Market Day in Montrichard

Fridays are market days in Montrichard, so this morning, before our friends Sophia and Mo arrived from Paris to spend the day with us, we put on our rain jackets and made the five-minute walk to town. (More like 15 minutes when you've got a geriatric dog in tow.)

Because it's a small town, I expected a market to match its diminutive proportions, but what we walked into--beginning at Mairie and continuing up the road for roughly two small-town blocks--was a rather grand and interesting marché with a wide variety of vendors. 

Sure, there were the typical things you find at most outdoor markets throughout France, namely fruits and vegetables, but there were also vendors selling organic locally made soaps, regional wines, olives and other cured things (looking at you, lupini beans!), plant starts, mushrooms galore, fresh Italian pastas, rustic loaves of organic bread, and fried potato pancakes that were *almost* vegan (we might have to beg them to find an egg replacer so we can eat them, too).  

There were several stalls that we were particularly excited about, including the tiny two-woman bread stand and the woman selling herbs, grains, olive oil, tamari, and other items in bulk. And then we stumbled on the bike fix-it guy!

One of the big draws to this area was the cycling; not exactly the kind that Jeff likes to do (crazy downhill mountain biking), but the kind I prefer: lazy rolling paved paths that allow you to feel safe while enjoying the scenery, and make stops for picnics and wine drinking. This area is cram-jam full of bike paths throughout both the Cher and Loire river valleys, so it makes sense that there would be a mobile mechanic out here. We didn't introduce ourselves but plan to do that the next time.

We ended up buying a ton of mushrooms, wine, green beans, and spinach, which we feasted on for the next few days before our Monday departure back to Paris. We weren't able to get through all the green beans, so we packed them to go, thinking that we'd add them to Fanny's homemade dog food. Turns out they went into a pot of soup last night, and—almost a week later—they were still crisp and flavorful.  

​I think we're going to love it here!