Bonjour

I hope that all is well with you and yours and that you had a great Christmas.

First  – an enormous thank you from me for all your support and friendship this year – I am hugely grateful that you subscribe to my newsletter and for all your messages and for your likes, comments and shares on social media. I’m truly thankful to those of you who have read my magazine and shared it with your friends and family (and made it the number one English language magazine in the world about France), and to those who have read articles on the website and shared them or taken inspiration from them. And finally if you have bought one (or all!) of my books – a heartfelt, humble and enormous thank you.

Bread Man (he delivers the bread, croissants and cakes to my village, he’s not actually made of bread!) asked me to wish you a “‘appy new year.” Claudette my 90 year old neighbour and the wisest woman in the village asked me to share some words that mean much to her. Though she doesn’t have a mobile phone or a computer, she knows that I sometimes tell you about her and how she quotes great authors whose words have meaning for a particular occasion. During the years of restrictions and curfews she often quoted Victor Hugo: “Even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise.” I think many of us took comfort from her wisdom and those words.

For the end of this year she is turning to Hugo again: “There is nothing like a dream to create the future…”

As for me, I wish you a happy, healthy and joyous new year from France as I sit writing in my little pigsty office – may all your dreams come true.

Janine
Editor

ps Find me on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter every day…

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream,  My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France all available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online.

Don’t miss the weekly newsletter which every week brings you inspiration from France

Read the whole newsletter here – loads of fun features and top tips for where to go in France…

It’s easy to subscribe if you don’t want to miss my weekly newsletters of musings from France and a round-up of fab features, plus exclusive random newsletter giveaways. Just scroll to the bottom of this post if you’re on a mobile device. Or look on the right on a laptop or PC. Type in your email address and click subscribe…

And don’t miss our brilliant, award-winning, totally free magazine: magazine.thegoodlifefrance.com

And we have a fun podcast – everything you want to know about France and more

The post Happy New Year from rural France appeared first on The Good Life France.

Can you believe it’s just a week until Christmas Day?! It’s still a little early for Christmas decorations where I live so if you were to visit a tiny hamlet in the Seven Valleys with an unpronounceable name that even French people struggle with, you won’t have any clues that December 25 is almost on the doorstep! I never say the name of my village because some of my neighbours have got it into their heads that my books may promote a Peter Mayle in Provence-like stampede to our muddy little roads! I have assured them that nothing of the sort will happen! Although in the summer, my other half was walking the dogs around the village one morning and chatting away to them when a man in a car driving very slowly along the bottom of our road stopped him and said “Do you know if Janine Marsh the British writer lives here?” “Never heard of her” said my husband and carried on walking!

We must wait a couple more days before we show signs of Christmas here, it is a tradition. Pretty much everyone makes their own wreath using pinecones and walnuts, spruce tree branches, holly berries, dried fruit and ribbons. I will be making a bouquet designed by one of France’s most famous florists who makes all the floral displays at the Chateau of Chenonceau in the Loire Valley (you can read the guide here, and it’s surprisingly simple and easy!).

We’ll be going to Madame Bernadette’s house tonight for her annual soiree. Every year she invites around 25 people to come and enjoy her amazing blow-your-socks off cocktails and eat yourself to a standstill party food. It is her way of saying thank you to people who have helped her through the year. She’s getting on a bit and we support her as much as we can, fetching shopping, clearing snow from her driveway, repairing things, heavy lifting and feeding her horse on cold days when the ground is slippery. Community is everything here so I can see that people might well want to know where I live, but I assure you that is the way it is in  most villages that I know in this part of France!

I will be back to wish you a Merry Christmas next week but for now, I wish you a very bon weekend from my rather snowy little village in the middle of nowhere, rural northern France.

Janine
Editor

ps The Good Life France’s Advent Calendar from France is on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter, a different photo on each platform every day…

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream,  My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France all available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online.

Don’t miss the weekly newsletter which every week brings you inspiration from France

Read the whole newsletter here – loads of fun features and top tips for where to go in France…

It’s easy to subscribe if you don’t want to miss my weekly newsletters of musings from France and a round-up of fab features, plus exclusive random newsletter giveaways. Just scroll to the bottom of this post if you’re on a mobile device. Or look on the right on a laptop or PC. Type in your email address and click subscribe…

And don’t miss our brilliant, award-winning, totally free magazine: magazine.thegoodlifefrance.com

And we have a fun podcast – everything you want to know about France and more

The post T’was the week before Christmas in France appeared first on The Good Life France.

