Our Teachers

Learn from butchers, bakers, and Armagnac makers. Live France.

Meet the people who turn dirt into food. My friends and neighbors, your teachers and mentors: Jacques, Yvette, Bridgitte, Denis, Patricia and Guillaume. When I arrived in Gascony over 20 years ago, I barely spoke enough French to get by. Shopping at farmers markets became an exercise in point and shoot French. “That rabbit, s’il vous plait. Now, how do I cook it?”

Luckily, the artisan butchers and bakers, fish mongers and cheese makers, not only at the markets, but down the street from me, and on the farms that dot this rich landscape, were more than willing to share their knowledge. Marc Chapolard taught me how to cook his family’s boudin noir with apples and butter.  His brother, Jacques explained the art of raising their prized pigs, and his older brother Dominique and wife Christiane opened the doors to their family butcher shop. Jehanne Rignalt shared her foie gras secrets at her organic farm. My neighbor, Madame Sabadini patiently taught me how to make pâté and saucisson when they slaughtered a pig each winter. And, most importantly, Madame Vetou Pompele walked me through Gascony’s larder of classic recipes from cassoulet to poule-au-pot.

These culinary artists became our teachers and mentors. Everyday they contribute to the process of learning here, weaving fellows and students into their artisan lives. It’s this community that makes the Gascon Kitchen a one-of-a-kind experience in France. These faces are not a cast of characters in a funny French memoir. They are your teachers, my good neighbors, your new French family. Picture yourself in France…

–Kate Hill