Many people will say well you’re French if you’re born French – but is it really as simple as that? And what makes French people uniquely French? I can tell you that coming from London as I do, and now having lived in France for many years, I know that there are certain things that French people do that make them stand out as French – such as dunking a buttery, flaky croissant in a bowl or cup of coffee! I’ve studied what it means to be French – and lived the life and here’s what I’ve found…

Things the French do that make them French

I’ve thought long and hard about how to be French – I’ve even written a book about it (see bottom of this post!). And covered it in a podcast (listen here). For me, I don’t think that you can just say being born in France is the only way to be French. I know French people who live outside of France, or whose children may have been born outside of France, but still they are “French” in the sense that they seem French, do French things…

For instance, cheese being served BEFORE dessert. Yes – in France the cheese course doesn’t come last. You eat your Camembert and Brie before your crème brulee. And my French girlfriend Isabel who is really into nutrition tells me that you should never have coffee with the dessert course – it makes the cheese solidify she says – not a nice thought!

French women are not all slim!

And there is a myth that “all French women are slim” – in fact there are books written about it. Well let me enlighten you – all French women are NOT slim! They’re normal! French women are real, not fantasy figures able to hold off weight in a magical way. But… and it’s a big but (excuse the pun). But statistically, French women tend to be more slim than women in say the UK or the US. Much has been written on the topic. Books, magazine articles, blogs and recipes galore. But in the end I think that it boils down to a few key things: Willpower, choice and lessons learned early in life.

It takes willpower to walk away from the boulangerie and the patisserie, to say no to all those gorgeous cakes. It takes immense effort to eat just a little bit of cheese when there’s so much to choose from. And the wine. And the gastronomy which is so good it has UNESCO listed status. But it’s more than just willpower. It’s also about habits that back up the willpower from a young age. The French aren’t massive snackers and it’s a habit formed early in life.

No snacking

French kids are not encouraged to snack between meals. The only exception is after school/before dinner. Lunch is at noon, dinner is generally around 7 pm to 8 pm or later. It’s a long time for kids to go without food so a small snack is given at around 4.30 pm. Known as goûter, which literally means to taste, it’s an institution in France. And it’s almost exclusively a sweet treat. Cake, chouquettes are particularly popular, biscuits, a piece of baguette wrapped around a chunk of chocolate. Or slathered in nutella.

Some kids grow out of the snack phase when they become adults. Some don’t. That’s where the willpower comes in.

And of course some French people snack or else there wouldn’t be rows and rows of sweets and biscuits at the supermarket. But I’m astonished by how many of my French friends simply don’t snack.

Hmmm but does not snacking, eating cheese before dessert and dunking your croissant in your coffee make you French?

Non – it does not.

French language

Lets talk language.

Oh la la. It’s such a French expression. In English we often say “oh la la” in a tone of ooher… but in France when you say oh la la it’s generally meant to indicate something you’re not happy with – and the unhappier you are, the more la las. I’ve heard French people say oh la la la la, or even oh la la la la la la la. Maybe more, but you get the picture… Perhaps when you go to get your train to Paris at the train station and arrive to be told that there is a strike. Which leads to another very French thing – the right to strike. 

Striking is a national sport in France

Oh yes. Striking and protesting is a national sport in France. That’s how unions negotiate with the government. All the time. There is the normal way: discussing and then, if there is a disagreement: arguing and protesting. And there is the French way: protesting, arguing (being on strike) and then discussing. Some people say that this behaviour started during the French revolution in 1789 and never stopped since…

I’m talking ’bout a Revolution

And talking of the French Revolution let’s get on to topics of scarves, maybe it dates back to when people lost their heads and tied a scarf? No not really, I’m kidding. But when I first came to France it was very clear to me that French people are obsessed with and addicted to scarves. Both men and women wear scarves at every opportunity. An American friend told me that she has learned 57 ways to tie a scarf in an attempt to be more French before she goes for her citizenship test to become resident. I told her I’m pretty sure they won’t ask you tie a scarf! They may though ask you about the French Revolution and the French motto that was born from it:Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité.

I once asked my mayor why he was wearing a scarf on a summer’s day and he said (in a French accent) “one – it looks good” and “two I don’t catch a cold, I have to make a speech later today and the scarf protects my throat”.

