27

THE SEASONS CHANGE ALMOST overnight. With just a few cold evenings the summer seems to be over and the days are growing shorter at a quickening rate. I am accustomed to a more gradual fading out of summer, and even though there’s a brief respite with a few precious warm days, there is a chill in the air that’s impossible to deny. The landscape, too, changes just as dramatically. Late summer harvesting of maize is hurried along, and the fields are quickly ploughed for the winter wheat crops. Where just a few days ago were tall stalks of green, ripening corn, suddenly there are bare fields with freshly turned, ginger-red soil that looks luscious in its fertility.

The vineyards are spectacular in their russet phase now that the harvesting of grapes is over. From an elevated position—and so many of the old fortified villages are on hillsides with fantastic views to the fields below—the varieties of grape are obvious, as each block of vines turns to a different shade of red, orange or yellow. It’s a dramatically different view to that of just a few weeks ago. A patchwork again, but a completely new one that is even more beautiful, if this is possible. The woods are now golden shades of yellow and pink. There seem to be no red foliage trees, but the poplars are breathtaking in the intensity of their yellow leaves while the chestnut trees turn pink for a day or so before changing to brown and dropping their canopy. The chestnuts themselves are falling, too, and I am intrigued, never having seen them before. The circular seed pods look like some toxic Australian sea creature with sharp spikes that make them tricky and painful to pick up in my bare hand. The locals gather chestnuts for market and they well know the trees with the largest, plumpest nuts. They wait until the seed pods burst naturally and shrink back, revealing the glossy brown husks which they then collect with long, wooden tongs to avoid contact with the piercing spikes. The chestnut harvest brings the small and shy red squirrels out of the forest, and I see them scampering along the road verges gathering a storehouse for the long winter ahead. They are more endearing than the large grey squirrels that seem to have overrun the UK, and even though they are considered rare, I see half-a-dozen during the first week that the chestnuts are falling.

It’s easy to imagine the farming families here feasting on wild boar and duck breasts and goose fat for generations, but that simply is not the case. It’s not all that long ago that the farmers were peasants with no hunting rights in the woods, which were reserved solely for the upper classes, and so they relied on the wild chestnuts as a major source of protein. Chestnuts are still treated with some reverence. At St Caprais there is even a chestnut festival in early autumn with a community meal or repas held again in the village square, but this time inside a large white marquee because of the autumn chill. There are fewer people and no live bands thumping out music, but the atmosphere is just as jolly with the farming families gathering to dine on pork and prunes with a side serving of mashed chestnuts. It’s a hearty meal, with all the usual courses—soup and salad and cheese and tart—and again so many bottles of vin rouge that I simply lose count. This time the children have decorated the tent and the tables with colourful cartoon drawings of chestnuts, each one showing considerable imagination. The chestnuts riding horseback catch my eye, along with a couple of jaunty, plump interpretations that look a bit like Jock. I can imagine my grandsons having fun drawing these comical creations.

Walnuts also ripen and fall at this time of year, although they are not wild trees but cultivated varieties that are planted as an alternative protein source. Every farm boasts four to six huge old trees, often positioned along the roadside, but such is the attitude of honesty and neighbourliness, that nobody dreams of picking up a fallen walnut unless the owner of the tree has given express permission: these crinkled brown nuts are traditionally too important to survival to be treated as simple windfalls.

