Red and white

I woke up again this morning to a white, white world. Although it's only October, the weather appears suddenly to think it's winter and is offering up crisp, cool days of impossibly blue skies and nights hovering below zero degrees. We're some 10 degrees down on the average temperatures for this time of year, and even though the sun is hot enough to strip off for a few hours in the afternoon, for the rest of the time long trousers have become the order of the day. We even closed the curtains for the first time last night.

As I drove towards Foix just before sunrise this morning (look, it's not that impressive. The sun doesn't come up here until nearly half past eight ...), the smell of wood smoke was in the air, the horses were wearing their blankets and even the cows looked cold. Although Grillou was, as usual, clear, there's a point a few kilometres to the east at Castelnau Durban where you always drive into early morning mist at this time of year; it always provokes the proverbial sharp intake of breath, and never more so than this morning. Note to self: must go out walking early one morning. After the réno, of course ...

The last of the summer plants in the potager have taken umbrage at being left out in below-freezing temperatures (who wouldn't?) and promptly died. Which meant that this weekend the réno just had to wait while we dealt with 11 aubergines, half a kilo of Scotch Bonnets, 2 kilos of cayenne peppers, half a kilo of green chili peppers, a good few sweet Basque peppers and another 2 kilos of Cornue des Andes tomatoes. I've come to the conclusion that anyone wanting to grow a cash crop here could do worse than go into the production of pimentos: from five cayenne plants, picked up at St Girons market for 60 centimes each, we've produced almost 5 kilos of peppers. Cayenne peppers sell here for up to 25 euros a kilo ...

We've already got a huge stash of whole cayennes in the freezer (thanks to the friend who introduced me to this particular astuce) and have given away as much again; this bit of the harvest was destined for drying. I've always wanted to string up my peppers (along with a few other - er - things. And I don't mean the builders.), so last night, when another friend phoned, I told him that I was sewing up my chillis. Sigh. Another credibility point lost ...

Anyway, I now know that strings of chillis are called ristras, and that apparently hanging one up in your house will not only bring you good luck, but is a symbol of welcome for visitors. Well, I've got three. Bring it on ...