Hello friends and fellow campers!
Gourmet Girl Denise here from Le Petit Saint Barnabé, Mouliherne, France. The weather is hot here at the homestead in the Loire River Valley. The mercury is topping out this week at 40 degrees centigrade or 104 degrees Fahrenheit! Yikes! Lemonade consumption is going to be high and I will be staying inside my 19th century stone house where the temperature stays cool and refreshing. This is because the walls are two and a half feet thick, much like the old adobe homes in my native Santa Barbara. The folks back then knew what they were doing.
There have been lots of changes here at the house, as I have signed up to host travelers via ‘Workaway’, an online site that links folks who want to visit a particular country and work for room and board. I have a new chicken coop that was built from materials found onsite that used to be an old hog pen. As soon as it was completed I ran right out and purchased my girls, five lovely hens. the have settled in and two of them have already started laying. There is nothing quite like fresh eggs!
My Veggie garden is also thriving. I have 10 tomato plants going and with this heat, they are all setting lots of fruit. 
I am also growing gold zucchini, Japanese eggplant, a local squash called Potimiron (see here)
Makes a great soup!
artichokes, strawberries, carrots, arugula, or rocket as the English and French call it, french radishes, golden beets, and lettuce called Les Merveille des Quatre Saisons.
and of course lots of herbs like rosemary, sage, thyme, chives, tarragon, basil, etc…
There are many recipes in The Gourmet Girls Go Camping cookbook, so get out your copy, or if you don’t have one yet visit our website here. And remember! You don’t have to go camping to try our recipes. You can cook everything in the book at home in your own kitchen or backyard. If you can’t get out camping then set up a table in the backyard. Everything tastes so much better when eaten outside. And there are many recipes for vegetarians too so that you can use up your garden bounty.
We hope you are having a delightful summer and don’t forget to eat your veggies!!
P.S. the featured image at the top of this post is the lovely town of Saumur and its beautiful chateau on the banks of the Loire, a twenty-five-minute drive from Le Petit Saint Barnabé.
Denise, Gail, and Lindsey
Fabulous!