A sudden windy overnight storm clears many of the walnuts from the trees and for several days I see men and women in long gumboots with baskets, stooping to harvest them. Once again the quality and size of the nuts is variable. Roger, Jock’s artist friend from Loubejac knows of several trees where he has been given permission to pick up the nuts and he takes me along. The walnuts fall, carrying with them a black casing which quickly shrivels from the shell but leaves an inky stain that marks our fingers as we pluck the nuts from between the wet, fallen leaves that smother the ground. It’s a back-breaking task when undertaken for several hours, but the yield is fantastic. The nuts need to be washed clean of their inky markings before being laid out on trays to dry for a week or so. Farmers who sell their walnuts, either to market or as a commercial crop, tend to bleach the shells to give them a paler appearance, but I prefer the natural dark colour of those left untreated. When I devour some of those from Roger’s bountiful harvest, I realise I have never tasted truly fresh walnuts before. They have a much more intense and sweet flavour than the ones I buy each Christmas for the children to crack open on the back steps. I hunt out some recipes and experiment by making a warm walnut tart which is quite simple but also time consuming because the nuts must be cracked open and then crushed. The pastry, a pâte brisée, is extremely rich, but with the walnut and egg mix baked inside it’s one of the best desserts I have ever attempted. I will make sure to try it out on the family when I get home.

The Lot is especially known for the diversity and profusion of wild mushroom species which start emerging from the tall native grasses in the woods in autumn. Villefranche is usually the centre of cèpe marketing, where barrows of these gritty, knobbly but flavourful fungi are bought and sold for several weeks from quite early in the season. This particular autumn, however, is notably warm and dry and as the weeks pass people vocally lament the lack of cèpes in the woods, especially as the previous season was the biggest for decades. I, too, am a little disappointed, but Roger is determined that I will gather and eat wild fungi, even if it means searching the woods early every morning. The mushrooms supposedly spring from the soil ten or twelve days after good rains, but this autumn is without heavy falls, just the occasional light shower followed by weather that is too warm and dry to produce anything of interest.

There are literally hundreds of species of mushrooms, many of them edible but many are also highly toxic. The pharmacies have huge colourful posters on display, indicating which mushrooms are safe and which will cause serious stomach upsets—or even death—but many of the good and bad species are so similar in appearance that it would take an expert to be able to tell the difference. Luckily, Roger is an expert and he introduces me to some wild and wonderful mushrooms that look as though they’d poison an elephant but in fact have the most sublime flavour and texture. People who don’t know the difference between the safe and dangerous species are advised to take any mushrooms that they gather to the pharmacy for positive identification, but in spite of this free service every season at least a couple of reckless mushroom munchers fall by the wayside.

Jock is also keen on wild mushrooms, but he is not quite as knowledgeable as Roger. Some friends give him a basketful of what they believe are common field mushrooms and he cooks them up with olive oil, butter, garlic and parsley for a late afternoon feast, then is left with a severe gutache that lasts for several days. I am a little nervous when I first contemplate eating some of the huge mushrooms I find popping up in the lawn around my small cottage, so I dash down to Lucienne’s place with them so she can check them out. She assures me they are fine and their exquisite flavour convinces me she knows what she’s talking about.

Roger calls me early one morning, saying he has spied ‘something interesting’ for me to look at in the woods. I beetle over, camera in hand, and he greets me wearing tall gumboots, a thick woollen scarf, jaunty black beret and carrying a basket over one arm. He leads me through a field and into a woodland clearing where giant parasol mushrooms are bursting from the rich, moist soil. These pale golden orbs look like the mushrooms of a child’s fairy story: high on slender stems, they have perfectly rounded tops. We only need two or three to create a satisfying meal, so we gather them in the basket and Roger cooks them up for lunch accompanied by crusty bread and wine, followed by cheese. It’s all rather the stuff of dreams, sitting in Roger’s pretty stone cottage in deep France, sipping great wine and eating fresh wild fare from the woods, a reminder that life can really be so simple yet so divine. We repeat this ritual several times over the next month, and each foray into the surrounding woods and fields yields a different species. Shaggy inkcaps, which look fiercesome and ooze an evil-looking black liquid, are a special favourite; their flesh is rich and juicy, like fine fillets of chicken breast. And trompettes de la mort (trumpets of death) which are small jet black mushrooms that look deadly but taste quite wonderful, are completely harmless, in total contrast to their appearance and name. I can understand how everyone becomes addicted to this mushroom-hunting ritual. The training of the eye to spot the elusive fungi hiding in the long grass, the thrill of the chase, the flavour of the spoils. I am determined to come back next autumn and try again, hopefully in a more abundant season.

