robust taste, but it also tends to retain some solidity, adding the delight of encountering softened chunks.

Gently stir and let simmer for a few minutes until the cheese is soft but not melted.  Serve with another grated cheese on top, like  Gruyère or Parmesan.

It is a transitional time in the garden, with autumn slowly unfolding.  I still don't need to put on wellies, and I don't really need my straw hat any longer, so they sit next to each other, keeping each other company.

The shadows have harder outlines and the nights are cooler.  Dayo enjoys the warm days, but he is way easier to round up at night.

The insouciance with which Dayo places his paws gets me every time.

The zinnias making room for Dayo

When twilight approaches, he snuggles up to the back door, waiting to be brought in

Each autumn Madame M buys a mammoth sack of semi-dried, white beans called Coco Paimpol, a Bretagne variety,  for conserving.  She says that one must stock away food for the colder months.  I agree and am delighted seeing boxes of potatoes/garlic and bags of onions in the root cellar; peas, strawberries, beets, herbs, veggie stock, rosewater, and tomatoes in the freezer; jams, fruit leather, and pickles in the fridge; beans in the cupboard.  The biggest joy however is looking out the window to the autumn/winter crops:  broccoli, Brussels sprouts, spinach, carrots, leeks, peas, escarole, and mache.

Broccoli with blue-green foliage and Brussels Sprouts with silver green foliage

I exchanged some of my Mirabelle jam for some of Madame Ms beans.  Her suggestion is to saute minced onions, add tomatoes till they are fondue, that is, melted,  then simmer the beans in this sauce for a short while.

There is not enough room to grow as many beans as I would like,  but I always plant some because I find them hugely attractive--smooth like little pebbles but packing a nutritive content hard to beat.   I chose a variety called soissons nain a gros pied because they can be enjoyed in three stages, fresh and soft, semi-hard, and hard.  Note below how large the fresh bean is, and how green its pod is.  The fresher the bean is, the less time and water is required to cook it.  When fully dried, it becomes small, taking up much less room and allowing for a long storage. 

The same variety of bean and its pods in several stages

The last green beans were harvested a month ago.  Legumes, like beans and peas, fix nitrogen in the soil, so I leave the plants in as long as I can after harvest with some pods remaining for collecting seeds for next season's crop.  Overwintering lettuce is being sowed successively now in this bed, as green foliage thrives on nitrogen-rich soil.

Dried beans can be kept in spice bottles which are lined with paper

Unfortunately, there was no fig harvest.  I lie, there was one fig.   All the others fell off the tree before ripening without even asking my permission to do so.  Fig trees are noted for their unrelenting abundance.  Even Dayo found it hard to believe; at great risk, he perched on a wire fence to see deep inside the tree, to make sure I did not miss one.

The only reason why figs are scarcely seen in greengrocers or if they are, they are exorbitantly priced, is that they do not tolerate the hard knocks of shipping.  Their fragility is the basis why each fig in a case is separately swaddled in tissue paper.

In an effort to make the lone fig look more filling and substantial and somehow lessen the heartache of having no fig jam or leather, I bulked it up with my Mirabelle jam.  However, not my stomach, nor my heart was fooled.

The gold of the saucer and the jam heralds mellow autumnal colours

These tall, small-bloomed asters are a billowy mass of powder-blue softness.  As the wind acts up more at this time of the year, they get whipped around a bit, but show great resilience and gracefulness.

The Chrysanthemums are covered with glowing, crimson buds.

In the front garden, the Box Elder's leaves are beginning to flutter down, scattering their yellow selves on the ground.

Soon, I will be off to a nearby Oak copse with a huge leaf bag to harvest as many precious oak leaves as possible so I can make a moisture-retaining treat par excellence for the garden, leaf mould.

À bientôt.