Here in my part of France, the heat of the summer is long-forgotten as the rain has been bucketing down. Even my ducks are getting a bit fed up with it. Charlie the house hedgehog however is home and dry – literally, as he is now living in our house AKA the Hedgehog Hilton. We found him in the chicken pen a few weeks ago, he was very small and very skinny. We let him be and hoped he would grow bigger in time to hibernate. Alas a couple of days later, we nearly mowed over him as he was sitting in the grass, very disorientated. We put him in a box with some food and water and it was clear he was starving as he scoffed away. We thought we’d keep him for a couple of days to get him back on his feet, but he really was too small to put back outside. All the other hedgehogs we feed now appear to have hibernated so it seems we will have Charlie throughout the winter and we’ll rehabilitate him in the garden in spring.

Added to two now very boisterous Labrador puppies, 8 cats, and I don’t know how many chickens and a few ducks, it does occasionally feel like I’m living in a zoo!

Meanwhile I’ve been having a lot fun writing a new book. Not a memoire this time, it’s called “How to be French” – from food to fashion and everything in between. It will be published next year and I can’t wait to share it with you.

I’m also busy finishing the last bits and pieces of the winter magazine which will be published in just 2 weeks’ time. And it’s a beauty! Full of fabulous features and sumptuous photos, mouth-watering recipes and much more. If you’re not subscribed to it – please click here – subscription is free (and so is sharing it!)…

Find lots of inspiration for your trips to, and dreams of France in the section below. And don’t forget to listen to The Good Life France Podcast – it’s a delicious episode and all about cakes (link below). We have more great guests coming up… subscribe here to never miss an episode.

Wishing you a bon weekend and bisous from my little zoo-like house in the middle of nowhere, northern rural France,

Janine
Editor

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream,  My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France all available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online.

Don’t miss the weekly newsletter which every week brings you inspiration from France

Read the whole newsletter here – loads of fun features and top tips for where to go in France…

It’s easy to subscribe if you don’t want to miss my weekly newsletters of musings from France and a round-up of fab features, plus exclusive random newsletter giveaways. Just scroll to the bottom of this post if you’re on a mobile device. Or look on the right on a laptop or PC. Type in your email address and click subscribe…

The post Podcast, house hedgehog & more France Newsletter appeared first on The Good Life France.

I missed sending you a newsletter last week as I have had my life severely disrupted by two puppies. I sadly lost my beloved dogs Churchill and Bruno within 3 days of each other a couple of weeks ago. They were rather ancient, Churchill was my first ever dog, and Bruno was a gentle giant, and I was heartbroken. The house just didn’t feel right any more without a dog. So when I came across two 5 month old Labrador puppies looking for a home – I said yes straight away. Reggie and Ronnie are bundles of energy on a level I’ve not experienced with a dog before! They have spent their whole lives locked in a barn, had never been on a lead or out for a walk, never seen grass, never slept on a bed. Everything is new and wonderful to them – especially the lady who cuddles, feeds and waters and cleans up after them – mostly because she makes a great climbing frame too (yes that’s me). You can see them on Instagram here, and of course more tales coming up – Bread Man hasn’t met them yet, but I’m sure it will be a memorable first meeting!

Meanwhile Halloween is in full swing here. One of my neighbours is really into it with lid swinging coffins in the front garden, skeletons popping up over the hedge as you walk past, smoke filled cauldrons, scary clowns, cackling witches and ghostly things hanging and quivering in the trees. It really isn’t for the faint hearted (take a peek here)! But it does remind me of one of the worst joke I know, and I can almost certainly guarantee it will make you groan: “haunted French pancakes give me the crepes”…!

A huge thank you to everyone who has read and shared the autumn issue of The Good Life France Magazine – a whopping one million readers in just 4 weeks, and if you haven’t read it yet, just click here – it’s totally free to read, subscribe and share, and it always will be.

Back next week with news about another new member of the family – Charlie the rescue hedgehog who is living in the house with us and looks set to stay for winter!

Wishing you a bon weekend and bisous from my rather bonkers little corner of France

Janine
Editor

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream,  My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France all available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online.

