When disaster strikes

But you still end up in paradise

Oh boy, what a week it was. What should have started as a lovely vacation on Saturday quickly turned into a disaster when our vintage Pininfarina decided to die… just 80km away from our little country house, and in the bleeding hot sun. It didn’t take long for me to start freaking out, which is totally not the right thing to do. I know. But how could I not? We were in the middle of nowhere, and I had the dog with me. Suddenly, I couldn’t speak a word of French, think straight or even use my phone. So I did what I thought seemed most logical at that moment: get out of the car and flag someone down to help us.

Luckily, a French couple quickly stopped, called a tow truck and tried to help us remain calm. They were angels, and I will forever be grateful. The man who towed us was also such a professional. He took care of everything and safely got us to the nearest hotel – where we thought we would only spend two nights. Well, it turned out to be three… but could have been 14 (almost half of our vacation).

Our car was taken to a local dealer/garage, and unfortunately, they told us they wouldn’t have time to even look at it until early July. That was a major WTF moment. No way was I going to spend another night in that tiny hotel room! I was supposed to be in a beautiful village… writing, painting, being creative and enjoying France!
When I finally regained my composure, I picked up the phone, called the nearest car rental and rented a Twingo… until July 2nd. And even though it was a crappy car, it wasn’t cheap. 

The next morning we called a cab, picked up the Twingo and drove straight to the place where they had our car. I was hoping that if we could get a chance to talk to them personally things would be done a little faster. They had to feel sorry for us, right? And indeed they did because the next day we got a phone call telling us we could pick up our car. Remember I told you we had rented a Twingo until July 2nd? Yep, there’s a very big chance that our money will not be returned. As for what the problem with our car was… the fuel gauge wasn’t working, and we were running on empty. I kid you not. Oh, and the cherry on the sundae was a bout of food poisoning that last night at the hotel.

But here we are, nearly a week later, and things are looking up again. Our house is just as lovely as I had hoped, the surroundings are straight out of a storybook and our days are spent taking long walks, loving France and creating.

I am happy to say our first video and recipe for the ‘Cooking with Vegetables’ series was sent to paid subscribers on Friday! And already so many people have made and enjoyed my piperade (a dish from French Basque Country made with onions, tomatoes, peppers and piment d’Espelette).

The post includes the recipe, history of piment d’Espelette and the video, which was such a joy to shoot.

If you haven’t subscribed yet, great news! I’m offering a special introductory rate of $5 per month or $40 per year until July 1st. Subscribers will have access to all my cooking videos, special recipe series and posts documenting our move to France.

Hope to see you there!

In the meantime… have a great week!

Oh, and PS: I just finished shooting the second video!