You may have come to France, or even Brittany to enjoy music festivals? Yes, Small Britain is the best place for live music... the region where there is the more important number of music festivals in France. The biggest, les vieilles charrues, gathers more than 200 000 visitors … and it's money worth... Famous international bands (old and young ones) and French singers will sing for you for a nice price !!!
And maybe, if you went to listen live music in Breton festivals, you've noticed that your glass was refundable! Using and using it again and again !



Festivals lovers know or imagine the quantity of plastic cups used on an outdoor demonstration ... Thousands of plastic glasses are used on those week ends... and sometimes (at best) they end up in a bin ? Or (at worst) on the floor...

And we have a local figure who is fed up of this mess of plastic and is looking for a solution... to fight this over-consumption of oil... Bruno, the boss of a pub (le sablier) in Rennes.

He began to work (voluntarily) with a supplier of glasses in the South ... of France. Who had a product made in Spain with the C E symbol (made in China not to be confused with our symbol European CE! It is almost the same... just the gap between the letters is wider!) ...
But it is a nonsense: to sell a « green » product that is not produced locally, that needs to parcourir miles to be washed and again ...... No, no, really, green washing will not go on with him!
He needs a more logical solution, a local one, a real green cup... produced here with recyclable plastic... And he did it !

The adventure began some months ago with a plastic food industry, Française des Plastiques, (located in Louvigné de Bais a few miles from Rennes), that makes the precious « container » with .... ITS waste, ITS defective products...The raw material is there, the cup Esprit planète is born ... The glass is recyclable and manufactured here. ... It is also washed in Brittany ... and the festivals love it ( Bobital, Reggae Summer Fest...).

And for good reason ... it has lots of advantages:
It can be rented or purchased by the event organizers. It can be used many times up to a 100th. You can customize it.



The principle: a deposit of 1 euro, you get a cup documented and reusable. For hot or cold drinks. Washable again and again.
The only problem : the tab. Because of it the glass is not 100% recyclable but 30 %. The tab does not hold when it is a 100%. But Bruno is looking for a solution... And he will find one !
Cheers



Read it in French : Festival du gobelet réutilisable en Bretagne : esprit planete détrone le verre en plastique à usage unique

Milky oyster's lovers should hurry... They' ll soon be a testimony of the past... Why ? Ask the oyster's farmers of Cancale, your usual market or even your favorite fishmonger online what you're eating !
Triploid oysters (also called wiht the poetic name of 4 seasons oysters), are a new variety of this mollusc. An singular oyster, born in the French laboratories (IFREMER) at the end of the 20th century... and almost invisible as it is written nowhere that you're in front of it ...

Explanation

Oysters have been a traditional meal for millenniums... Already during prehistoric times, coastal men enjoyed them ... (They were wild at the time). Romans settled in Britain loved them...10 centuries later, French King Louis XIV was fond of it.
Soon the overconsumption became a real problem... Fear of the disappearance of natural beds of oysters ... Already in the 19th century, rules were allowing the harvesting only during defined periods of the year (September to April). Then the idea of breeding... Napoleon III asked Victor Coste to study the oyster farms in Italy. He created the modern oyster farming. Today wild oysters are very rare. And in addition, they're transformed ...

The original species and the modified ones

Oysters are flat or hollow ... and... fragile ... The Belon oyster in Brittany is known abroad. Even though it has been threatened by the Portuguese oyster, rejected by a ship in the Gironde. It will be bred until an epizootic (epidemic) almost decimated it. Since then, the Japanese oyster did replace the hollow ... until the next illness ...
That's in real life...
In the lab, since the late 20th century, there is a new variety... the four seasons oyster ... Be careful not to confuse everything ... They are not Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs) (but a story of chromosome!). Researchers made them sterile...
These so-called triploid oysters have two advantages: as they are sterile, they do not spawn, need less energy and therefore grow faster. You need almost 3 years to get an adult oyster, those ones need one year to be sold...
The second advantage is as they are sterile and they're never milky (too bad for my mom who loves them like that!).
If, you know the months with the letter R and the months without the letter R (May-August when most oysters are not eaten).... Well, this period corresponds to the breeding season, summer ... and during this period less oysters are eaten. With those ones, you can taste them throughout the year.

Defenders of the four seasons oysters will say that the fear of a new epidemic was the reason of this new variety. Sûrement... That' right, the Portuguese oyster have been destroyed in the 70's. And if the Japanese Oyster has the same problem... What will happen ?

And the consumer ...

As usual, we forgot to ask his opinion! Too bad for him! But never mind, research has done the same thing for the mussels! Never change a winning team!
And worse, we do not know what we eat ! No mention tell the customer if they're triploid. 15,000 to 20,000 tonnes are produced every year, 10 to 15% of the production is triploid.... (as it is explained in an article of the French newspaper Libération ).

Next time you'll buy oysters, you'll ask ? Does anyone know if they are still aphrodisiac, these new oysters ?

Read this article in French : Huitres triploides : ogm ou pas

Yes, the old fashion wooden shoes are back... in a trendy way.... colorful, high-heeled, glamourous... and french...Even Channel's models are wearing them.

These wooden clogs ... used to be the symbol of an outdated France, here in Brittany ... Parisians were looking at the inhabitants of the rest of France and specially the Western part as backward people with their wooden shoes and their cap...
Brittany is taking its revenge being the land of clogs, traditional ones and fashion ones...
Villecartier forest (next to Fougères)used to house manufacturers of those wooden soled shoes ... One is still working in the artisanal tradition at Parigné, a small village really close ... but there used to be lots.... about 400 people were living in 1840 amid the trees. The forest was inhabited until 1932. Today ten clog'makers are still working in France ... half in small Britain, but no more under the trees.