Don’t miss the weekly newsletter which every week brings you inspiration from France

Read the whole newsletter here – loads of fun features and top tips for where to go in France…

It’s easy to subscribe if you don’t want to miss my weekly newsletters of musings from France and a round-up of fab features, plus exclusive random newsletter giveaways. Just scroll to the bottom of this post if you’re on a mobile device. Or look on the right on a laptop or PC. Type in your email address and click subscribe…

The post Happy Halloween from France newsletter appeared first on The Good Life France.

Bonjour from autumnal France,

I hope that all is well with you and yours.

It was National Dessert Day this week (14 October) and I mentioned it to Claudette, my 90 year-old neighbour. “I never heard of such a thing” she said. “But I think we should honour it with a cake.”

Well I wasn’t going to disagree with her as she is known to be a most wonderful cake maker. Her sponges are light and sweet, her crème patisserie is like velvet, and her eclairs are the most delicious I have ever tasted, smothered in chocolate or vanilla flavoured icing and oozing with Chantilly cream filling. She asked me what we should make and we talked about the many cakes we love, crème brulée and crêpes, sugar tart and beer tart, madeleines, millefeuilles and macarons.

In the end we decided to make pain perdu, which isn’t a posh dessert at all, but it’s very quick and easy to make, very more-ish and very shareable. Which was just as well as her son-in-law, Jean-Claude turned up while we were cooking – his pain perdu radar clearly working well.

He took his shoes off at the door and sat at the table as the aroma of the sweet eggy brioche swirled around her cosy kitchen.

“I just saw Madame Bernadette” he said, “she’s planning on having her usual Christmas soiree this year.” Well that cheered us all up no end, what with lockdowns and all, we missed it for the last two years. “She’s already planning the menu, and she’s got some home-made orange liqueur on the go” he said and sighed with happiness at the thought as Madame Bernadette is as good as cook as Claudette and her cocktails have a reputation for blowing your socks off.

Claudette placed a slice of pain perdu in front of us and we sat in quiet contemplation of a dish that’s said to go back as far as the days of Rome. This wise old lady often says that cooking is love made visible, and I promise you at that moment, I totally got it! (Here are the recipes for Claudette’s pain perdu, and for orange liqueur).

Wishing you a bon weekend and lots of entertainment and inspiration for your France trips…

Bisous from my little corner of rural northern France,

Janine
Editor

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream,  My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France all available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online.

Don’t miss the weekly newsletter which every week brings you inspiration from France

Read the whole newsletter here – loads of fun features and top tips for where to go in France…

It’s easy to subscribe if you don’t want to miss my weekly newsletters of musings from France and a round-up of fab features, plus exclusive random newsletter giveaways. Just scroll to the bottom of this post if you’re on a mobile device. Or look on the right on a laptop or PC. Type in your email address and click subscribe…

The post Cakes, love and life newsletter from France appeared first on The Good Life France.

Bonjour

I hope that all is well with you and yours.

We were walking home with the dogs in the rain early one morning last week when we were confronted by a strange sight. By the gate of the house opposite Thierry’s farm at the top of our road stood a plastic cow.

“Look” said Mark my husband, “A plastic cow.”

Not much happens in these parts, we get a bit excited at the prospect of something a little out of the ordinary. Though to tell the truth, it isn’t particularly unusual to see a plastic cow round here. People say of my little village “142 people and 1000 cows”, some of which are plastic, though not that many, normally just 6 plastic cows on the roundabout where there are four roads going their separate ways at the top of the hill that leads to the village church.

But then the plastic cow lifted its head up and looked at us with an air of mild curiosity. It was in fact a real cow, a very young one and it was munching away on the flowers in Madame Monique’s front garden.

“I think it might be Mr and Mrs Pepperpot’s cow” I said, I knew they had got a new little girl cow recently as I’d been to see it.

And I dashed off to get Mr Pepperpot (that isn’t his real name, but we call this couple the Pepperpots as they are very petite), who rather reluctantly pulled on his rubber boots and a raincoat as by now the heavens had opened.

“Zut alors” he said when we arrived at the corner where Mark stood drenched in the rain,  “that’s my cow!”