The French LOVE to talk

Ok now we’re getting down to the nitty gritty of Frenchness – talking. French people LOVE to talk. If there is a way to say something using one hundred words instead of ten, you can be absolutely sure they will go for it. Every single event I have ever been to in France has started late because, given an opportunity to make a speech, a French man or woman simply cannot pass up the chance to make a speech. A French audience accepts this as normal, foreigners are completely bemused by it. Whether it is the opening of a road, a restaurant or a play – everything that can possible be started with a long drawn out dialogue is considered an opportunity to use the skills of language, a highly prized talent in France.

Sometimes debates sound like arguments, full on, abusive, yelling at each other rows. Monsieur and Madame J – I’m not going to tell you their names in case anyone knows them – who live across the road from me often scream at each other, trading insults and accusations that anyone who walks by, or lives opposite them like me, can hear. Their ‘debates’ go on for a long time sometimes.

Jean-Claude, my neighbour, tells me that being able to debate in public in this way is seen as a sign of a healthy relationship, your partnership is close enough that you can talk to each other this way and still be friends, lovers, married even, after it’s over. He has a point perhaps.

The local bar is where everyone knows your name

When we go to our local bar – there is always a lot of debating going on. It ranges from the gossipy type, perhaps about how much everyone hates Monique the barmaid’s yappy little dog, to what President Macron is getting up to in Paris, or just down the road from where we live in the seaside town of Le Touquet where he has a holiday home. Discussions about the goings on at the Elysées Palace are spoken of as if everyone in the bar is on first name terms with the President and his nearest and dearest.

If you didn’t know better, you’d think old Monsieur Dubarre – who we all know has never been further than Picardy, spent the week in Paris as an invisible spy since he has an opinion on everything from what Madame Macron had for breakfast (he reckons she has two egg whites and a slice of melon, abstains from lunch, and has vegetables and meat for dinner – yes she does have willpower) to whether President Macron should have met with this world leader or that and what he should have said or done.

French kids learn to debate

Being able to talk for hours on end is considered a very good thing in France. At school French kids learn to debate as a matter of course. A wildly popular French TV documentary in 2016 called A Haute Voix (Aloud) pulled in the punters with its preview promotion which read: “Speaking well is the key to social advancement and what is better than a beautiful and long speech? Nothing. Is not a beautiful and long speech to be heard, understood and acclaimed? It is an ancient art that has a name: eloquence…” The programme followed teenagers who took part in verbal contests to prove their oral worth by “arguing, whispering, arguing more, laughing, haranguing and arguing again”.

Blimey. When I was at school, we had clubs where we learned to disco dance or make paper flowers.

Talk, talk

There’s even a TV show in France called Le Grand Oral which definitely isn’t as exciting as it might sound to some. Basically 12 amateur speakers compete against each other to give the best speech before a Jury, not the sort of talent show most of us are used to. It’s very earnest and there’s not a lot of laughing. French audiences lap it up, the more passionate, dramatic and eloquent the speaker, the more everyone French seems utterly mesmerised. One of the speeches gained more than 10 million views on social media networks. The old saying that “sometimes not speaking says more than all the words in the world” doesn’t apply in France.

Janine Marsh is Author of How to be French: Eat, Drink, Dress, Travel, Love (Published October 2023)

Her international best-selling series: My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream,  My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France are available as ebooks, in print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online.

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In February 2004, on a cold and sleety February morning, I boarded a ferry at Dover and watched the famous White Cliffs fade as I headed to France on a day trip with my dad and my husband. We were going to buy wine and cheese, have lunch and head back home with our booty.

It didn’t quite work out as planned. We bought the wine and cheese. We couldn’t find anywhere open to have lunch as we left it too late. So we succumbed to a cup of coffee offered to us by a property agent who spotted not just our rather miserable faces peering in his window but also an opportunity! Despite my adamant assertion that 1. we didn’t want a house in France and 2. we couldn’t afford a house in France, he persuaded us (me) to look at his three cheapest properties. And somehow I fell in love with one of them despite the fact that frankly it was a hovel. I bought it there and then (it was very cheap, less than the price of one of Kim Kardashian’s designer handbags), though my dad said it was going to be a ‘never ending money pit.’

A home in France – not just a house

Well this year may be the year (year 19 since we bought it) we finally finish renovating. Stage one. Dad was probably right. The house is now comfortable and I think, rather nice. We basically built a house within the shell of an old barn that was insulated with tons of a mix of muck, mud and straw which we spent many fun-filled days (not) removing. I’ve filled the house with mementoes of my travels around France. And with animals. 4 dogs and 8 cats, plus occasionally a hedgehog called Charlie and a dove called Doris. Though when the weather is good they stay outside with the many chickens, ducks and geese that rule my garden.

