Le Résinier

Here is a picture of our guest room at La Maison Rose. You can sort of get a feel for the comfy tranquility of it all. We slept like logs.

As was dinner the night before, breakfast was a homemade take on the classic petit dejeuner; breads, jams, yogurt, fruits, coffee, orange juice. Though in this case the breads included homemade brioche and pound cake, courtesy of Corinne.

Gérard had spent some time the previous evening describing some of the terrain through which we would be cycling today. Of particular interest were some lagoons we would be passing by. The water table was very close to the surface in this area, and the depressions gouged by the glaciers of the previous ice age now were constantly filled with shallow water, making for a special ecosystem.

***

Cycling Experience: Today I heard the phrase, “NO!! Stop doing that. You may not feel my bewb when we are riding bicycles.”

***

So, we arrived at the lagoons, and there was this totally cool sign that indicated to us that this was a Serious Thing that many people would be interested in. So we were.

There was a circular trail that we could hike around; it would take roughly 1.5 hours (we got that figure by dividing by two the amount our guidebook said it would take). We set off in search of lagoony goodness.

This was a bona fide ecologically sensitive environment, and the walkways to the observation areas consisted of boardwalk, surrounded by a barrier on either side, and often on top – presumably to prevent visitors from going off-path and trampling on things.

The walkway led to an enclosed room with viewing slits. I sort of felt like I should have a .30 cal. machine gun at hand…

So at any rate, here is what the lagoons looked like.

We were, to say the least, mildly disappointed. It was clear to us, given our previous experience in the French countryside, that the Lagoons were closed. Likely they would not open until 16:00. Either that, or water was not provided to the Lagoons on Thursdays.

We hiked on around the loop, disappointed, but not undaunted. Until…

We’re not sure what happened here, but we got to see a lagoon with actual water. Also, we noticed a number of different animal tracks around the lagoon, and that was pretty cool.

As we hiked the rest of the way back to our bicycles, we cut though a stand of forest, filled at ground level with chest-high ferns; that was seriously cool.

***

Cycling Experience: Chainring print on back of calf.

Level Up!!

***

We arrived in Le Barp, and checked in at Le Résinier, an inn and also a restaurant that we were very much looking forward to enjoying. Listed in the Michelin guide, the restaurant Le Résinier is all about the fresh. Here is a shot taken from just outside the door of our room, where their herbs are grown.

At dinner that night, as an opening cocktail, we ordered Cocktail du Résinier, consisting of champagne, red wine, floc de Gascogne, crème de mure, and armagnac (if the rouge version was ordered), or white wine, floc de Gascogne, crème de peche, and armagnac (if ordering blanc).

We didn’t know what to expect, but we ordered one blanc and one rouge. Our take is that they were the French version of sangria. And, man, they were good.

An amuse bouche arrived – tall shot glasses of hot cream of asparagus soup, topped with slightly soured whipped cream. This was a treat. The soup was stellar, and the topping was a perfect counterpoint.

The previous evening, we had discussed how pleased we were to get to pedal through Sauternes. Gérard offered that they rarely ever had Sauternes with dessert. Rather, they drank it as an aperitif, with cheese, or, ideally, foie gras.

We ordered glasses Sauternes with to accompany our entrées, because this:

Seared foie, with a lightly sweet broth and pieces of apple

From the moment we saw seared foie on the menu, we knew how this was going to go down. And it was OhMyGod good. To quote Julia, “One of the top five things ever to hit my tongue”. She was kind enough to share with me. I still don’t know exactly what the attraction is, but I kept asking for more bites. It was really that special. And yeah, the Sauternes was the perfect accompaniment.

In keeping with the theme of Foods That Are Wrong, for my entrée I ordered veal. Presented with vegetables in a, um… veal sauce of some kind.

For the wine, we had an incredible 2007 Chapelle d'Ausone Saint-Emilion.

For the main, Julia had a sort of shredded, roast duck. Tender, juicy portions are obscured in this photo beneath thin slices of crisped potato. The fun bit here is that Julia didn’t actually know what she had ordered. The entire menu was in French, with no helper descriptions in English, and she picked it without help from wordreference.com. When it arrived, we were trying to decide whether it was beef or maybe some kind of seasoned pork. We asked the waitress, who gave us a sort of puzzled look and told us it was duck. It was, once again, not heavy or fatty or greasy or any of the things that duck seems to be when we have had it locally at home. Rather, it was exquisitely good.

I have hypothesized that, after having harvested the livers for foie gras, the French have had to find a way to deal with vast quantities of leftover duck-remainder, and have therefore - of necessity - gotten very good at preparing it. Whatever the reason, the assessment of preparation skill stands: France Knows Duck.

I got a lamb part, in a rich white sauce and lots of roasted garlic. I’m not certain entirely what the lamb part was. Perhaps a shoulder?

For dessert, I got some kind of chocolate thing. It looked like a take on molten chocolate cake, but its core appeared to be some kind of bread pudding.

Julia nailed a crème brûlée. It was delectable, of course, but what we have both noted and been impressed by is the delicacy of the brûlée.

Armagnac is a type of brandy, produced in the Bordeaux region, and Le Résinier stocks an impressive cellar. Like Cognac, Armagnac is distilled from wine. However, it is only single-distilled, and thus also spends longer maturing in the barrel. We opted to splurge a bit and get some of the older stuff. Burying one’s nose in a snifter of Armagnac is a mistake. Holding it at chest level and drawing in the bouquet provides a surplus of olfactory input.

Both contained copious amounts of buttery vanilla, nuttiness, and assorted florals. The 1933 seemed a smidge softer than the 1934, though that is almost certainly characteristic of the different Armagnacs rather than the extra year. It would have been cool if we knew enough about brandies to have been able to appreciate them more.