Photo du Jour - Les Olives

Les Lucques, hanging heavy on the tree. Soon to be harvested and crushed into a heady, silky, grassy flavored oil.
It takes about 7-9 kilos of olives to make 1 liter of olive oil. Pin It

Photo du Jour - Black Olives

Above the village, in the garrigue, there are countless Lucques olive trees that don't seem to belong to anyone. The olives in this region are picked green and taken to the olive oil co-op for pressing by the end of December.
Can I cure them once they've turned black? Need to do some research! Pin It

Photo du Jour - Olive Cake

Savory Cake aux Olives.
Delicious to serve with un petit apéro.


Domaine Saint Luc's Cake aux Olives
8 servings
from The Paris Cookbook by Patricia Wells

4 tablespoons flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
1 cup whole milk
4 large eggs, lightly beaten
3 ounces (1 cup) freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano or Swiss Gruyère cheese
1 scant cup black Nyons olives, pitted and halved lengthwise*
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
About 1 cup homemade Tomato Sauce (optional)

1. Butter a 6-cup loaf pan (preferably nonstick) and set it aside.
2. In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt, and stir to blend. Slowly add the eggs, whisking to incorporate. Whisk in the milk, cheese, olives and oil. Set aside for 2 hours to allow flour to absorb the liquids (making for a lighter cake).
3. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.
4. Stir the batter to blend once again. Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan. Place in the center of the oven and bake until firm and golden, about 30 minutes. Serve at room temperature, sliced and cut into cubes. Or to serve as a first course, slice and serve with fresh tomato sauce.

*I like to make this cake with green lucques olives or a mix of green and black olives. Pin It

Photo du Jour - les Lucques

A perfect apéro - les lucques and a glass of rosé. Pin It

Photo du Jour - Olives

The olive tasting bar at l'Oulibo, our local olive co-op. They offer amazing single varietal olive oils such as Lucques, Olivière and Picholine.
Most of our neighbors take their olives here for pressing.
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Weekend Goings On - Most Importantly, What's for Lunch

This morning I'm getting all sorts of little, last minute things done around the house before I run to la boulangerie and begin making lunch. We've got three family members arriving from America around two o'clock this afternoon, so we thought we'd have a glass of wine and lunch waiting for them.

On the menu today:
Lucques olive tapenade
An updated Coq au Vin that I make with some sparkling Saumur, which I started cooking with last spring. It makes a lovely sauce! I need to write the recipe down and share it.
Cheese course consisting of Maroilles, Cantal Entre-Deux and Chabichou de Poitou.
Tarte Tatin

Tomorrow, I'll let someone else be the chef! Pin It

Photo du Jour

Barrels of olives at the Olonzac market.

The local Lucques are so delicious! Perfect to nibble on with a Kir or a glass of Muscat. Pin It

Top 100 - 41 Through 50

41. Saint Marcellin cheese. A sweet, soft and creamy cheese that is usually sold in little ceramic crocks to keep it's shape. The taste is mushroomy and earthy, some say fruity. As it ages the texture becomes more chalky. Delicious served with some olives and a glass of Châteauneuf du Pape.

42. The Pitcher. For serving water, wine, sangria, lemonade, margaritas, etc.


43. Rick Bayless's Mexican Kitchen. A very well researched and knowledgeable cookbook featuring the complex, unique and often overlooked flavors of Mexico. I've had this book for ten years and think it is fantastic.

44. Lucques Olive Tapenade. I prefer the flavor of tapenade made with green olives rather than black olives. And my favorite green olive to use is the Lucques, although manzanilla or green Greek olives would work with this recipe. Spread it on some bread and serve with apéritifs.

Lucques Olive Tapenade

1 cup pitted green olives
2-3 anchovies, rinsed and dried
1 tablespoon capers, rinsed
1 clove garlic
1-2 tablespoons olive oil
Combine all ingredients except the olive oil in a food processor and pulse until you have a coarse paste. Add a little olive oil at a time until you reach a smooth consistency.
Makes one cup.
Can be kept in the refrigerator, covered, for several weeks.