The village I live in, in Pas de Calais, is very rural, very authentic, my dad used to say it was like going back 50 years in England. There are no shops, bars or cafés in my village. Just 150 people – mostly farm workers – and 1000 cows in a very green corner of paradise.

My 90-year-old neighbour Claudette has watched us toil on our house these past two decades. We’ve laid floors where there was once dirt. Pututting in windows where there were once holes. And fixed a roof that you could once see the stars through.

“A house is built of logs and stone, of tiles and posts and piers” she said to me recently, quoting her favourite author Victor Hugo. “A home is built of loving deeds that stand a thousand years…”

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream,  My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France all available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online.

She is also the editor of the world’s most popular English language magazine about France – and it’s FREE here: magazine.thegoodlifefrance.com

And she is a podcaster on all things French!

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Bread Man bought my baguette this week and handed it over with a little flourish. “Zis” he said, “zis ‘umble baguette I made with my very own ‘ands, is a UNESCO-listed treasure you know.”

And he’s not wrong. This week UNESCO accepted France’s application for the baguette to be listed under the heading of intangible cultural heritage – savoir-faire (know how).

French bread is a way of life

In honour of the occasion, Bread Man came in for a cup of coffee. It’s been a bit cold this week so I had the wood fire lit, FatCat and Mimi the Marmalade Moggy were lying on the hearth and barely opened their eyes to acknowledge our presence. Tigger the kitten jumped on to Bread Man’s lap and curled up making eyes at him while we sat chatting. Ronnie and Reggie the Labrador puppies looked hopefully at the baguette on the table.

“’Ooo would ‘ave thought it” he said, “me and UNESCO…”. I think he feels personally responsible for the baguette making the list. “Just four ingredients you know, really it’s five, but you won’t read zat in a recipe because you can’t see it, it’s passion.”

Bread Man learned to bake bread as a child, his dad was a baker too. His daughter is learning the arts of baking and cake making and will join her papa one day. His wife is also a baker. It isn’t an easy life being an artisan baker. Early morning starts, copious amounts of paperwork in running a small business, rising costs, and not huge profits. You definitely need passion to be a baker.

A long history

Strangely, no one knows when the baguette was first invented. Bread Man poo poos the theory that Napoleon invented them so that his soldiers could carry the thin sticks in their pockets whilst marching. He adamantly disagrees that they are Austrian in origin (like the croissant). His preferred provenance is that the baguette as we know it is an evolution of elongated loaves made in France since the 1600s.

“Baking a baguette is a bit of magic when you think about it” he said. “You squash 4 ingredients together, put zem in oven and out comes something delicious. Life without baguettes would be long comme un jour sans pain” and he laughed at his own joke. It literally means ‘as long as a day without bread’ which the French say to mean the same as ‘as long as a month of Sundays’ or very, very dull. Passing Tigger over to me, he pulled on his coat waved goodbye and resumed his rounds delivering a cultural treasure to the rest of the village…

More on bread

History of the baguette

Bread is a cultural experience in France

How to make a baguette 

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream,  My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France all available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online.

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When, out of the blue, I received a message from the American Library in Paris informing me that my book had been nominated for their prestigious book prize awards, you could have knocked me down with one of my chicken’s feathers!

Now before I go any further, let me tell you I didn’t win. I never expected to. The American Library in Paris book awards are very highbrow and tend towards the ‘intellectual bent’ as they put it. I was up against tomes on Napoleon, Lafayette and Robespierre and some of the best names in literature.

It’s possible that my stories of life in the middle of nowhere rural France aren’t as scholarly as some books on the list. I write about my 30 chickens who have unusual names like Zsa Zsa Gabor (very, very bossy), Barbra Streisand (on account of her clucking sounding just like “I am a woman in love”) and handsome cockerels George Clooney and Brad Pitt. I tell tales of Bread Man, a philosophical delivery driver who ruins my plans to diet with his tempting cakes and pastries. I reveal all about my rucking ducks, including Mel Gibson and Rocky who spend most of the day glaring menacingly at each other through the fence that is required to separate them and quacking “you want some?” to each other. And I write about the traditions, heritage and sometimes quirky way of life in a very rural part of northern France in a village with no shops or bars where the people have sunshine in their hearts.

Nevertheless, my book – Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France was one of just a handful of books for the year 2022 to be accepted for submission to the judges. And I am thrilled. To whoever nominated me – thank you very much!

