Homegrown Strawberries

Hmmm... well, I mentioned that I'm excited to get back to my kitchen and to garden produce in France, as well as to the superb local strawberries. So it's of a bummer that the strawberries in my garden are ready right now! Hopefully there'll still be some late ones ripening by the time I get home, but in the meantime I'll have to make do with this juicy photo of a small proportion of the strawbs from my garden, and console myself with the fact that my kind friend who tends the garden is getting a well-deserved reward. (Photo courtesy of gardening friend.) I must plant some more varieties so that there are always strawberries whenever I arrive between May and September.


Juicy, fragrant, delicious, organic, homegrown strawberries.

Elderberry Wine and Friends, South-West France

Not really cuisine from the far corners of the planet, but definitely a gastronomic triumph, and some might find it adventurous...

My best mate Perry's been cosying up for autumn and having some culinary adventures in his own kitchen in France, with the help of wood-burners (yes, plural) and Unglum the cat (whose fave food is tomatoes, by the way). Italian heart stew, pizza dough flatbreads puffed up over a barbecue for kebabs, Moroccan meatball and egg stew, blood sausage omelet and freshly-collected oysters have been some of the mouth-watering delights on the menu over the last couple of weeks.

This is the elderberry wine the dude's been working on for two months, after collecting the berries in his garden. Perry carefully completed each stage exactly by the book, to avoid the risk of his precious potion turning to vinegar instead of alcohol. Success! It was all worth it. Now he has litres and litres of potent, fruity wine to get through. Lucky he's got good friends to help him out! See tasting notes below.

The beautiful results of weeks of careful work.


"It tastes really fruity, but not in a dodgy way, a bit like really weak ribena, but it smells wonderful. I think it should become amazing, because everything I've read says it should be undrinkable before Christmas at the earliest - maybe it's just my vin de table standards! It is certainly pretty strong even at this early stage - all I had was the glass in the picture and I really felt the effect strongly as you can probably tell from my email." - Perry Lancaster

Gemma Driver - Food & Travel Writer

Gemma Driver, 31, is the gourmet journalist and food editor at FrenchEntree, French News, and her own site, The Gastropod. Journalist, writer, editor, interviewer and researcher for publications and television, recipe writer and translator, food correspondent for radio ( Radio Liberte), and reviewer.

The combination of a refreshing, vibrant style of writing with an accredited tasting background, means that Gemma's writing and knowledge has quickly become sought after. In her pursuit of gastronomic adventure, she frequently dispels traditional culinary rules and advocates honestly and ethically produced food. Gemma moved to rural South-West France, in 2002, for the lifestyle, ingredients, sun and her ancient stone house.

You can view my work at The Gastropod, but this is the place for my food blog, with reports on the food and drink I experience on my travels...