Well the cow was a very skittish creature and ran off into Thierry the farmer’s field where the road turns so that there are two ways out. It was followed by Mr Pepperpot calling it names and waving his arms about and sliding in the now sodden mud left by the recent harvesting of maize. Mr Pepperpot instructed Mark to stand in the middle of the road on one side, and me in the middle of the road on the other side, ready to stop the cow running off. I did wonder if perhaps I ought to have a lassoo but Mr Pepperpot had a tight grip on a piece of rope and he wasn’t letting go of it.

We stood there for ages as Mr Pepperpot attempted to cajole, and eventually yell at top of his voice for the cow to get out of the field. Meanwhile neighbours had come out to watch the shenanigans, when all of a sudden the cow came dashing out and headed straight towards Mark who ran about waving his arms. The animal changed its course and came charging towards me – I flapped my arms like I was trying to lift off the ground. The cow decided a flying woman in the road was too much to deal with and clip-clopped its way into Thierry’s courtyard where “Villaine” the Labrador awoke with a start from her bed in a shed and started barking. We all ran into the courtyard and Thierry came out to see what the normally very lazy Villaine was getting in a tizzy about. The little cow jumped over a trough of flowers and skidded to a halt in front of Thierry’s barn load of big cows which moo’d in surprise at all this unusual action and made her come to a confused standstill. Mr Pepperpot swiftly put the rope around her neck and wandered home. You can lead a cow to water, but you can’t make her think!

Bisous from my little corner of rural northern France,

Janine
Editor

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream,  My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France all available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online.

Don’t miss the weekly newsletter which every week brings you inspiration from France

Read the whole newsletter here – loads of fun features and top tips for where to go in France…

It’s easy to subscribe if you don’t want to miss my weekly newsletters of musings from France and a round-up of fab features, plus exclusive random newsletter giveaways. Just scroll to the bottom of this post if you’re on a mobile device. Or look on the right on a laptop or PC. Type in your email address and click subscribe…

The post An escaped cow fun newsletter from France appeared first on The Good Life France.

Autumn has arrived here in France, though actually it feels a bit like it arrived early this year after the very dry summer we had. We celebrated the arrival by going to a rather whacky ‘waiter’s race’ in Montreuil-sur-Mer, our nearest ‘big’ town. They haven’t held one for decades here, and there was a big turn out to cheer some 40 tray-carrying servers as they ran around the ramparts trying not to spill the full glasses!

And I have big news this week…

The Good Life France Magazine Autumn 2022

First – the Autumn issue of The Good Life France Magazine is out! It’s totally free, totally gorgeous to look at and totally full of fabulous features. You can read it by clicking here: The Good Life France Magazine Autumn edition. It’s free to share, subscribe and post a link – an enormous thank you for that.

In it we explore exquisite Aix-en-Provence, the French Riviera, delicious Dijon in Burgundy – the new foodie capital of France and bucket list Bordeaux. We head to Normandy to visit the artists’ favourite – the Alabaster Coast, the seaside resort of Ouistreham and the new British Memorial. In beautiful Beaune, the glorious wine country of Burgundy, follow in the footsteps of film stars and nuns; discover Saint-Guilhem-le-Desert, one of the prettiest villages in France, and walk with storks in Alsace. Want to know where to find the most stunning lavender fields in Provence – we reveal all! Discover the foodie credentials of Three Musketeers author Alexander Dumas, the UNESCO listed treasures of Nice, the perched castles of Dordogne and find out how Champagne got its pizzas. Recipes, guides, language lessons and much, much more. I hope you enjoy it.

The Good Life France podcast

Second – The Good Life France podcast is out – you can hear it here: The Good Life France podcast. There’s a subscribe button at the bottom of the post  if you don’t want to miss an episode as soon as it comes out. We have some fabulous guests lined up and I’ll be popping a podcast out every two weeks!

Take a virtual trip with me…

Next week I am off to a secret part of the south of France –  the Drome and the Loire regions. Not the Loire Valley, but in Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes. I’ll be visiting a chocolate museum (research!). And I’m fulfilling a dream to visit a palace built by a postman from pebbles collected on his delivery rounds. And loads more fascinating places. Come with me via Instagram…

Bisous from France,
Janine
Editor

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream,  My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France all available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online.