By the way, the title of this post is a joke – there is no way I am going to eat my chickens, even if I didn’t win! I did try once. When I first came to France many moons ago I took in a baby chicken that was challenged in the looks departments as chickens go. Very gangly and with drab feathers. She did though have a rather outstanding physique. We called her Eaglet. She rapidly outgrew her sisters and stood so tall I considered entering her for the Guinness Book of Records “biggest chicken” category. Imagine my surprise then when she started cock-a-doodle-doo-ing while I was pegging out the washing one day.

Of course I had made a rookie error. She was a he though he did attempt each day to lay an egg just as the rest of the gang did. And he had impeccable manners as far as they were concerned, never bothered the girls at all unlike his successor Roger Moore who certainly lived up to his name. We loved Eaglet dearly. One sad day he fell out of the coop and broke his leg. Distressed and in pain, we put him out of his misery. We convinced ourselves his life should not be in vain and we prepared coq au vin. It smelled delicious. It looked delicious. We couldn’t do it. All we could think of was that Eaglet was our pet. I guess you can take the slicker out of the city but you can’t lead it to water…

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream, My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life  and Toujours La France: Living the Dream in Rural France:

AMAZON UNIVERSAL LINK: smarturl.it/ToujourslaFrance

AMAZON UK LINK: www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B09S3WPJ61

AMAZON .COM LINK: www.amazon.com/dp/B09S3WPJ61

All are available as ebook, print & audio, on Amazon & all good bookshops.

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Every year I look forward to the TV Show Village préféré des Français – the favourite village of the French, presented by the likeable Stéphane Bern. 2022 is the 10^th anniversary of the show and there is much excitement in the bit of France where I live as Hesdin, one of the ‘big’ villages near my tiny little hamlet, is representing our region!

The show is a chance to see places you sometimes have never heard of, sometimes more well known, and certainly famous if they win this coveted title and join a list of gorgeous villages in France…

Take a look at the contenders for 2022:

Hesdin – Hauts-de-France

Hesdin in Pas-de-Calais (top photo), boasts a picturesque cobblestone square with an imposing Town Hall dating back to the sixteenth century, a former Spanish castle. Surrounded by cafés and small shops, this is the perfect place to sit and grab a coffee, relax, and people-watch. On Thursdays the square is filled with market stalls and people and you can buy everything from fruit and clothes to bread – the archetypal traditional French market. It’s a small town, everything is within easy walking distance and it’s friendly, welcoming and quintessentially French (the TV series Maigret was filmed here).

Quintin – Brittany

Awarded Small City of Character status, Quintin has two castles and thirteen listed monuments, watermills and mysterious megaliths. Once a centre of the weaving industry, there’s also a museum of linen.

Pino – Corsica

Pino is made up of 13 hamlets which pepper the landscape from the edge of the Mediterranean Sea to the crest of Monte Cupieta. Utterly unspoiled and uncrowded, it is like time forgot this beautiful area with its grand though largely empty buildings and glorious views.

Saint-Sulpice-de-Favieres – Ile-de-France

This village in the Essone department, metropolitan Paris, has a long heritage though most people have never heard of it, even in France. Its 13th-14th century church is as big as a cathedral. There is also a historical arboretum with some 6,500 species of tree, established in 1857.

Bergheim – Alsace, Grand Est

Close to the city of Colmar, Bergheim is a wine producing village and watched over by the castle of Haut-Koeningsbourg. It’s beautifully preserved with 16th century buildings, surrounded by ramparts and has an unusual museum dedicated to sorcery. Don’t miss the public garden with its 700 year old lime tree.

Levroux –  Centre-Val-de-Loire

Medieval Levroux, in the former Provence of Berry, in Indre, Loire Valley, is picturesque and historic. It has long been a centre of leather production and still is – producing goods for the luxury industry to this day. Cobbled streets, half-timbered houses and an impressive medieval gate to the town.

Saint-Sauveur-en-Puisaye – Burgundy-Franche-Comté

It’s here in the village of Saint-Sauveur-en-Puisaye in the Yonne department, that the writer Collette was born. You can visit her former home, now a museum. This listed “City of Character” has many ancient buildings, a 12th century church and 11th century tower.

La Bouille – Normandy

La Bouille is in the Seine-Maritime department. Just 20m from the city of Rouen, it was one of the strongholds of the Impressionists. Turner, Gauguin and Sisley all captured its beauty on canvas.