Autumn into winter is also the legal season for hunting, and the chasseurs, or hunters, now fill the nearby woods with the piercing sounds of gunshot, making them suddenly a dangerous place for walking, especially at the weekends. Hunting is a cult in France, and devotees are a particular breed of man (though there are also a few women) who wear jungle greens and bright fluorescent orange baseball caps which have been thoughtfully introduced to help reduce the incidence of accidental shooting. It is a topic of some amusement among the non-chasseur population, how often the hunters manage to shoot each other instead of the wild boar or deer that are their intended target. It’s not a laughing matter, however, as every year unwitting walkers are killed. I am informed, as a warning, that a woman was shot in the head when out walking just a few villages from here. An eighteen-year-old boy on his first chasse was also killed. My exercise regimen goes out the window, especially when I am woken at dawn by the sound of guns blazing in the woods near the house.

On Sundays the chasseurs are out in force. They’re easy to spot because most of them drive the small white vans that seem to be a symbol of testosterone-laden masculinity. The vans, which only have a front seat, are relatively cheap as well as being eligible for a government subsidy as ‘farm vehicles’. There are thousands of them in southwest France, usually belting along the narrow winding roads far too fast, and more often than not on the wrong side. The chasseurs are often staked out on the edge of the woods, near the roadside, gun in hand with grim facial expressions; they honestly don’t look as though they are enjoying themselves in the slightest. Even walking along the edge of the road when the chasseurs are around is perilous—if a deer suddenly breaks from the woods their guns will be swinging wildly and aiming at anything that’s moving. You seldom hear one lone shot. It’s always a wild volley and I am relieved not to be in close proximity when I hear the gunshot cutting the air. Adding to the danger is the chasseurs’ indulgence in long lunches on Sunday, just like every other French citizen. The idea of them crashing through the woods after a three-hour lunch, vin compris, is not a happy one.

Although deer and boar are the main targets of the chasseurs, they also hunt rabbits, hare, pheasant and wild duck. Most birds in the countryside are now protected, because of the devastating impact that year-round shooting has had on wild bird populations over several centuries. Indeed, until a few years ago the sound of birdsong was rare in rural France, apart from pigeons, which breed so prolifically that they are sometimes known as airborne vermin; however, because their droppings are a valued source of soil-enriching nutrients, they have never been wiped out. Not so lucky the smaller, less flashy birds of the countryside, whose decline is explained by my regional recipe book: it features delicacies like ‘woodcock on fried bread with blackberries’, ‘partridge with cabbage’, and ‘thrush casserole’. Poverty and hunger rather than greed were the cause of the small birds’ decimation—indeed everything that could move was used to pad out the meagre food sources on offer. Small birds were an important source of food right up until after the Second World War. It wasn’t until tractors and other more sophisticated pieces of farming equipment were introduced—bringing greater agricultural prosperity—that the situation improved. These days, greater affluence means that such drastic measures as eating our tiny feathered friends are not necessary—only the larger birds can be hunted, and then in strictly regulated numbers. It’s incredible to imagine a country stripped of its bird life, but wonderful to know that numbers are increasing rapidly due to some commonsense controls.