Don’t miss the weekly newsletter which every week brings you inspiration from France

Read the whole newsletter here – loads of fun features and top tips for where to go in France…

It’s easy to subscribe if you don’t want to miss my weekly newsletters of musings from France and a round-up of fab features, plus exclusive random newsletter giveaways. Just scroll to the bottom of this post if you’re on a mobile device. Or look on the right on a laptop or PC. Type in your email address and click subscribe…

The post Free France magazine, podcast & more newsletter appeared first on The Good Life France.

Bonjour

I hope that all is well with you and yours.

As usual the newsletter is jam-packed with fabulous features and fantastic photos of France – there’s a link below to see this week’s update…

Last week was my birthday. I read somewhere that at my age, chocolate, cake and wine could speed up the ageing process.

There’s only one way to deal with that sort of thing. I stopped reading.

I spent the day in my garden with Mark, my other half, chopping down trees that have got out of control over the long hot summer, and moved five baby chickens into the chicken nursery pen. Amazingly their mum Barbra Streisand is still caring for them. Normally she gets bored with the whole looking after kids thing. She’s a bit of a diva. Then we have to take on the role of surrogate parents and have them in the house. They are like hungry little dinosaurs, constantly tweeting for food. It was the perfect way to spend a birthday surrounded by my animals, Churchill the now very old and incontinent dog, Bruno the greedy stray who came for a week and is still here 10 years later, Winston the biggest and most neurotic cat in the village, Mimi and Tigger the kittens (well they think they are), Loulou and Shadow, Fat Cat, Marie-Antoinette, Little Socks and Ugly Cat.

This week we are celebrating 13 years since we decided to give up our sensible jobs in London and take time out to make our French house habitable. I’d bought it several years before for less than the cost of a posh handbag. It was a wreck, dirt floors, rattling windows, holes in the roof, more of an abandoned barn than a house. At the time I wasn’t sure that moving here was the right thing to do. We planned that when our contingency money ran out, one of us would go back to work in London. We had virtually no heating, if you don’t count the body heat from rats and mice. We couldn’t afford builders so we learned how to do everything ourselves from building walls to plumbing. It’s been a rollercoaster ride from day one (thanks to an exploding septic tank in the garden). And I have no regrets – not one single bit – despite the blood, sweat and plenty of tears. It’s been life changing and led me to start my website, write books, create a magazine and travel all over my adopted country and meet and chat to many wonderful people through social media and this newsletter. We’ve made a home that we love, have way too many adored animals and wonderful neighbours.

Next week I’m off to the Loire Valley to go chateau hopping and visit castles that I’ve never got round to – Ussé, known as the Sleeping Beauty castle, Villandry, famous for its gorgeous gardens, Loches, the ‘royal city and Chinon which has a stunning fortress and a charming medieval village. I’d love you to come with me and you can – via Instagram!

Bisous from France,
Janine
Editor

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream,  My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France (April 2022) all available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online.

Don’t miss the weekly newsletter which every week brings you inspiration from France

Read the whole newsletter here and see our photo of the week and loads of fun features and top tips for where to go in France…

It’s easy to subscribe if you don’t want to miss my weekly newsletters of musings from France and a round-up of fab features, plus exclusive random newsletter giveaways. Just scroll to the bottom of this post if you’re on a mobile device. Or look on the right on a laptop or PC. Type in your email address and click subscribe…

The post Newsletter: Fabulous features & fantastic photos of France appeared first on The Good Life France.

Bonjour

I hope that all is well with you and yours.

Last week I popped next door to see my neighbour Claudette. She is now in her 90’s and has hardly changed in the 18 years that I have had a home in France, time does not seem to wither her. She has told me many times her energy is due to her ‘good morals’ and a glass of home-made cider with breakfast! She is stick thin, sprightly and the wisest person I know.

I crossed the cobbled courtyard to her front door where a tea towel was laid on the doorstep as usual for people to wipe their feet or remove shoes before entering the house. I rapped on the door and she called “entrez!” and pushing it open, I stepped straight into the kitchen which as usual was baking hot. Her oven is powered by wood, even to make a pot of coffee. It is the bane of her son-in-law’s life as his job is to cut the wood into pieces small enough to fit the rather petite oven furnace. The oven was a wedding present, it looks as good as new with a bright blue enamel façade decorated with tiny multicoloured enamel flowers. The oven is not far off 70 years old, but as Claudette says, if it’s not broken, why replace it? And everyone agrees, the oven turns out the most amazing cakes.

