A Visit to Champagne

Earlier this fall, Troy was working like crazy on a project in England. The new system went "live" on November 2nd, and thankfully everything went well! He hadn't had a day off in ages (sometimes not even a weekend!), so just after Armistice Day we decided to sneak off for a long weekend to the land of Dom Perignon: Champagne!



Wine has been produced in the Champagne region since Roman times, but "bubbly wine" was not produced until the 1600s. According to legend Dom Perignon, a Benedictine monk from Hautvilliers and keeper of the abbey cellar, was experimenting with production techniques and stumbled upon the double-fermentation process that creates all those lovely bulles.



A visit to wine country in November might sound odd, but it turned out to be lovely. It was definitely chilly, but there was also something quite beautiful about the frosty Côtes des Blancs landscape.





We found yet another wonderful, unique B&B in our Sawday book, this time an 1800s farm/manor house located in the teeny-tiny village of Oyes (about 30 minutes south of Epernay).



The B&B is the home/side-business of a charming New Zealand couple whose primary métier is art and costuming for the film industry. Their eye for scene-staging is evident throughout the house, from the beautiful and delicious meals they served...



To the book-lined loft-style room where we stayed...





To the original mason's marks preserved on the old plaster walls.



Even the village itself contributed to the B&B's atmosphere: named Aupres de l'Eglise (literally "Near the Church"), this was the view from our bathroom window. As Glennis (the owner) said, 'Contemplative bathing'.



With such a lovely base from which to venture forth, we set off on a round of dégustations. Armed with recommendations from friends, we visited three small champagne houses. We were definitely the first people EVER to get lost in the teeny village of Romery looking for Champagne José Marc. We circled the village streets a couple of times before the vintners themselves came outside to rescue us. There followed a lovely tasting, complete with appearances from the hosts' daughter and grand-daughter. We had such a nice visit that we completely forgot to take pictures. We also neglected the camera during our second tasting experience, but we did remember for the third small house: Diogène Tisser et Fils, located in the pretty hillside village of Chavot-Courcourt.



Oddly, everyone else in the tasting room at Diogène was Belgian! We met a nice couple from Grimbergen, who left with over twenty cases(!) Needless to say, our purchases were much more modest.



No visit to Champagne is complete without a least a stop in the "capital city" of Epernay. Famous names front the gates all along the Avenue de Champagne, not the least of which is the iconic Moët & Chandon.





We chose the grandaddy of all champagne houses primarily to get a glimpse at its cellars.



Thankfully the visit is guided because the cellars form a subterranean labyrinth. They stretch for kilometers beneath the streets of Epernay and reputedly contain more bottles than there are residents of France!



This cave contained a paltry 8900± bottles, but keep in mind that there are thousands of caves in the cellars.



These turning racks help the sediment to settle near the mouth, making it easier to remove prior to the second fermentation.



Near the end of the tour, we passed an entire cartload of Dom Perignon Rosé Vintage. A bottle of this will run you about $500.00.



We had such a lovely little trip to Champagne, met some nice producers, and came home with a few bottles of the bubbly. All in all, the perfect weekend away. Cheers!

Champagne Photo Album - Click Here

Armistice Day in Ypres

Belgium suffered terribly in World War I, and thus November 11th (Armistice Day -- aka Remembrance Day/Veterans Day) is still an important day of commemoration and honor here. Two years ago, we attended the commemoration ceremonies in Brussels, but this year, on the recommendation of friends, we decided to drive out to western Belgium to attend the ceremonies in Ypres (Ieper, in Flemish).

Ypres was all but obliterated during World War I. About five major battles were fought in the town and the nearby countryside, and the surrounding Ypres Salient was the scene of some tragic 'firsts' in the world, including the first use of poison gas as a weapon. The British Commonwealth in particular suffered immense casualties here (there are 137 British WWI cemeteries located in the former battlefields of the Ypres Salient), and it became a place of pilgrimage for veterans and veterans' families. The town eventually rebuilt itself, but never forgot the war.

In 1929 the Anglican Church inaugurated St. George's Memorial Church, and they hold a special Remembrance Day Service each year on November 11th. Because so many people wish to attend the service, visitors must obtain (free) tickets to get a seat in the small chapel. My great-grandfather (Duke Chiasson - 114th Trench Mortar Battery, 39th Division, Army) served in the trenches of France during World War I. Obviously we're not British, but we still thought it would be nice to honor my PaPa by attending the service at St. George's and so I e-mailed about tickets. Given that it was the week of the event, I was not surprised to get a reply that all the tickets had already been allocated. However, it was a lovely surprise to receive an e-mail the day before the service informing me that two tickets had been returned and asking if we would like them. So, we got up at 6am that Thursday (I know, can you believe I did that?!?) and made the 1.5 hour drive to West Flanders. We arrived early, but the church was already packed by the time we found our seats. The little church is very lovely and is completely filled with plaques, flags, banners, medallions, and other memorials to the fallen soldiers in the Great War.





This is the plaque that was on the seat in front of me. We were seated next to a friendly Australian man, a member of the British Legion who has been traveling to Ypres on Armistice Day for the last 20 years. He explained a lot of the medals and bits of history and trivia to us.





