Tag Archives: markets

From AU to the UK to the EU in 5 weeks!

I’m tired just thinking about it — but we have gone from Australia to the UK to France in the very short space of 5 weeks. Seriously — whew!

We don’t bounce back energy-wise as fast as we did 20+ years ago — so we were well into Week 2 in England at Mark’s parents’ house before we started to shed SOME of the jet-lag. But even when we first arrived in France in the 3rd week of November, we were still exhausted.

Once we had the shopping and car insurance and ferry reservations and so forth sorted out, we drove in the wind and rain to Portsmouth to take the night ferry to Caen. I had booked a cabin so we could get some sleep, but the staff hadn’t finished cleaning the rooms when we arrived, so we ended up getting very few hours of shut-eye.

Waiting in a long and very slow line to board the ferry.

Waiting in a long and very slow line to board the ferry.

Waiting for our cabin to be cleaned in the blue-light disco.

Waiting for our cabin to be cleaned in the blue-light disco.

Arriving in France, we drove through persistent rain towards Caen and then south to the town of Saint-Pierre-sur-Dives and onward to the nearby village where we will be living for the next several months as Mark does a large renovation project.

The house was built over several centuries — but the oldest section is from the 1400s. And the part we are living in — the red brick section — is from the 1800s. We even have a resident mouser named (badly!) Caramel who SHOULD be named Rocky because he’s such a sturdy bruiser of a cat. However (ahem!) — he has now adopted Mark and he follows him around like a puppy. So much for the cat’s stand-offish reputation!

The Normandy renovation project.

The Normandy renovation project.

Mark inside the renovation project.

Mark inside the renovation project.

Mark's new playmate -- the cat in residence.

Mark’s new playmate — the cat in residence.

The town of Saint-Pierre-sur-Dives is quite stunning and given the fact that they were occupied by the German army during World War II — a remarkable amount of truly old and lovely buildings are intact.

Every Monday morning, there is a large local market that takes place both inside the medieval market hall (another post about that coming soon!) and in the nearby street and huge parking lot. The range of fresh produce, cheese, wine, meat, seafood, and more was a wonderful surprise.

The packed Monday market in Saint-Pierre-sur-Dives.

The packed Monday market in Saint-Pierre-sur-Dives.

Inside the historic medieval market hall at Saint-Pierre-sur-Dives.

Inside the historic medieval market hall at Saint-Pierre-sur-Dives.

Rooflines show the overlapping time periods of the town.

Rooflines show the overlapping time periods of the town.

Leaning against a wall of the cloister, a statue awaits restoration of the abbey in Saint-Pierre-sur-Dives.

Leaning against a wall of the cloister, a statue awaits restoration of the abbey in Saint-Pierre-sur-Dives.

And finally — a hello from our next door neighbours on ALL sides — the lovely cows of Normandy. I’ll be back with more slices of life-in-France in the next few days. Enjoy!

The pretty cows in the fields next door.

The pretty cows in the fields next door.

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Emerging From The Twilight Zone With Chutney

Seriously, when I realised that it had been a month (and a very odd month indeed!) since my last post, I felt like I had stepped inside an episode of The Twilight Zone and time and space had eaten me. There have been rather a lot of ups and downs with medical issues, but I am hopeful that things are on the upswing now. (fingers crossed!)

We did our very-few-blocks walk across the river to the Saturday market here in St. Girons yesterday and came back with a new digital kitchen scale and all of the ingredients for something wonderful — tomato chutney!
 

9 completed jars of tomato chutney


 
I laughed at the online instructions that said that the chutney took half an hour to prepare and one and a half hour of simmering before it was time to jar it. Perhaps if someone works a lot faster than I do they could do the prep in half an hour, but it took me an hour of peeling, chopping, and stirring. And Mark, the darling man, had to step in right at the end because I was gasping from chopping the onions.

This simmered for over 2 hours before it became the colour and texture that made me happy, but here is the recipe for anyone who’d like to try it. And it made 9 jars of recycled-marmelade-jar size final product. I tweaked the basic recipe with lots of spices after reading several versions of tomato chutney recipes online and deciding that just tomatoes, sugar, and onions was going to be a bit too bland for our taste.
 

Spicy and fragrant tomato chutney simmering atop the stove as it thickens


 
This totally fits in with our ethos of trying to live in an eco-conscious manner. We didn’t spend a penny on fuel since we walked to the market, we bought local produce with very low food miles, and we used recycled glass jars. The total cost for the ingredients was just about €7, I got 9 jars, and frankly that’s a much more sensible economic idea if you enjoy cooking than spending €3-4 or more per jar for quality chutney.
 

Glass jars simmering in boiling water to sterilise them


 
Here’s the recipe below. The amount of seasoning can be adjusted up or down according your own idea of what is spicy enough. Enjoy!

TOMATO CHUTNEY

2 kilos of ripe tomatoes
500 grams of sliced and slightly chopped onions
8 fat cloves of garlic
8 cm piece of ginger peeled and chopped
375 grams of brown sugar
325 ml of cider vinegar
Juice of one lime
1 large or 2 medium apples — peeled and chopped
1-1/2 to 2 cups of raisins
10 cardamom seeds
1/2 tsp sweet paprika
1/2 tsp smoky paprika
1/2 tsp chili powder
4 tsp cumin
4 rounded tsp allspice
3/4 tsp cinammon

Bring all ingredients to a full boil in a large kettle-style pan with a heavy bottom. Once boiling, reduce the heat and allow the mixture to simmer for at least 2 hours, perhaps longer, until you see the liquid significantly reduced, the mixture thickened, and the colour of the chutney change from bright red to a brown-red.
 