We sat and chatted about Bread Man, wondering where he has gone on holiday as last week he left a note saying he’d be back in a fortnight. And about the fact that autumn already seems to be on the way with apples falling from the trees and blackberries ripe for picking. I told her I am going be launching a podcast – she had no idea what that is, ‘like the radio’ I said, ‘except that I’ll be talking about France.’ Claudette doesn’t have a computer or mobile phone so I promised to go and play her the first episode when it is published (soon!). And we talked about this and that and how there seems to be so much to be anxious about these days, and I thought I would share her words as they made me happy!

‘There is always hope’ she said. ‘There is hope in a new-born baby. In the rain and in the sun, in the winds that blow across the sky. In the animals and in the flowers, in the crops that grow and the cows that give us milk…’ she stopped to sip her coffee and then said if we had time we could think of a million things that give us hope.

‘And in the wisdom of old ladies’ I added and she laughed and said she would tell her book club that as it would make them smile.

Life here in my village isn’t glamorous or exciting in the way that city life can be, but over the years I have come to understand that often the very best things in life are the simple things that we all share…

Wishing you a very bon weekend from a possibly becoming-philosophically-French ex-Londoner in the middle of nowhere, rural northern France,

Bisous from France,
Janine
Editor

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream,  My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France (April 2022) all available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online.

Don’t miss the weekly newsletter which every week brings you inspiration from France

Read the whole newsletter here and see our photo of the week and loads of fun features and top tips for where to go in France…

It’s easy to subscribe if you don’t want to miss my weekly newsletters of musings from France and a round-up of fab features, plus exclusive random newsletter giveaways. Just scroll to the bottom of this post if you’re on a mobile device. Or look on the right on a laptop or PC. Type in your email address and click subscribe…

The post A simply lovely part of rural northern France appeared first on The Good Life France.

Bonjour

I hope that you and yours are well.

Bread Man (the man who delivers bread to our village, not a man who is actually made of Bread) is a bad influence.

I am still trying to lose the extra weight I put on during lockdowns when I started to bake at home with rather a lot of enthusiasm. I’ve been taking the dogs for long walks through the Seven Valleys where I live in northern France. I do 100 sits ups each night before I go to sleep. I’m doing a lot of gardening and working out in the gym 4 times a week. I’m cutting back on the things I love, wine and cheese, bread and cakes, delicious flammekueche – the local tarte flambée – made with stinky maroilles cheese and piquant crème fraiche. But it’s hard to say no. Really hard.

Each week Bread Man arrives with a treat. And that’s the hardest part – how to resist his melt in the mouth fruit tarts, his sweet chocolate millefeuiles and his oh so naughty sugar cakes.

This week when I heard him sounding his horn as he made his way round the village dropping off baguettes and country loaves, croissants and pains aux chocolat, I was determined to resist.

“Non, merci” I said when he asked if I wanted to look at the cakes in his little van and choose a little “treat.”

He looked crestfallen. Broken-hearted.

“I love your cakes” I hastily reassured him.

He brightened up.

“Macarons” he said. “With framboise. Magnifique.” And he closed his eyes, pushed his cap back, kissed his fingers and like a magician fluttered them dramatically but seemingly without intent over towards the side of his van where the panel was open to the trays of gateaux and my eyes followed as if hypnotised and fell upon the pretty pink macarons filled with raspberry cream.

Well you can probably guess what happened.

I trundled up the garden path with a loaf of bread and two macaron cakes – consoling myself that I was not only expanding my waistline but my standing in the eyes of Bread Man, himself no stranger to the irresistible joys of cake. I guess I will just have to walk a bit more each day.

Bisous from the middle of nowhere France, where temptation comes in the form of a raspberry-pink mouth-wateringly luscious macaron…

Bisous from France,
Janine
Editor

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream,  My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France (April 2022) all available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online.

Don’t miss the weekly newsletter which every week brings you inspiration from France

Read the whole newsletter here and see our photo of the week and loads of fun features and top tips for where to go in France…

It’s easy to subscribe if you don’t want to miss my weekly newsletters of musings from France and a round-up of fab features, plus exclusive random newsletter giveaways. Just scroll to the bottom of this post if you’re on a mobile device. Or look on the right on a laptop or PC. Type in your email address and click subscribe…

The post Bon weekend from tempting France… appeared first on The Good Life France.