Ainhoa ​​- New Aquitaine

This pretty village in the Pays de Basque, Pyrénées-Atlantiques, is on the pilgrim route of Santiago de Compostela. Founded by monks in the 13th century, it is a town of red and white coloured houses, typical of the area, with espelette peppers drying round windows. Ainho is officially one of the most beautiful villages of France.

Dieulefit – Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes

Dielefit is in the Drome department, a land of lavender fields and olive orchards and stupendous scenery. The town’s pastel coloured houses and tree lined streets are watched over by mountains and surrounded by gorgeous countryside.

Port-Joinville – Pays-de-la-Loire

Port-Joinville in the Vendée is both the capital of, and the gateway to the Ile d’Yeu. Its very pretty with white washed houses and a thriving marina.

La Grave –  Provence-Alpes-Côtes d’Azur

La Grave is in the French Alps, (Hautes-Alpes). Its traditional stone houses at the top of La Meije and the Girose glacier in the Oisans Massif make it a standout location. It’s a skiers paradise with an unspoiled landscape.

Le Malzieu-Ville – Occitanie

Le-Malzieu-Ville in Lozère, is one of the officially Most Beautiful Villages of France. It’s a medieval city with cobbled streets that are festooned with bunting in summer months, ancient buildings and historic towers.

Saul – Guyana

Representing the overseas territories of France, Saul is in the heart of the Amazonian park.

Discover all the past favourite villages of the French winners

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With spring in full swing, in April, our thoughts in this rural part of northern France turn to wood. I don’t mean literally of course. Despite the fact that the warm months of summer are yet to come, we start to think of keeping warm in winter. Pretty much everyone in the village has a wood fire, and some have wood ovens. My nonagenarian neighbour Claudette has had her boat-shaped enamel wood oven, the colour of the Mediterranean sea on a sunny August day, since she got married in 1960. It’s fed by small sticks of wood. Her son-in-law my neighbour Jean-Claude, abhors the job of log chopping on this scale. However, he can spot an opportunity from a mile away.

The first rule of Wood Club is you don’t talk about Wood Club

‘Let’s talk wood’ he said to my husband Mark one day a few years ago. ‘You can never have too much, and as it happens, there’s an opening in the Wood Club of which I am President. And me and the rest, well, we’d love you to join. It means free firewood in return for a little bit of help to manage the trees in Claudette’s fields’. Claudette is the biggest landowner in the area and rents land out to several farmers.

The ‘rest’ turned out to be Claude Senior AKA Claude “Claude at the top of the big hill”. Every day he visits his sone “Claude at the top of the small hill” (I hope you’re still with me). Petit-Frère of course is part of the team, he’s Jean-Claude’s best mate.  And Monsieur Durand and Monsieur Rohart, both former farmers. Jean-Claude made getting into the club sound as if it was an exclusive and coveted achievement. A little while later, at a formal meeting of the other members of the Wood Club, Mark was accepted into the group. He was told that he shouldn’t share details of what they do with anyone else, or they’d all want in.

They get together once a year in the winter months to chop down damaged or too big trees. The wood is then stored it in stackable sized pieces in Jean-Claude’s enormous barn where it’s left to season. Jean-Claude, as the leader of the gang, does little but sit on his tractor and direct operations.

How much wood would a woodchuck chuck

In late spring the Wood Club get together to chop the seasoned wood into usable logs. Jean-Claude and Claude-who-lives-at-the-top-of-the-hill bring their tractors to which are attached home-made wood choppers. The booty is shared out between the Wood Club members.

Jean-Claude is a wily operator and provides his team with a feast each day, buttering them up at lunch time with buttery fondant potatoes and rich  stews. Beef cooked in beer and creamy chicken poule au pot. He doles out great chunks of crispy baguette to mop up the sauces. And to finish there is one of Claudette’s famous fruit or chocolate tarts or crème brulee.

At the end of each day there is beer and wine or a glass of pastis, Jean-Claude’s favourite, his ‘petit jaune’, his little yellow sunshine in a glass. When he tacks a request for just one more day of help to cut small bits of wood for his belle-maman’s oven there is much raising of eyebrows. Everyone pretends to be exhausted or too busy. In truth they are all used to his ways by now. And all the Wood Club members expect this last request of the week but of course no one lets on! Life here in rural France is about friendship, neighbourliness and community, and eventually everyone gives in and the wood is cut to Claudette’s satisfaction!

