Dégel

Thaw. Dégel. There you have two words that bear little resemblance to each other but mean the same thing. The dictionary says 'thaw' was first used as a noun in English in the 15th century. It has its origins in German (douwen), Greek (takein), and even Latin (tabere). We are having a thaw today.

It's a good thing I saw this scene a couple of days ago. It's gone now.

'Thaw' is a very hard word, I think, for a French-speaking person to try to pronounce. First, there's that TH sound that doesn't exist in French. If you become self-conscious about it, you end up feeling kind of silly rubbing your tongue on your front teeth to say the initial consonant of 'thaw'. Is it TH as in 'then' or as in 'thin'? And then there's that vowel. Is it an A sound or an O sound? Some Americans would pronounce as if it were spelled 'thah'.

Old vines on a December day

Dégel is much easier. The first attested use in writing was in the year 1265, according to the French Robert dictionary. The pronunciation is obvious, I think — [day-ZHEL] — even for us anglophones. Of course, you have to say it with a French accent, cutting the first syllable short (no diphthong) and pronouncing the final L completely, not just partially as in 'bell' or 'tell'. The ZH sound is the one we have in the middle of words like 'pleasure' and 'measure'. It's also the consonant of the first person singular pronoun je in French. I don't think we have any words in English that start with that ZH sound.

Frost and feuilles mortes

Okay, I got carried away. The fact is that the temperature this morning is above freezing for the first time in a few days. It's cloudy instead of foggy, and that's why we've had a thaw. No more freezing fog. We haven't seen the sun much this week, but today we probably won't see it at all. It's a trade-off. Clouds and a thaw, or a hint of sunshine through the freezing fog. I'm not sure I'd want to choose. I don't get to choose, anyway.

Promenade du matin, promenade du soir

Walt, Callie, and I have a carefully worked out and regular schedule for our walks around the hamlet or through the vineyard. For example, Walt went out this morning. I'll go out with the dog this afternoon (Wednesday) and tomorrow (Thursday) morning. Then Walt will take Callie out tomorrow (Thursday) afternoon and Friday morning. Et ainsi de suite. Only illness or absence disturbs the schedule.

Stepping out the back door at 8:15 on an early December morning

That way, the dog gets a morning and an afternoon walk every day, and Walt and I each get one walk a day. Some walks are longer (3 or 4 km) and some are shorter (1 or 2 km). Some of it depends on the weather, of course, but we seldom really get rained out. Light rain doesn't bother us, and we get a lot of that. Heavier rain dampens the dog's enthusiasm, and she doesn't want to go far. She just need to take care of business, and then she wants to go home.

Callie does a quick sweep of the yard to see if she can chase away any intruders — mostly birds.

Some days a camera goes out on the walk too. Yesterday was one of those days for me, in the morning. It was cold (0ºC) and foggy. The fog was freezing on plants at ground level, but not so much on trees. The ground isn't yet frozen, and it's still fairly soggy after all the rain we got in November. There was no wind yesterday, so the walk was chilly but pleasant.

Autumn leaves on the edge of the vineyard

One problem with carrying the camera on the walk is that it means I have to keep taking off my gloves to snap a picture. My hands get cold and the walk is slower, but that gives Callie plenty of time to have a good sniff around. I think she's picking up the scent of deer, mostly. Yesterday I went into Saint-Aignan and when I was driving back up the hill at 10:30 a.m. a deer crossed the road just a few meters in front of the car. There was no danger of a collision, but it was surprising to see a deer out in broad daylight like that.

Spend the winter improving your French

On these gray winter days, what better way is there to occupy yourself than to improve your French? If you live in France now, it's doubly important. You'll enjoy living in France more in proportion to your ability to understand and speak the language. If you are planning a move to France, or dreaming about it, or you just want to travel here frequently, you'll benefit from good French language skills too.

One proven tool that can help you understand and speak French better is a video series — 52 thirty-minute espisodes — called French in Action. I've just discovered that most of it is available on YouTube. French in Action is the story of two young people in Paris, and their friends and families. Robert is a young American whose mother is French but lives in the U.S. Robert speaks French but doesn't know much about France. He meets Mireille, a French student. Here's a sample lesson from very early in the series that you can watch:

Each episode of French in Action is half story and half lesson. For the first part of the episode, you observe Robert, Mireille, et compagnie in entertaining and realistic everyday situations. Then the professeur, Pierre Capretz, comes on and goes over the scenes you've just watched, giving explanations that include pronunciation exercises and verb conjugations. You both hear and see the language, which can be very helpful.

