What a nice day we had yesterday! The high temperature was only 71ºF (22ºC), and it rained for several hours. Accuweather says 4 millimeters of rain fell. That's not much — less than two-tenths of an inch. But we'll take what we can get. We'll check our own rain gauge once the sun comes up.
You can see how dry the ground was (and is still) in the photo above. I took the picture three days ago. The ground around the vineyard is just parched. Only the vines and trees are green, and that's because they have very deep roots.
There are a lot of blue grapes on the vines, that's for sure. I looked at the regional newspaper's web site yesterday to see if a date for the start of the grape harvest has been announced, but I didn't find anything. It's bound to be earlier than in most years, with the heat and drought we've been having. One of our neighbors, who has a daughter, son-in-law, and grandchildren living the the Los Angeles area, is convinced that because of climate change France's weather patterns are starting to resemble California's, with wet winters and long dry, hot summers.
The weather is supposed to turn dry again starting today, and stay dry all next week. That's according to meteociel.com. The pink grapes (Sauvignon Rose, I think they're called) in the photo above will be happy if that forecast comes true. No big worries about blight (mildiou).
I didn't have to think about watering!! Yahooooo!
ReplyDeleteAnd I don't mind about more sunshine.... our tomatoes have only just got going!
We had 10mm in total yesterday [just before Midnight to 12 Noon]
We got only 4 mm in our rain gauge. Good for you to have 10. Walt is making another 6 or 8 liters of sauce right now, using red tomatoes. Some of it we will cook down into paste. Some we will freeze. And some we will eat on pizzas for lunch today.
DeleteWe're getting a nice break in the extreme heat today, too. Probably hot on the weekend, though (Labor Day weekend, this weekend).
ReplyDeleteAbout finding lardons in U.S. grocery stores: next time I go to the grocery store, I'm going to try to remember to take a photo of what we have that I think is basically that cut of pork... it's sort of hidden away, and I'm not sure it's cut up, but it might be... so, it's not marketed and packaged quite like the lardons, but I'll show you what it is, and you can tell me if it's basically the same thing. It's sold by the hams, and it's marketed as the type of thing you put in when you're seasoning something like slow cooked greens.
I'll be interested to see that, Judy. In San Francisco, I couldn't find slab bacon, which, if lean enough, could be dut into lardons that were good. I did find slab bacon imported from Germany in one supermarket, but it was double-smoked and needed to be blanched in boiling water to take out the aggressive flavor before you could put it into vegetables or a stew. Do send a photo. In France, pork used to be (decades ago) salted or smoked to that degree, but now, with refrigeration and vacuum-packing, they just smoke or salt the pork slightly so you can use it without "pre-processing" and it tastes good without a lot of effort in the kitchen.
DeleteThe sauvignon rose grapes are pretty...I didn't know there was such a variety. What kind of wines are they used for?
ReplyDeleteRosé wines, whether still or sparkling, I imagine. They're pretty grapes, and not widely planted, from what I've read.
DeleteI never tire of seeing photos of grapes on the vine.
ReplyDelete