One early autumn morning I sit on my small porch in the sun, drinking tea and admiring the view of sloping grassland, golden woods and autumnal fields. I have to go out for a few hours, and when I return it’s to a scene of devastation: the grassland has been torn apart and turned upside down, with each tuft shredded into fine particles. It is a frightful mess, and I wonder what has happened here. Then it dawns on me—sangliers, or wild boars, have paid the garden a bold daytime visit, using their large black snouts and sharp tusks to rip the lawn apart in search of small grubs. I have seen them twice on the road to Cahors, once early in the morning and again at dusk. They scoot out of the scrubland and onto the road, posing the same sort of danger as kangaroos back home. The first one simply runs across my path, a fair way ahead; the second dashes out fifty metres in front of the car but is unable to mount the bank on the other side. He turns to go back but hesitates for a moment, glaring at me as the car advances towards him. Thankfully he then makes a break for it and disappears back where he came from—I can just imagine what would happen to my small car if I hit him full force. I am struck by how ugly these wild boars are, and how different from our own wild pigs which are descended from domestic ones that have gone feral. I am glad I wasn’t home when the sangliars came to call!

News travels fast, and the chasseurs hear of my porcine visitation. The following Saturday morning I realise that several hunters are stalking around the woods nearby, hoping to meet my ugly friends. If wild boars taste anything like they look, I am happy to skip that particular meal. Roger, however, decides to hold a chasse dinner, consisting of wild foods either hunted or gathered from the woods. Several months previously he and Danny, quaffing a glass of wine in the dwindling twilight, spotted a hare bobbing through the fields below Roger’s house. Although it wasn’t then legal hunting season, Roger took a pot shot and missed, then handed the gun to Danny who likewise took aim and bagged it in one. Having killed the poor creature they felt obliged to do something with it—so it was cleaned up, hung for a bit, then popped out of sight in the freezer. Hare is not a tender meat, and needs to be severely dealt with to make it palatable. It takes Roger several days of marinating the defrosted hare in wine and herbs to tenderise it, then he cooks it long and slow over two successive days, adding wild mushrooms and carrots for flavour. Jock, Danny and I gather at Roger’s for the dinner and I have brought along a warm walnut tart because although Roger is a great cook, he is not a ‘sweets’ man.

We start with an aperitif of red wine laced with cassis and walnut liquor, followed by a cèpe tart with crumbly short pastry and eggs supplied by the local farmer’s wife. The braised hare is accompanied by piles of crispy potatoes sautéed in goose fat and followed by salad greens from Roger’s garden lightly tossed in walnut oil, then mouth-watering runny Brie cheese. The hare meat is rich, incredibly rich—just a few small cubes are quite enough to eat in one sitting, though the sauce is absolutely sublime, and we mop our plates with bread between courses. Even Jock finds it hard to eat a large portion of hare, pushing it round the plate with some effort. When you consider that the smallest book in the world is ‘The List of Foods Jock Doesn’t Enjoy Eating’ it really means hare is an acquired taste! When we dine at Roger’s we follow common French practice of using only one plate, knife and fork for the entire meal: the idea is to wipe the plate clean with bread between entrée, main course, salad and cheese. Given the number of courses these people love to eat, it makes commonsense to recycle rather than wash up mountains of dishes.

Carole tells me of a special meal prepared one evening for the hunters at Madame Murat’s, using some of their catch. Forty or so strapping men descend on the restaurant at dusk for an aperitif, accompanied by only one or two wives and girlfriends. It’s very much a bloke’s night out, and the meal is a serious one.

A wild boar’s liver, weighing at least eight kilos, is sautéed in a massive frying pan and served with garlic, parsley and a red wine sauce. Next come the boar’s kidneys which have also been pan fried, and are apparently extremely rich and tasty. As if sufficient offal has not already been consumed, a third entrée is dished out—boar’s testicles poached in wine with capers. Madame Murat is quite red in the face by now, but the blokes are extremely happy. The main course is the roast wild boar itself, glimmering with crispy fat and basted in its own juices. By now it’s almost midnight and the party is getting rowdy, as jugs of wine are thrown back and tales of hunting exploits exchanged, but more courses and more wine are to come before Carole staggers home, well after 2 am, with the party still going strong. Heaven knows how the restaurant managed to open for lunch again the following day, or how the hunters managed to rouse themselves to stalk the woods again all weekend.

