Category: stories

< Monday morning 7 am : the first gunshots can be heard in the distance. As the morning progresses they come closer and one can hear the hunting dogs clearly. A bit later four or five white mini-vans race up the road and turn to get to the ridge of the mountain, each having one or more dogs inside. Fifteen minutes later, we have eyesight contact with “les chasseurs” and the gunshots are so nearby that one might consider taking cover … A typical sunday in l'Ardeche-Cevenolle (I know, it is monday but yesterday the weather was just too bad and luckily for them it's a holiday today).

The weather is really nice and as every other
addicted cyclist I want to seize the opportunity because it is highly
uncertain that there will be another dry day this week. I would like
to do my favourite round-trip : to Dompnac, then Pourcharesse and back
via St-Melany.

If you ever did this you will never forget the
Dompnac-Pourcharesse part of the trip : it is merely 4km but if you
know how to read a map you will understand what I mean. Unfortunately,
afterwards one has to descend to St-Melany crossing the hunting
forests of the community and I have no desire to end up in the
statistics as one of the over 70 deads or seriously wounded by
hunting-accidents in France every year …

So, I did
choose the second hardest (but safer) route : first to descend to the
bridge below and then climb to Sablieres (takes 15 min), descend to
the Drobie (4 mins) and then the serious climb to the highest road in
the vicinity at Peyre (takes 45 min) and back. The first time I did
the 'col de Peyre' I had to stop three times but now I know
one has to divide the thrip into three parts : the first part,
climbing to 'Le Mas' is fairly hard and by far the longest
part, after Le Mas one has a km which isn't that steep and one
needs to use this to recuperate a bit because the last part, when you
have the ridge of the mountain in sight, has still some very steep
streches. As this was my first cycling trip in the mountains in over
two months it was still pretty hard and I was glad to see the stone
pillar indicating the summit.

There was hardly any traffic :
7 cars and just 1 other cyclist. But I came across quite a few hunting
dogs that had lost their group. At first it is a bit scary to be on a
lonely road facing an unescorted dog but these hunting dogs are
usually rather nice. On the final climb back I met one who just turned
round and followed me whole the way back to LeTravers and stayed there
for the rest of the afternoon.

Later on, another lost dog
turned up and decided to stay as well. The local etiquette then
demands that you phone the owner(s) (the telephone numbers are written
on a collar they wear), which we did later on when we thought 'la
chasse' was ended for the day and the dogs were picked up around 8
pm. Unknowingly we did exactly the right thing to get our yearly piece
of fresh wild boar (to be continued)…

Although we can hear every night (in France) wild
boar descending the mountain in search for water and though
shooting them seems to be the only (male) social activity in Sablieres
this time of year, it is much easier to prepare a wild boar stew in
Belgium than in the Ardeche-
Cevenole. The reason being that it is impossible to find wild boar
meat in a supermarket or butcher in the region. A few years ago we
went there in the winter and I wanted to prepare wild boar for
new-year's eve but every butcher we approached for meat replied
with a fairly angry 'ne fais pas!' as if we asked him to
perform some illegal act (which probably, unknowingly, we did…).
In contrast, supermarkets and butchers are flooded with duck
('fillet de canard', 'cuisse de canard', 'confit
de canard', you name it) but I've never spotted a living duck
in the entire region! It turned out that, in order to prevent people
from shooting boar to make a living, it is not allowed to sell wild
boar meat. The only possibility to get it is either to shoot one
yourself or to have a friend in the local hunting society (les
chasseurs, omnipresent and rather political influencial in France).
Once you managed the latter, you have to master the basics of the
exchange-trade (you always have to give one commodity to get another).
The first time we offered a bottle of Pastis (Ricard) which was
flatly rejected because to them the value of Pastis is much higher
than that of boar meat, but they would accept a bottle of wine
instead…
Anyway, here is a fairly erratic recipe for wild
boar (serves 4 to 6) as I made it on thursday : get 1kg to 1.5kg of
wild boar meat, defrost if necessary and slice it into 1-2-3cm
cubicles (don't take this too strict). Meanwhile, heat up plenty
of olive oil, slice up two fairly large onions and as much garlic as
you (and your dinner partners) can master and fry this in the oil. Add
the sliced up meat and let it fry until all pieces are nicely brown.
Add pepper and your favourite herb (which is Thyme in my case, but
Oregano or Rosemary might be other choices). Add half of bottle (or
more) of red wine and some water (change percentages if you have
younger children) and heat it up. Have a look in the refrigerator for
vegatables that would go well with the meat. This time I used carrots,
mushroom and courgettes as they were available but use your own taste
to change this. Slice up 6 big carrots and add them (in general :
slice up the harder vegetables and add them now, keep the softer
vegetables for later) and let all of this stew for 2 hrs or more on a
moderate fire (stir every 10 minutes and add wine/water when needed).
Half an hour before serving add the courgettes (or any other softer
vegetable) and 15minutes later the mushrooms. Should be accompanied
with a proper 'gratin' but as I cannot approximate the one
made by Michel, chef of camping la drobie and part-time mayor of the local
village, I went for Rosti on thursday. Enjoy!