Toujours Provence (Vintage Departures)

There is something about lunch in France that never fails to overcome any small reserves of willpower that I possess. I can sit down, resolved to be moderate, determined to eat and drink lightly, and be there three hours later, nursing my wine and still open to temptation. I don’t think it’s greed. I think it’s the atmosphere generated by a roomful

“To England and the English, as long as they keep their cooking to themselves.” Most of the French people we had met were more or less disdainful of la cuisine Anglaise without knowing very much about it. But Régis was different. He had made a study of the English and their eating habits, and during dinner he told us exactly where we went wrong. It

It was not unknown, he said, for a Châteauneuf to reach fifteen percent of alcoholic content. And these days, when Bordeaux seems to get thinner every year and the price of Burgundy is only possible for the Japanese, the wines of Châteauneuf are nothing less than bargains.

The beginning of a hot summer day in the Lubéron, sitting on the terrace with a bowl of café crème, the bees rummaging in the lavender, and the light turning the forest to a dark burnished green, is better than waking up suddenly rich.

the best food in Avignon is displayed and sold under the car park, in Les Halles.

It has often happened before, in many other parts of the world. People are attracted to an area because of its beauty and its promise of peace, and then they transform it into a high-rent suburb complete with cocktail parties, burglar-alarm systems, four-wheel-drive recreational vehicles, and other essential trappings of la vie rustique. I

He tucked his napkin under his chin and murmured to the waiter. “Un grand?” said the waiter. “Un grand,” said Régis, and sixty seconds later a large glass pitcher, opaque with cold, was placed in front of us. Régis became professorial; our lesson was about to commence. “In a serious restaurant,” he said, “one can always have confidence in the house