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream – My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France – available as ebooks, print & audio, on Book Depository, Booktopia, Waterstones, Barnes & Noble, Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online…

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Whenever friends or family come to stay, they’re a bit taken aback at how busy my life is in rural northern France. “We thought you’d be having a lie in every day, you know, taking it easy. Putting your feet up.”

Yes well, that’s not quite how it works. At least not when you have an extended family of 72 animals. And heating is from a wood fire, which means there’s always wood to chop. You’re trying to be more self sufficient by growing your own vegetables and fruit. And you are addicted to writing, like Forrest Gump if he’d picked up a pen.

I rise at 6am, as I always have. After life in London, the peace and quiet of my little village in the Seven Valleys still surprises me. An owl might hoot in a barn, considering me inconsiderate for turning on the light in the courtyard so I can see my way to my way to the pigsty, now my office, where I like to start writing first thing in the morning. A pheasant may rustle its feathers in the hedge. Sometimes a tractor will pass. No traffic, no airplanes, no sirens.

George Clooney and Brat Pitt get the party started

However, as soon as I put the kitchen light on at the back of the house to make a cup of tea, it’s a different story. My cockerels Brad Pitt and George Clooney kick it off. They crow loudly and constantly at the artificial sun/kitchen light. This is followed by chickens clucking, geese honking and ducks quacking, shattering the peaceful tranquillity of the village.

One year I let the ducks roam freely in the garden, I loved how they waddled to the back door to greet me in the morning.

“You look like a demented Pied Piper with that lot following you around” said my husband. There’s nothing like the adoration of ducks to make you feel good. They ran amok. Or rather, I let them do as they wish.

“It’s fine” I said, all blasé when my neighbour Jean-Claude tried to advise against it. “Don’t do it” he urged, “let them out – and they’ll create havoc, you’ll be sorry”.

Quite why I didn’t listen when I know, after several years of him being my mentor in France that he is always right, I am not sure. What was I thinking? Clearly I wasn’t thinking at all, as Jean-Claude delights in reminding me.

That year 52 ducklings hatched. I spent several months rehoming as many as I could to new owners who wouldn’t eat them. I ferried them about in crates all over the region. There is now no roaming free in my garden. Men to the left pen, ladies to the right pen.

Once my tea is made, I turn off the lights, head to the pigsty and with the darkness, peace returns temporarily.

The birds, the birds

When the sun comes up, I feed the wild birds. The minute I open the back door there is frantic activity in the trees as chaffinches, sparrows, robins, finches, blue tits, great tits, doves and birds of all kinds get ready to swoop. Arthur the ‘Alf an ‘Ead pigeon is always well-mannered, he’s missing half his head (yes the name is a give away) and sits calmly on the washing line waiting his turn at the food trays.

Then I serve the chickens, ducks and geese to a cacophony of squeaks, clucks, quacks, honks and cock-a-doodle-doos.

On the way back to the house I feed the escapees. Chickens Kendo Nagasaki, Barbie, Belinda and Beatrice refuse to stay in the pen and run wild in the garden where they dig holes for dirt baths, which I regularly fall over in.

Then I let the cats in or out. All of them screeching for food, cuddles, this and that. By now the dogs are barking to be taken for a walk.

Did I say peace and quiet? All that’s missing at this stage is a marching band!

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream – My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life and Toujours la France: Living the Dream in Rural France – available as ebooks, print & audio, on Book Depository, Booktopia, Waterstones, Barnes & Noble, Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online…

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In the far north of France where I live in the lovely Seven Valleys, by the time February arrives, we’re usually feeling a bit soggy after the long winter months. Though heavy snows do happen here, it’s fairly rare, but it sure does rain a lot which makes everything green and lush.

In the south, by late winter, the mimosa trees burst into blossom, heralding the spring. It’s often warm enough to eat lunch out in a t-shirt. One February I took a train from Paris to Nice. I considered myself well prepared. Wrapped up for northern winter weather in a quilted coat, scarf, hat, gloves – like a yeti on a city trip. I left the biting winds and sleet of the north behind and a few hours later arrived in the city. In complete contrast, I arrived to blue skies and sunshine. It felt like I’d taken a train to a different country, not just a different region.

The north does have one thing in common with the south though at this time of the year – it’s carnival time. The big southern one is in Nice which is where I went when I took that train. It’s a fabulously flamboyant affair with flower fights and fantastical parades. It’s joyous, bright, beautiful and bold.

No winter blues at the Dunkirk Carnival – it’s multi-coloured!