Regimental crests decorate the stained glass window above the altar.



Patrick Hawkes, the thoughtful church administrator who set aside the tickets for us, is standing behind Troy. He also took pains to show us the plaque dedicated to American service personnel.





You can see several red spots on people's lapels in this photo. They are artificial poppies, a symbol of the fields of poppies immortalized in John McCrae's iconic poem In Flanders Fields. It is now a tradition for people in the British Commonwealth to wear a "poppy" in their buttonhole during November as a sign of remembrance.



More poppies.



The poem in bronze.



That's me standing outside St. George's after the service. Originally, our plan was to attend the service, then head over to the Menin Gate for the commemorative ceremonies, and finally round out the day with a visit to the Flanders Field American Cemetery. But, as you can guess from this picture, by the time we got out of church the weather had turned bad. So bad, in fact, that we had to reconsider the outdoor portions of our day. Now, we've had our share of poor weather while living in Belgium, but this day was a rare, miserable trifecta of cold, rain, and super strong winds. It was like walking in a cold hurricane. We did stand in the main square long enough to watch some of the ceremonies on the big outdoor screen, including listening to the bagpiper's salute and a ceremonial playing of The Last Post. As you can see in Troy's short film below, hundreds of people braved the wretched weather to watch the ceremony. It was really moving.





This is the rebuilt Cloth Hall. Originally constructed in the 13th century, it was the largest non-ecclesiastical Gothic building in Europe and it served as the hub for Ypres' prosperous cloth trade. (Think Flemish tapestries and linen). The Germans bombarded and torched it during WWI, but it was painstakingly reconstructed after war's end. Now it houses the In Flanders Field Museum, which we visited after the ceremonies.



The Menin Gate is a British War Memorial inscribed with thousands of names of soldiers whose bodies were never recovered. Every night traffic stops around it while a bugler plays The Last Post. The only time this custom has been suspended was during the years of German occupation during World War II.



Here, Troy is standing underneath the Menin Gate arch, in front of dozens of 'poppy' wreaths. Right after I snapped this photo, we happened to run into our friends who recommended Ypres to us. After visiting with them for a minute, though, our resolve against the weather gave out, and we headed home. But we are planning a return visit this summer to visit the trenches and the American cemetery.



Despite the miserable weather, we were both really glad that we made the effort to go. All war is horror, but somehow World War I is particularly tragic and sad to me. Perhaps it is the optimism people felt at having fought 'the war to end all wars', set against the ultimate heartrending futility at having it all start over only 20 years later. What I do know is that it was a poignant day, and it felt good to honor the courage and sacrifice of the service personnel and civilians alike. Requiescat in pace.

Le Creuset & Moroccan Stew

Long blog silence, yet again. This time chalk it up to the general busy-ness of life, plus an Armistice Day commemoration in Ieper followed by a long weekend to Champagne. I will get to all that (hopefully!), but first a quick post about Christmas, Le Creuset, la cocotte, and cooking.

I have a few pieces from Le Creuset, the venerable French cookware maker, in my batterie de cuisine--a giant moule à clafoutis (ceramic pie plate) and a pair of heart-shaped ramekins that I received as a birthday gift--but that's it. I eye other pieces whenever I'm in a cooking store, but haven't bought anything else until now because, well, they're expensive. However, I happened to learn from my friend Maisie that there is a Le Creuset factory store not that far away from us (±2 hours), in Fresnoy-le-Grand, France. In fact, it is not just any factory store, but THE original factory and birthplace of Le Creuset! Our friends stopped at the store on the way to Champagne, and their trip sounded so nice that we decided to do the same a few weeks later.



Here I am standing outside the store holding a very heavy bag!

Le Creuset produces many products, but is most famous for its line of enameled cast iron cookware. Interestingly, this iconic French company was actually founded by two Belgian 'industrialists' (a casting specialist and an enameling specialist) who set up their foundry across the border in Northern France in 1925 to take advantage of transportation routes for raw materials.



Now, why are we posing with this box? That brings us to the exciting part of the story. This box was holding our new cocotte (French oven aka Dutch oven aka heavy iron pot), and we wanted to show Troy's parents since they gave it to us as an early Christmas present!!! (Many thanks, again, Dennis and Sharon for the fabulous gift!)


Cocotte unveiled!

Le Creuset's most famous color combo is cerise et dune (aka cherry red for the outside, with a sand-colored interior). As you have seen in numerous posts, cherry red is our 'signature' kitchen accent color, so of course we had to get the cocotte in cerise! To inaugurate the new pot -- in all its 12.5 pound(!) glory -- I decided to make a lovely, fragrant, and delicious Moroccan chicken stew.



Loaded with vegetables, dried fruit, and spices, beyond the eponymous chicken, this recipe is a recent arrival to my kitchen, but one that promises to become a staple.



Red onions softening in our pretty red cocotte.



Before: Layers of goodness. The recipe calls for just black raisins and dried apricots, but this time I also added golden raisins and prunes. (Oh yes, poor ol' uncool prunes are actually delicious, especially in this type of dish.)