A couple of weeks into the hunting season, Jock’s black tomcat Shagger disappears. The body of another similar village tom is found in Sue and Andy’s garden next door, but it’s not Shagger; the dead cat has what appears to be bullet holes in the side of its neck, and we can only assume Shagger has met a similar fate. It’s common knowledge that bored or frustrated hunters will take a shot at anything that moves, including village cats on their hormonal rounds. Jock is greatly saddened at the loss of his scruffy old friend. The same week one of the kittens Sue brought from Spain is knocked down and killed by a car in the narrow street out the front of the house—it’s the second time one of their animals has been run over in St Caprais.

Meanwhile I mysteriously acquire a ginger tom that comes screaming at me out of the night, demented with hunger, eyes blazing red in my torch beam. I wonder how on earth he has found me here in the middle of the woods, a good distance from the nearest barn or farm. Unlike Pierre and the other village cats in Villefranche, who were being fed by half-a-dozen other people, this stray will be quite a responsibility to take on because I can’t just throw him out, close the door and walk away when I leave in December. But it doesn’t look as though he has anywhere else to go. I name him Jacques le Roux (Jack the Redhead) and he follows me from room to room, yowling for food and generally being very demanding. It’s as though he’s suffering from separation anxiety, and yet I have only just met him. I force worm tablets down his throat and apply flea powder liberally from ears to tail tip, and he purrs as if it is the greatest joy of his life. He possesses all the personality of ginger cats, and I find his company very appealing. I would have preferred, however, a half-wild cat to throw the odd scrap to, rather than this limpet that has taken me on one hundred per cent.

The attitude to cats can be hard-hearted here, but I am told a story that is quite reassuring. Danny’s neighbour, Monsieur Besse, has a tribe of wild barn cats, originally numbering twenty-six in all, that once belonged to his parents, both deceased some ten years. Since they died he has travelled daily from nearby Frayssinet to feed these cats. Eventually he decided the only solution was to desex as many as possible and he set traps, catching and carting at least sixteen furious furballs to the veterinary clinic. Now they are down to only seven cats, all plump and healthy, and all still fed daily by Monsieur Besse. They run wildly to greet his car as it pulls into the farmyard every evening, rain, hail or shine. Danny also slips them the odd bowl of cat kibble, but they are still quite wild and impossible to get close enough to give them a stroke.

I seem to be a cat magnet: Jacques le Roux becomes so firmly attached that I now worry about what will happen to him when I eventually leave. Just when I was enjoying freedom from all responsibility, I now have a small creature to consider.

As the weather cools and winter approaches, the festivities of summer wind down and various members of the group peel off in other directions. Miles and Anne have long gone, as he still works full time in London and six weeks is all they can spend at their glorious summer residence. They pop down again for a week in the autumn and when we lunch together at Madame Murat’s on their way to the airport at Toulouse, I know I’ll not be seeing them again.

Anthony, who spent last winter camped in a makeshift house in one of his outbuildings, has vowed never to endure a winter in the Lot again without central heating. Needless to say, he hasn’t quite got that far with his renovations, so he packs up his four-wheel drive and a trailerload of goods, including some boxes of fine wine, and heads back to the UK and comfortable civilisation. Andy and Sue leave for their house in Spain, with their dog and remaining kitten on board their crowded station wagon. Then Roger decides he must also return to England and close up his much-loved summer cottage for at least five months. We have several farewell dinners including one he prepares for us and one cooked for the remaining crowd by the indefatigable Lucienne.

I start feeling rather sad at the dwindling numbers, especially as I have a feeling that once I leave I shall probably never return. Life is like that. I always intend to come back but I rarely do. I know perfectly well that once I fall into my old routine of work and family and other commitments, it will be very difficult to find the time, not to mention the money, to take another holiday in this part of the world that I have grown to love so dearly. As the days get shorter I feel a certain gloom descending that makes me feel homesick for Australia and my family, yet I am reluctant to leave my present home and my new-found ‘family’.