Here in the north, we have the Dunkirk Carnival and believe me, it’s every bit as animated and fabulous. Not for the parades though, and there are no flowers – it relies on the revellers to be the carnival. It is the craziest, noisiest and most friendly event I’ve ever been to. It began in the 17^th century when local fishermen left for Iceland to spend six months away from home catching herring. They still love their herring here though the fishing expeditions are no longer quite the same. To send the fishermen off, the townsfolk paraded through the streets. The men disguised themselves as women (reflecting that there were no men left. Amateur musicians beat drums and played merry tunes. Everyone enjoyed lots of beer, linked arms and sang rousing songs.

Nothing has changed.

As always in this part of France that adores its heritage and traditions, the street carnival has remained true to its roots. The chilly streets are filled with people dressed in their brightest colours. Think neon coloured feathered boas and colourful tiny parasols on long sticks. Everyone applies make up with a heavy hand, more clown style than make up artist. And if you’re not up to doing it yourself, pop to the tourist office where they’ll help you. Let’s just say they won’t be joining the beauty counters of L’Oréal any time soon.

Blowing the winter cobwebs away

My first time at this carnival I was blown away – almost literally. There was an icy gale whooshing off the English Channel along which Dunkirk sits. And snow flurries swirled around the swirling dancers. The feel good factor of this carnival is off the scale and it’s super friendly. I have never been kissed so many times in one day, possibly not in a year! In a world seemingly inhabited by pantomime dames you’ll also meet the local giants in Roman costume and probably Asterix the Gaul, Superman and Bart Simpson. Imagine a river of colourful, happy, freezing cold, slightly bonkers people singing at the top of their voices, dancing and swaying through the streets and you’ll get the picture.

A sort of hokey cokey/conga is de rigeur. And I’m not kidding when I say that in order to take photos and videos, I tied myself to a lamp post to avoid being swept up by the crowds. And if that’s not all mad enough, at the end of the carnival the mayor chucks hundreds of herring into the crowd from the town hall balcony. Yes real ones though they are wrapped in plastic, they’re not quite that far gone here. He also chucks a couple of plastic lobsters. If you’re lucky enough to catch one, you can exchange it for the real thing. I’m guessing that being hit on the head by a real lobster might not be that much fun.

The glow of goodwill

The fun factor of the Dunkirk Carnival knocks your winter socks off I can tell you. But any time of the year they really love a party in this part of the world. Dancing breaks out wherever there is music, whether it’s in a restaurant, in the town square or simply someone playing an accordion at a market.

No need for southern sun in the north, the glow of goodwill blows the winter cobwebs and blues far, far away…

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream, My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life  and Toujours La France: Living the Dream in Rural France (April 2022), available as ebooks, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online…

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Every year it’s the same in my little village in the Seven Valleys, northern France. Madame Bernadette who lives at the bottom of the hill announces that her New Year’s resolution is to go on a diet.

Sometimes It’s tough living here in this little rural paradise. We’re surrounded by villages that are home to tempting boulangeries and patisseries. And I guarantee that the aroma of fresh baked baguettes from a wood oven, lifted out by a ruddy faced baker on the end of a long paddle, or the scent of flaky, buttery and golden just-cooked croissants, is utterly irresistible.

And then there are the cakes.

Cake makers in France are craftsmen. They train for years to learn how to make perfect little edible works of art. Opera cakes, Paris-Brest, eclairs, macarons, mille-feuille and many more. Classic French cakes really are in a league of their own. Nowhere else in the world does cakes like France

Keep calm and eat cake…

Regions, departments, even some towns have pastry specialities that are unique to them. Here in the far north, the “merveilleux” (marvellous) is a favourite. A speciality from Lille, it’s a seriously sweet meringue puff ball of a cake covered with whipped cream, chocolate or other sweet things. I can promise you, it requires fortitude to eat a whole one. In fact, if you get through one you may find you’ve eaten yourself to a standstill.

In the little town of Beaurainville near my village, the local baker makes a cake that I’ve never seen anywhere else. I am not sure you could put it in the great French classic gateaux category. Le Doigt de Charles Quint is a long sponge finger – literally. Red jam and Chantilly cream ooze from the centre. It’s meant to represent the gouty pinky finger of Emperor Charles V who ruled these parts. It tastes better than it sounds…

There are even seasonal cakes and breads. A Gallette des Rois (King’s Cake) is de rigeur in January. Bûche de Noël (yule log) in December. Cherry clafoutis in spring. And tarte tatin in autumn…

French women do eat cakes

I am always reading in some foreign newspaper or other that French women are somehow able to exert superhuman strength over their appetites and remain skinny. That might be true in Paris where I once saw a pencil thin woman order a bowl of lettuce for dinner as her lover tucked into succulent oysters, a juicy steak and ended with a dreamy tarte tatin. But I promise you, your average French woman, certainly where I live, is quite normal and able to resist anything but temptation – just like the rest of us.