Et voila: After several hours simmering on a very low temperature, we have the finished stew. Serve it up with some couscous, toasted pine nuts, and a scattering of fresh cilantro, and dig in! Or, as the French more elegantly put it, bon appetit!

Orval - Double Edition

We have every intention of blogging about all the stuff we do right after we do it, but you know what they say about good intentions... Frequently we get behind, which usually leaves me overwhelmed and annoyed. However occasionally it works in my favor, such as when I can combine two events to make a better post than would have occurred by blogging about either one alone. Case in point: our visits to the Orval Trappist Brewery the last two Septembers.

The Val d'Or (Valley of Gold), and hence the name Orval, is a beautiful, hilly countryside of green, green fields and peacefully grazing sheep. Located just a few kilometers from the French border in southern Belgium, the Abbaye d'Orval holdings once included land that is now in France, the borders having changed numerous times since 1070 when the first monks arrived in the valley.


Village and countryside not far from Orval


The Orval Abbey as seen from the forest


Last year, Troy was ready to join the sheep in the pasture


This is the same field, but this year's visit was much sunnier

Since the 11th century, Orval has had quite the tumultuous history, with periods of boom and bust, and a particularly rough patch during the French Revolution when much of the abbey was pillaged and wrecked. However, in 1926 a private family who had acquired the lands gave them back to the Cistercian Order to reconstitute the abbey. By 1948 the rebuilding was complete, and Orval has been an active monastery ever since.


The Art Deco central chapel was constructed during the rebuilding of the 1930s-40s.

There is a long tradition of beer, bread, and cheese fabrication at monasteries in Belgium, having originally served as nourishment for the monastic communities. Word spread about these great products, and several monasteries created commercial wings to distribute them. Orval has a brasserie (brewery) and fromagerie (cheese-makery) within its campus and uses its profits to support local charities and maintain its site.

A note about the elite "Trappist" moniker. Only beers brewed at a functioning Cistercian abbey, i.e. a monastery where they are still actively monk-ing, are allowed to use the name "Trappist". There are only 7 Trappist breweries in the world, six of which are located in Belgium(!): Achel, Orval, Chimay, Rochefort, Westmalle, and Westvleteren. (The other is Koningshoeven in The Netherlands.) In some of the breweries the monks themselves still brew the beer, while in others they hire outside workers. Regardless of the division of labor, the whole point of the monastery is for the monks to monk, so all of these breweries are rarely (if ever) open to the public. BUT once a year for two days only, the Orval brewery makes an exception and opens its doors to the public! The tour is free, but is available by appointment only, on a first-come, first-served basis. Luckily, I have a plannerific hubby who discovers things like this, and thinks to call in May to score spots at the open brewing days in September.

Last year, we went down for the day and briefly met up with some friends after the tour. During our visit, we learned that you could also tour the ruins of the old abbey church and attend a service in the chapel. Unfortunately, we figured this out too late in the day, so we resolved to come back this year and do it all.

The brewery is actually very pretty, and the tour was fascinating both years. The finishes are modern, the equipment is spotless, and there is even stained glass upstairs behind the giant copper holding vats.



Legend has it that the Widow Mathilda accidentally dropped her wedding ring into the stream flowing through the valley. She prayed to God to get it back and toute de suite a trout appeared out of the stream with the ring in his mouth! Thus the fish and the ring are the symbol of Orval and appear throughout the brewery.





Our favorite part both years has been the bottling room. It is this amazingly efficient operation, mesmerizing with its shiny steel, constant motion, and clinking glass. A model of industrial automation at its finest. Check out this sweet short film Troy made -- if you remember that old TV show 'Laverne and Shirley,' it will definitely make you want to sing the theme song:



After the excitement of the bottling room, you pass through packaging, aging, quality monitoring, and distribution. Finally, at tour's end you enter the cantine where you receive your complimentary beer and cheese.



It's good stuff.





After our delightful brewery tour, we entered the inner grounds of the monastery and toured the ruins.


Ancient ruins set against modern buildings built along classical lines.




This gorgeous rose window once held stained glass, an architectural innovation during medieval times

We had just enough time to wander through the grounds and make a quick stop in the museum before heading over to the chapel. The monks observe the ancient order of seven services a day, every day of the week. As long as you are respectful and stay for the entire service, the public is welcome to attend them too (well, perhaps not Vigils at 4am???). The timing of our visit made it perfect to attend the late afternoon Vespers. Being a Protestant, I have only attended Mass a handful of times in my life, so I was both excited to experience something new, but also a little nervous about following all the 'sits and stands'. About 30 monks sang the service in French, which we in the 'audience' could follow via service books. It was very interesting to hear the familiar Bible verses spoken in French, and it was a lovely service.

We enjoyed the whole day (and would highly recommend it for anyone here) and would have been content if the story ended there. Mais non! From there we set off to a little French B&B for dinner, followed by adventures in Northern France and Luxembourg the following day. But, that is another post for another day...Until then Salut (Cheers)!

Orval Photo Album - Click Here