Jars of hot chutney turned upside down as they cool to give a tight seal


 
Spoon mixture into hot, sterilised glass jars making sure to wipe the rims clean before sealing the lid tightly. Turn the jar upside down whilst cooling to allow for a tight seal.

Enjoy!
 

Cooled jars of tomato chutney


 

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London’s Funky and Vibrant Spitalfields and Brick Lane

One of the nicest aspects of living in a thoroughly metropolitan place like London is the market scene and we’ve recently discovered two back-to-back and quite wonderful areas. The neighbourhoods are gritty and funky and full of a mix of old shops, new shops, converted warehouses, and vast spaces that formerly housed manufacturing of some kind and which are now partitioned into market stalls where up-and-coming fashion designers ply their wares. Art galleries, performance spaces, and the vintage clothing and goods scene are all quite well accommodated in this part of London, too.

The markets at Spitalfields and Brick Lane are both a short walk from the Liverpool Street Station which serves both the London Underground and the regional above ground trains.

Just getting there is an interesting walk past a mix of old multi-story buildings with shops or restaurants on the ground floor and apartments above juxtaposed with glossy, glass, and oh-so-contemporary skyscrapers such as the London landmark amusingly nicknamed ‘The Gherkin’ and more correctly named 30 St. Mary Axe.

 

London landmark skyscraper nicknamed 'The Gherkin' looming over older buildings.


 

The walk that leads to the Old Spitalfields Market has the beautiful Christ Church, Spitalfields at the end of the street. Shops, pubs, and galleries flank both sides of this lovely street.

 

Christ Church Spitalfields at the end of Brushfield Street.


 

We entered the vast glass-covered area filled with market stalls and stumbled upon an in-progress beauty pageant featuring four-legged contestants — the Paw Pageant.

 

Spectators and participants at the Paw Pageant in Old Spitalfields Market.


 

The Paw Pageant in the Old Spitalfields Market.


 

Leaving the market and turning right onto Hanbury Street, we popped into a vintage store, Absolute Vintage, that was lined from top to bottom with purses, dresses, shoes, and more. In case you were wondering, that perfectly posed female is not a mannequin in the picture below — it’s a shopper frozen in the moment of deciding what purse to take off of one of the many overflowing displays.

 
Shopping in Absolute Vintage on Hanbury Street off Brick Lane in London.
 

We walked a few blocks further and arrived at the cafe-lined Brick Lane. I can honestly say that I have never seen such a concentration of Indian restaurants in one place!

 

Brick Lane in London's East End is lined with a vast variety of Indian restaurants.


 

More markets are held within the old Truman Brewery buildings — the smokestack of which is seen in the photo below. Everything from one-off sales to designer samples in sparsely furnished warehouses line Brick Lane so it is a slice of shopping heaven for the hip and trendy.

 

Smokestack of the old Truman Brewery off Brick Lane in London.


 

The funny, funky streetlamps on funny, funky Brick Lane in London.


 

One last note — in spite of the occasional crowds in various restaurants (and that is to be expected on any weekend!), this entire area felt less like a ‘tourist market’ and more like a local market with quality products that are aimed at London residents. In a previous post that discussed a visit to the Camden Markets, I aired my aggravation with the throngs of pushy people, the overlapping food smells, the sheer tattiness of most of the goods on offer, and the distinct sensation that it was being touted as a ‘must do’ thing for tourists in London.

Camden Market was such a jolting disappointment that we were thrilled to visit the Spitalfields and Brick Lane area after a recommendation from our friend Claire. This is the happy, upbeat, relatively uncrowded, and genuine market experience for the kinds of quality items that we were looking for in London.

Try it for yourself and see!

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Crushed By Crowds and Crabby

Note to self — no matter which of us says to the other one, “Oooo! They have a really big market over at (insert location of choice). Want to go?” — the default answer in a humongous city the size of London should always be no-no-no-no-no. This also falls under the category of ‘How to spoil a perfectly lovely day on the weekend.’
 

Jammed up in the crowds at Camden Market


 
But wait — it gets better. Not once (are we slow learners on occasion?) but twice on the same weekend we sampled a market. At least on the second try I took zero pictures and we walked briskly through the crowds and out the other side in less than five minutes with me saying “This is not the way I remember things being.”

Am I getting old and crabby? (don’t answer that!) Or has my tolerance for being crushed by crowds, smelling too many overlapping food aromas, hearing music playing loudly that I outgrew decades ago, seeing people draped on every available surface, and looking at items that I could find on Ebay simply erased my joy in the whole ‘market scene’ rather a lot?

I choose to regard this minor case of a shock-horror moment — complete with remarks from my husband to the effect of “If you could see your face, Deborah!” — as another time capsule moment when things were viewed from a different perspective 17 years ago. Otherwise, the population boom in London really has resulted in a population boom at the large markets and they are no longer a pleasant way to spend an afternoon.

Camden Lock

Crowds on every waterside walkway at Camden Market

It isn’t strictly a ‘young scene’ although the preponderance of people sitting, standing, or elbowing their way through the throngs on the waterside walkways did appear to primarily be in the under-30 category.

Elsewhere there were people in attendance of all shapes, sizes, and ages — gamely picking through the goods on offer, slurping down a latte or a chai tea, or simply people watching.

I continue to read that this market is a recommended place to go when you visit London. But unless you have lived a deprived or rural or shopping-zone-free life, I cannot for the life of me understand why a guidebook writer would find this place thrilling.

Crowded shopping in the Camden Market halls

So, if a crush of crowds with pointy elbows and massive feet, a plethora of ‘cuisine’ smells, dated music sounds, and so-so merchandise makes you as crabby as it made me, this might just be a place to avoid!

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