Madame Bernadette loves cakes. The Bread Man who visits our village three times a week to drop off fresh bread and pastries knows this. And he is a good salesman. In January he hardly mentions the sweet feasts he has in the back of his van. Madame Bernadette accepts her lonely baguette with a sigh, but resists the urge to look in the side window at the trays of cakes and pastries. By February she will be asking “do you have a mille-feuille?” By March the Bread Man is openly tempting her with sugar cakes (basically a sweet pastry baked with a thick butter and sugar topping) or a sticky and creamy religieuse. The battle is lost. Resistance is futile.

But as Madame Bernadette says – there’s always next year…

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream and My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life available as ebooks, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & from all good bookshops…

Cake recipes from France

Love the sound of the cakes I’ve mentioned? Here’s how to make them at home!

Tarte tatin – like maman used to make

Merveilleux – a creamy meringue concoction that will blow your diet out of the water!

Galette des Rois – the king’s cake

Buche de Noel – a Christmas classic

Cherry Clafoutis – sweet and irresistible…

The post Life in France in January appeared first on The Good Life France.

As a poultry keeper, I’m always amazed by the antics of my birds. I have ducks, chickens and geese – they’re pets, not for the pot, despite the urging of my French neighbours.  I love them all but it’s the chickens who for me are the most fascinating. Ducks fight it out to establish a pecking order. Geese seem to be quite democratic, group together and have no clear leader. Chickens are a whole other story.

Reggie and Ronnie Kray

Take Reggie Kray.

Reggie and Ronnie Kray are beautiful cockerels who are the spitting image of their dad Roger Moore who is the leader of the pack in the chicken pen. Roger does not share. He keeps a very beady eye over the ladies and what they get up to. Reggie is a romantic. He fell head over heels for a fluffy brown, coquettish chicken called Annette and the pair managed to escape the pen for a quiet tête-à-tête together. She is able to squeeze through the fence as she’s a miniature chicken, and he just goes straight over the top.

Their affair blossomed under the leaves of a quince tree. Every night they returned to the pen. Reggie slept in his tree, Annette in her tree with Roger Moore and his harem. They do have chicken coops, but they prefer to be outdoors.

Annette eventually tired of her young lover and refused to leave the pen. Reggie was heartbroken and cock-a-doodle-doo’d forlornly every day.

So we bought yet another coop, 4 new girls and put Reggie in a new pen with them.

It started well. The girls were wary but made welcome by the rest of the group. And Reggie did a little welcome dance too (you can see the video on Instagram). But it soon went wrong.

Kendo Nagasaki wins this round

Reggie stayed with the girls all day but at night, went back to his old pen to sleep up in the tree with Ronnie.

Kendo Nagasaki, a miniature cockerel who is a solitary old boy and chooses to live in the garden alone (where he can nibble my vegetables to his heart’s content) saw his chance. Every night he nipped over the fence into Reggie’s pen and stayed with the girls. In the morning he left the pen.

Then he decided not to leave every day, sometimes he stuck around all day long. When this happened, Reggie, who is a lover not a fighter, refused to leave Roger Moore’s pen unless Kendo Nagasaki went back into the garden.

This went on for weeks. Cockerels to-ing and fro-ing like yoyos. The girls seemed to take no notice whatsoever of the boys shenanigans.

The cockerels who stay together win together

Then early one morning I heard Kendo Nagasaki at the back door calling me for breakfast as he always used to when he was living in the garden. I fed him and went to the pen to see what had happened. Reggie and Ronnie Kray were strutting about with the girls. If they had been twirling silver topped canes and doffing their top hats I wouldn’t have been more surprised (alright maybe I would a bit!). They had staged a coup in the coop.

So now I’m thinking I need to get more girls for Ronnie. It’s a never ending saga. Peyton Place with pecking I call it…

Janine Marsh is Author of My Good Life in France: In Pursuit of the Rural Dream – ebook, print & audio, on Amazon everywhere & all good bookshops online, and My Four Seasons in France: A Year of the Good Life

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