45. H & H Bagels Truly the best! If only they were available in France...

46. Hand Blender or Immersion Blender. Saves me from having to purée soups in a food processor and therefore, from burning myself in the process. Also useful for making smoothies, fruit sauces, whipping butter and making custard. It takes up very little space in my tiny kitchen and it is one of those tools that I reach for again and again.

47. Bar Pinoxto in Barcelona, Spain. Located inside La Boqueria market, this little bar with only 12 counter seats and a couple of small tables is my favorite place for a café con leche or lunch. There is no menu but Juanito, the lively proprietor and quite the local celebrity, will tell you what is being served that day. My favorites were the grilled razor clams, grilled whole little green peppers and salt cod croquettes. The bar is frequented by locals as well as tourists and the counter seats fill up early.

48. Susan Spicer. Chef and owner of Bayona and Herbsaint in New Orleans. I was introduced to her cooking on my first visit to New Orleans when we snagged a last minute reservation at Bayona. Housed in a 200 year old Creole cottage in the French Quarter, Bayona was opened by Spicer in 1990 and has been winning awards and serving some of the best food in the city ever since. Herbsaint was opened with chef Donald Link in 2000, and lucky for us, it was just around the corner from our apartment. We ate there as often as possible!

49. Leite's Culinaria website. An elegant and mouth-watering collection of recipes, food writing, book reviews and resources for food lovers.

50. Vin D'Oranges. I wrote about this homemade apéritif back in November and am now on my fourth batch. I've tried it with rosé twice, red and now white. The red wine version tasted too much like sangria, which I love, just not in the winter, but the rosé version was excellent. The white wine version will be ready next week.

Vin d'Oranges

7 juice oranges (about 2 1/2 pounds), preferably organic
2 bottles dry white wine, rosé wine or fruity red wine (I used rosé)
grated zest of one orange
1 cup sugar
1 cup vodka

Peel the oranges and chop the flesh into 1/2 inch cubes on a cutting board that will collect the juices. Put the orange pieces and all the collected juice into a 12 cup, wide-mouthed jar with a tight fitting lid, or divide between two smaller jars. Pour the wine over and close the jar tightly. Set aside in a cool place for 10 days. Each day, gently shake the jar and on the 10th day, add the orange zest.
On the 11th day, strain the wine into a large bowl, pressing on the oranges to extract all the juice. Discard the oranges. Add the sugar to the wine and stir until dissolved. Then add the vodka.
Pour through a funnel into 3, sterilized wine bottles, seal with corks and set aside for another 10 days in a cool place.
Serve very cold.
Drink within three months.

This recipe comes from a cookbook published in 1994 called Backroad Bistros, Farmhouse Fare
by Jane Sigal.
. Pin It

Lucca...

... was stunning.





The most popular form of transportation is the bicycle. They were everywhere and could be rented by the hour or by the day.




The living area of our apartment.

And the kitchen.


Across the street from our apartment was a focaccia bakery with about seven different kinds to choose from. No photos were ever taken as it was always eaten too quickly.
Here is some bread from another bakery with some marinated olives and baked eggplant.


Gelato was everywhere and we took advantage of it!

Two or three espressi a day kept me very happy. Perfect flavor and crema every time.


What a wonderful week!
Seeing our friends from New Orleans was the best part and when you add to that a beautiful city with welcoming people, divine food and amazing scenery, the combination is a recipe for the perfect vacation.


Lucca, I just found out, is known to the French as Lucques, which must be why whenever I told someone in our village where we were going, they looked at me blankly.
Les Lucques is also an olive varietal grown in the Hérault. This olive has a small crescent-shaped stone, thin skin, crunchy flesh and an incredible flavor with tastes of fresh almonds and avocados. Pin It