La Maison des Mots - December 2025
♫ …It’s beginning to feel a lot like Noël,
all around the ville… ♫
Oui, c'est vrai - La Charité-sur-Loire is trimmed and festive for the season. And though the trend to begin mulling the wine and decorating the house feels to commence earlier each year, Maison des Mots still waits until mid-month to jolly up. Of course, I am thinking a lot about what I might do differently this year – shaking up ideas from the past can be exhilarating.
I discovered an idea for making a wreath from poking holes in a large potato and sticking chosen greens inside the holes. The image provided was beautiful. I will give it a try - though I will need to go searching the forest for greens and branches with red berries. Maybe I will give my overgrown Rosemary bush a holiday haircut and work with what is within stepping distance. Though a walk in the forest is always a good idea - if I am lucky, I will find some mistletoe. It is all over the countryside, but most of it grows high and is difficult to reach.
My menus in December will be different. I recently purchased half a pig. Organically raised and well fed, he was delivered to me separated, vacuum packed, and ready to preserve in the freezer. I vow to honour Piggy by preparing his parts with recipes that are new to me. The first recipe I prepared yesterday was a schnitzel with a curried sauce made from home made chicken stock and a roux spiced up with curry powder. Served with buttered peas and leeks, and a mash of yam and sweet potato.
A journal of recettes cochon commence…!
Though as much as my today self thinks a Christmas dinner of Roast Pork with a Cranberry Apple Sauce might be delicious – my true desire is to braise a leg of Turkey that I will brine first for 24 hours with Thyme and Pears. The sauce will be divine. I will begin the menu with a Butternut and Chestnut velouté. The vegetable companions will be Brussel Sprouts and Carrots, sauced together with a light and simple creamy curry. A purée of Sweet Potato and Yam – which needs no butter or cream to taste delicious. Spoonbread Soufflé. Cranberry Jelly Mold. New ideas I melange with my love for a Southern Style Menu.
Methinks, it has a French feel, what say you?
If we care to continue eating, salad and vinaigrette will be washed and ready. But I will forgo the plateau de fromage. That I will reserve for a Boxing Day Treat after the leftovers are enjoyed.
Dessert will be the Christmas Baking I have yet to prepare. Peggy’s Nanaimo Bars, Peggy’s Shortbread, Granny’s Yorkshire Custard Tarts, and a new recipe for Molasses Cookies. In my youth, Christmas baking day was a Saturday at the end of November. Mother (Peggy) would turn on the radio and we would listen to Saturday afternoon at the Metropolitan Opera while baking and humming along. We were not allowed to eat any of the baking until the middle of December. Though I suspect she did not honour her vow of sweet abstinence. Peggy was a bit piggish with sweet treats. I could never find where she hid the baking!
There will be Champagne, and there will be Wine…
A few weeks ago, I drove to St Amand-en-Puisaye, a pottery town which is about 45 minutes north east from here. The Château which has been transformed into a musée for pottery, was hosting an organic (BIO) wine exhibition. It was a delight. When you entered the room for the tasting you were greeted by a cheerful face seated at a table laden with bags of Gougères. The cost? 4 for 3 euros. So civilized to walk about the room tasting fine wines while nibbling the perfect accompaniment. There were about 20 producers and I knew none of them. It was a charming experience and my unobtrusive cellar is now holding only bottles of natural wine. I do not limit my imbibing to natural wines; I live in wine country and enjoy many of the exquisite wines produced here. But if a local producer has taken the time and money to prepare a plot for bio vines, and perfected a natural and delicious elixir, I will purchase it first.
I am not one to make new years resolutions, but much ado with docteur et dentiste of late, I find myself determined to alter habits, and be more cognisant of my movements in the garden, with my modest exercise routine, and even how I walk about. I have been slowly moving into a lighter eating regime. I tend to eat red meat 1 day a week, fish 2 days (one day fresh, the other from a Tin), Feathered Fowl and/or Rabbit - 2 days, and 2 days vegetarian. And generally, I eat 3 times a day - breakfast, one substantial meal, and another meal of fruit, bread, and cheese.
Minette ensures I go to bed early - these chilly nights are meant for cuddling. She tells me when she wants out for her evening airing, returns bushy tailed with desire for a session of play. When she has had enough, she tells me to get ready for bed, then waits for my rituals to finish, patiently waiting for me to get into bed, before joining me. The nights I leave the house for social activity find me returning to a noisy lecture from herself. But by the time I crawl under the covers, there she be, purring and grateful.
From our pleasant home in the pastoral French country-side, where wood fires burn, and bells toll, Moi et Minette send our hopes and wishes that these Wintering days find you warm and cozy, with all the seasonal treats you desire.
“Love and do what you will”- St. Aurelius Augustine
I feel our beautiful world tremble. Reading poetry is a comfort, albeit sorrowful at times. Especially lines written long ago, where we can witness history, and with a weary heart, feel it repeating.
I leave you with the last stanza of a poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning – 1806-1861
My Heart and I
“Yet who complains? My heart and I?
In this abundant earth no doubt
Is little room for things worn out:
Disdain them, break them, throw them by!
And if before the days grew rough
We once were loved, used, -well enough,
I think, we’ve fared, my heart and I.”
Gros bisous et beaucoup de bises and a very Merry Christmas to you all.
- Barbara-jo et Minette