The French in Action series is done with a lot of humor. For example, at one point Professor Capretz asks why you think he named his main characters Robert and Mireille. It's because both of those names are so hard to pronounce for English-speakers. He'll help you with them.

The situations and spoken French in French in Action are authentic and the scenery — mostly Paris — is fun to watch. There are movie and TV excerpts illustrating the use, meaning, and pronunciation of many words and expressions. If you have a computer or a tablet and a good internet commection, go to YouTube and search for French in Action lesson X — entering the number of the episode you want to see. I think you'll enjoy it.

P.S. I just noticed that the sample video I posted above won't play through Blogger on one of our Android tablets but works fine on the other. If you click the link in the last paragraph of the post and then click to see lesson 2, it works fine in YouTube. Qui sait pourquoi...

Shanghai choy and shrimp

When we went to the Asian supermarket called Paris Store over in Tours Friday morning, one of the things we wanted to buy was a bag of big frozen tiger prawns, also called Asian tiger shrimp. We try to keep a bag of them in the freezer at all times, but we were out. I believe these shrimp are farm-raised. Paris Store is a chain of Asian markets based in... Paris.

We grabbed a few other items off the shelves — sesame seeds, hon mirin, teriyaki sauce, a jar of grated ginger — and were headed toward the checkout stand when I noticed the produce section. On an impluse, I picked up a bag of what was labeled as shanghaï choï, just because it looked so fresh and appetizing. There were six heads of choy in the bag. (I have a garden full of collard greens and kale ready to be harvested, but never mind...)

Braised Shanghai choy with a hoisin-based sauce

At the checkout stand, I asked the cashier if this was the same thing as bok choy. She said no, it's Shanghai choy, and it's not as green or as large as bok choy. Then she shrugged her shoulders and said, « Enfin, c'est à peu près la même chose. » I was just curious because I'd never heard the term Shanghai choy before. I'm not even sure I'd ever cooked bok choy before.

Sliced Shanghai choy

When I got home, I thought about the possibility of combining the some choy and some shrimp to make a stirf-ry. I found some recipes for such a dish on the internet. (On trouve tout sur le 'net.) What I found of most interest was that the way to cook Shanghai choy is just to braise it very briefly in simmering water.

Stir-fried shrimp, mushrooms, onions, bell peppers, and garlic in the same sauce

One recipe I found for a dish called Hoisin Chicken called for making a sauce using hoisin sauce, soy sauce, sesame oil, pepper, and cornstarch. That sounded like it would be good with both the braised choy and some shrimp stir-fried with vegetables.

This is what is called la mise en place — everything is prepared and ready to be cooked.

Here's the recipe I came up with. Most of the quantities are very flexible. You could make it with broccoli, for example. It might seem complicated, but if you cook the choy and the rice while the shrimp are marinating, and then make the sauce, all you really have left to do is the stir-frying.

Hoisin shrimp with Shanghai choy

1 medium onion, sliced

3 garlic cloves, roughly chopped

1 red bell pepper, cut into strips

6 large mushrooms, sliced

3 heads of Shanghai choy

18 large tiger prawns, peeled and de-veined

¼ cup toasted sesame seeds as a garnish

Marinade:

1 Tbsp. grated ginger

2 Tbsp. white wine

1 Tbsp. white wine vinegar

Sauce:

3 Tbsp. hoisin sauce

1 Tbsp. soy sauce

2 pinches of black, white, or cayenne pepper

1 tsp. sesame oil

1 Tbsp. corn or potato starch

¼ cup water

Marinate the shrimp in the wine, vinegar, and ginger for 15 minutes or longer. Meanwhile, stir-fry the onion, garlic, bell pepper, and mushrooms in a wok or skillet.When they are just slightly cooked but still crisp, take them out of the pan and set them aside.

Cut each head of choy into two or four pieces, from the root end to the leafy top. Braise the choy slices for no more than three minutes in just enough simmering water to cover them. When they're done, take them out of the pan and keep them warm. (I put them in a dish in the microwave onion so I could re-heat them briefly if necessary.

Make the sauce by combining all the ingredients. Mix well and set aside. Take the shrimp out of the marinade and stir-fry them briefly in the wok or skillet, just until they turn pink. As soon as they are done, take them out of the pan and put them aside with the stir-fried vegetables.

Put the sauce mixture into the pan and bring it to a boil so that it will reduce a little and thicken. Add more water as necessary. Also add in the shrimp marinade. When the sauce has a nice syrupy consistency, spoon some of it over the braised choy in one dish, and then toss all the stir-fried ingredients briefly in what's left in the pan. When everything is hot, sprinkle on toasted sesame seeds and serve with steamed rice or Asian noodles.

Silent Sunday