La Serre pt. 5 -- Andy and Sara

The Universe is a good place. It realized our relative stir-craziness that was happening, and it delivered to us two wonderful Americans within walking distance. Just when things were getting bleak at La Serre, we were given Andy and Sara, a married couple from Florida. They are living in Lyon at the moment while Andy is working on some math thing, and they decided to wwoof on their vacation time to learn about permaculture. Anyway, we could not have asked for more wonderful neighbors. They are so intelligent and funny and entertaining. We've been over to their house (or their wwoofing farm) like 6 times and spent the night twice. Their hosts go out of town a lot, so we have really taken advantage of that. So these pictures kind of chronicle the food we've eaten together.

This is the kitchen at their farm. The night before I first saw it, I dreamed that I used a bunch of Christmas popcorn tins in my own kitchen. Weird!

More of their kitchen

One of the things we have learned from them is which weeds are edible and which ones aren't. This is some lovely nettle juice that we drank for its wonderful vitamin content and lovely grassy flavor.

At dinner party #1, we ate a raw lentil salad. It inspired me to want to participate in Raw Food Wednesdays when I get back. Raw lentils are good and filling!

Because Derek and I didn't have anything to bring to the dinner, we picked a million wild blackberries on the way to their house, which I promptly turned into a cobbler. It was good, but a little seedy.

The next day, we dined with them again. Here is the plate of assorted organic tomatoes along with the dippers for the raw hummous.

This is raw hummous. It is made from germinated chick peas. It was much fluffier than regular hummous, and I think I enjoyed it more!

Another day without anything to bring, so we picked more blackberries, plums, and elderberries. I made this pie. I made an olive-oil based crust "au pif" which means without really knowing what I was doing, and it was so good! I will always make that over a butter crust now.

The next morning, Sara made us pancakes using some pears I brought from our tree.

Someone get me this cookbook! I must have it!

Later that same day, we ate a great salad of lettuce, weeds, and edible flowers.

I forget what this weed is called, but it reminds me of the horticulture teacher in Harry Potter. Ughh what is it?? Well, no matter. The leaves taste like fish! We fried the leaves in a Corn Flake batter and ate it with sesame sauce. It was really delicious!

Andy fryin' up the leaves.

So anyway, bless the Universe for bringing these people to our lives. Derek and Andy have bonded over trading enlightening books and have very good discussions about them. We've had an amazing time knowing them! We are sad that they're leaving on Sunday, but we're leaving no later than Wednesday, so that'll be okay.

Yeah, we are trying to go back to Paris for a few days before going to London. We are straight up tired of farming, and this woman is about to drive us out of our skins! We'll see if it's worth the extra money to change our train tickets, but we think it just might be.