Oh Honey!

Beekeeping-at-Camont, Round 2.

A couple summers ago I trapped? caught? coaxed? a wild swarm to move into my waiting hive- la ruche. I savored the summer apiarist antics while discovering the sweet taste of Camont, letting the garden wild up, and learning from my favorite beekeeper- Narcisse Ferronato.

The winter was hard, the swarm was fickle, bee mites attacked and the bees were all gone by the spring. Like many new things I’ve attempted- making charcuterie, growing a garden, and driving an 85 foot barge- you don’t always get it right the first time around. Part of the ‘getting it right’ (or just getting it done) & part of growing up (and older) that I’ve practiced at Camont is learning that once is for dilettantes. Pros work, create, and practice all the time. (Sorry, but cooking once a weekend doesn’t make you a chef!) So at the end of last year, I took my sorry/sad/empty ruche to Narcisse’s small bee farm underneath the Chateau Madaillan and left it with him to over winter for some loving care. Today I picked it up- 3/4 full of fat honey and healthy bees and ready to welcome them back to Camont’s bounty. I am ready to begin again and really learn to keep bees. So what’s bloomin’ at Camont?

Colza at the corner field; apple orchards down the street; kiwi, peaches, nashi and pears across the canal. And on our own 2+ acres at Camont, right now, wisteria, crab apples, flowering cherries are rioting. A couple dozen heritage plum, fig, apple, quince & peach trees are all flowering at once. Next, the acacias will pop, the roses will blossom and mint will start to flower. I learned to relax the garden and leave it a bit wild, a bit shaggy for the good of all. I think the new working grrls will be happy here. Plant more trees now! I planted my orchards, spreading them around the place, little pockets of fruitful activities over the last 20 years. Think long term, kids. It’s rewarding to be harvesting time as well as fruit and honey now. I didn’t know I would stay so long in France, but I did know someone would have profited from my acts. I think of this as insuring gifting future foraging rights for someone. Anyone.

From time to time, I’ll let you know what the Honey-Man is teaching me. These posts will be under a new Living-at-Camont section coming soon. For now, just look for the #beebuzz tag.

Bee Smart Lesson #1- Before opening the hive when I got it home, Narcisse told me to give a couple puffs of smoke at their front to let the p’tite darlings knowI was there. That it was me, their new sweet maman, and I would help take care of them. Now that I have read some more on whether bees have ears and can hear sounds, I think I will also tap lightly on the hive with a gentle bonjour greeting. Tap, tap tap-allo mes puces!

After all, I’d rather have someone tap on my door than blow smoke in my face…

Recipes:

Miel de Poivre- no bees? here’s a favorite faux honey confiture from my Keeping Kitchen

Pain d’Epices- an easy French classic honey cake perfect with foie gras

A new project, a new program for the Gascon Kitchen. Lisa Maiklem, our neighborhood fleuriste grows all her own organic flowers that she weaves into magical bouquets and airy celebration of color and scent. Running out of space to fill the growing demand for her jewel-toned and naturally eccentric blossoms, we hatched a plan to turn a little used strip of park by the petanque court into a Gascon Kitchen floral annex.

Beginning with seedlings that Lisa mothers in March and armed with a pitchfork, we are fencing out the hens and ducks, and creating a colorful and organic cutting garden that will welcome students and visitors to Camont’s productive park. A mowed lawn is slowly and thoughtfully becoming a living work of art.

Lisa Maiklem of le Frechou tends her ephemeral crops and weaves daring tapestries of posies.

Color against the stone gravel terrace at the Gascon Kitchen at Camont.

Tea cakes in Franco-Anglais style.

From green to a riot of color- a lot of hard work and planning. New programs are available for those interested in apprenticing with Lisa on how to create and maintain an organic cutting garden and business, program runs from March-October.

Green fields will give way to color this summer! Come join our new Organic French Cutting Garden  program.

http://www.fleursdete.com/

The bees at Camont are going to love it!

Now that I have your attention, let me explain. I love honey. I use honey in many of my traditional recipes like pain d’épice, chevre, miel & armagnac tartine or a pan-seared foie gras aux 4-épice. Best of all, I love honey straight from the pot, drizzled over warm toasted bread that has been smeared with fresh salted butter. But I have never, ever had such delicious honey as that Miel de Ronces (bramble honey) from local beekeeper Narcisse Ferranoto.

This year I wished for a bee swarm and got one (see archives here), followed the #Tweehive happening on Twitter and have been planning to integrate more beekeeping in Camont’s resident programs. Only problem was WHO would be our King Bee?

While working on a chapter for my book of French food producers- “Butcher, Baker, Armagnac-maker’, I have long ‘stalked’ this honey man, this beekeeper, this sweet pillar of the market. This week Photographer Xtraordinaire Tim Clinch, fall intern Julia Leach, and I went across the Garonne River and through the woods to discover the sweet secret way of the beekeeper Narcisse Ferranoto at his Ferme de la Chateau Madaillan. After coffee with his smiling new bride, (they have lived together 30 years and just married 5 months ago!), Narcisse told me a few sweet secrets and, at last, I know the answer of just how he makes THE BEST HONEY IN GASCONY.

Want to know how? Then join us this spring in France for the inaugural Apiculture Internship at

La Ruche… outside the Kitchen-at-Camont.

April-June 2010.

Narcisse the Sweet by Tim Clinch

Narcisse Ferranoto by Tim Clinch

French Beekeeper Teacher at Camont