Restaurant St-Hilaire | The Rambling Epicure

Taste Unlocked Equinox 2015

Published by Jonell Galloway + Monday, September 21, 2015 Permalink 0

Taste Unlocked Autumn Equinox 2015 in Chartres, France

Taste Unlocked 2015 was a great success. Our guests have returned to England, but the house reverberates with the still-fresh memories of their presence and the joys of good food, fine wine and the excellent company we shared. Happy souvenirs of their visit, a few unfinished bottles we tasted will be emptied in coming days, but we shall toast our special guests each time we partake.

I prepared traditional dishes from the Beauce region, using the recipes I’ve researched over the years and the best products from local farmers and producers. These were accompanied by what we consider our local wine, that of the Loire Valley, which starts less than 50 miles down the road from here.

ChartresCathedralLighted2

We kicked off the weekend on Thursday over a dinner of locally farmed duck cooked in Eure-et-Loire apple cider and served with Beauce turnips and carrots and apples. This was followed by a curried green gauge plum sautée with Financier almond cake.

Chartres, Easy Getaway from Geneva: Restaurant St-Hilaire

Published by Jonell Galloway + Friday, January 21, 2011 Permalink 0

by Jonell Galloway

Rambling ’round France: Chartres Cathedral, a Gothic Wonder

Chartres makes for an easy, affordable weekend jaunt. There is no lack of things to do.

The Gothic cathedral is of course, the main thing to see, and you can spend 2 days just exploring that.

The cathedral itself, both inside and out, is truly one of the wonders of the world. The crypt includes a Romanesque church on top of which the cathedral was built, Roman ruins, an old Druid well, and a gallery that was probably used by the Druids to worship Bellissima, and later converted into a chapel dedicated to the Mother and Child of Chartres (it is said that the Druid goddess Bellissima also held a baby in her arms, although in a different position from the classic Christian manner).