A few decades ago, these families were migrants, they settled for almost two years, near a tree to have the time to turn it into wooden shoes... Yes they needed a long time to do the work... Then, the home was disassembled and reassembled next to another tree. In the Villecartier forest, you can see a wooden hut which is a replica of the traditional habitat.

These wooden shoes were used for field work and every day life... They were carved for young girls to marry ...



Today there is the trend shoe, the classic Swedish clog, double sole clogs (wood and rubber), the crocks in plastic, these leather sandals with soles made of wood ... the wooden and leather shoes... for men and women, very useful for those who love gardening: they can wear their shoes and go picking vegetables in the garden next door).

Read this article in French : Chaussures tendance : le sabot revient à la mode

This year, French fashion will be striped... stripped T-shirts... If you don't wear a top T-shirt or a navy striped sweater, you'll be old-fashioned... Fashion is stripped and the wardrobe of babies, children, women and men, youngs, … even old ones, Parisians and Froggs... are full of them. You have to wear some...

The reason for stripes ...
Initially, these stripped clothes have a history and a very specific use ... Fishermen and sailors used to wear (and still do) stripped clothes ... And for good reason ... A man overboard is easier to find with this type of clothing ... That's what the legend says ... I did not try !

No wonder that great clothing brands are French, even Breton : Armorlux for example... has an entire collection of marine clothing... Long or short sleeves, blue, white, red, yellow stripes... Nautical trend is back...

And to buy them cheap, you can either plan to go to France, even Brittany and buy them there on the Armorlux company at Quimper... Or get them on websites Brin de mer, for example, another marine clothing brand, where they sell the last year collection online … cheaper... at really low prices...

Other clothes are originally sailor « wardrobe »... la vareuse , a cotton jacket really thick that protects you from the wind ...

There's also the yellow rain slicker ... The emblem of stormy weather in Britain, of wet and drizzled weekends ... I discovered that its history starts in 1960, in France when a man tired of waiting his friend in the rain, (he was a clothing manufacturer) had this great idea... Before there were oiled jackets... waterproof ... but it was a different time ...

The sailor sweater, buttoned on the shoulder, has had its period of glory ... It used to be wool, 100%, … now they use cotton or other materials...
In short, these stripped tee shirts are trendy ... With the first sunbeams, everyone is wearing them... And you ?

Brittany and specially the North coast is known for its high concentration in algae. They are famous abroad, above all in Japan, big algae consumers.




Roscoff, a small city on the littoral is pretty well endowed : 800 species out of 1500 compiled in Brittany in 2000. Probably others must have been discovered.

The location of Roscoff explains why it has such a wide variety of algaes : the Gulf Stream allows a water temperature that doesn’t change a lot. The Stream gives a good waterquality.

Now, look at the shore and at the algae lying on the sand. You’ll see 3 colors : green, red and brown.



Each color is on a specific place on the shore. The brown ones are under the sea, then you have the red ones and the green algae are the closest to the earth.

Here in Brittany we have had lots of problems with the green ones. Thanks or because of fertilizers and nitrates from our pigs breeding, they were too many. It used to be a real annoyance. It's getting better but before on some beaches you could not walk or swim because they were doing a really too thick cover on the littoral.

For a really long time, seaweeds were used as fertilizers by farmers.



If Japanese eat them for a long, long time, we are just starting to be interested in them.
We do use it as gelling agents : when you buy an applepie in a shop and you are amazed by the nice shaped apple segments, well don’t think too much : the compote has been mixed with algae to make those nice perfect pieces of fruits.

Algae are also used as dietary supplements. They are full of vitamins, minerals, calcium, proteins… Sprinkle them on your salad.

In thalassotherapy centers they are used to help your body to recover… Your wrinkles will dicrease, your orange peel disappear, your hair will be beautiful … Used in cosmetics, we make lots of products with algae extracts : from anti-aging creams to oil to fight cellulite, skin care products or algae shampoo… They are everywhere. And to use them, you need to mix them as algae can’t be dissolved in water !!!

Read it in French : Algues en Bretagne : de l'engrais de nos grands pères aux complémetns alimentaires et produits cosmétiques

Christmas in France is like a gastronomy fair. During a week or so, you’re eating from one place to another. And everyone is trying to do his best. The most typical is turkey with chestnuts and as a dessert we call it la buche (it is an icecream looking like a log)... May be you’re doing the same across the Channel…
Anyway, for some years, another poultry is savoured during those times of plenty : the capon. And when you know that France is the first producer of poultry in Europe and that Brittany produces 40% of the French production... Here I am !!! In Janzé, a small town 20 km south from Rennes where the production of the poultry (poulet de janzé) is famous for his quality ...



What is a capon ?
It is a chicken that eats corn (75%) and enjoys walking on 2 square meters land.
Its also a cock



whose reproductive organs and comb have been removed when it was 6 weeks old. It grows outside



for 6 months (3 months only for the chicken) and spends the last 3 weeks of his life locked eating unskimmed milk. When it is ready to be eaten, it weights 4 to 4,5 kgs (2 kg for an adult chicken).

A traditional caponization ?
Roman learned caponization from other countries and used it in Rom to stop the cockcrow. In Brittany, capons were breeded during the XIXth century but it stopped at the beginning of the XXth century because of the high mortality rate of the castrated cocks. The production began again in 1988.
The raising of capons begin in July to be ready for Christmas time. The castration is a delicate operation and does not always succeed. If the capon begins to crow, forget the unskimmed milk... Because of castration, the cock doesn’t have male hormones and and its metabolism changes. Its flesh is tender.



The poulet de Janzé is a grouping of breeders from the region of Janzé. They breed a high quality poultry (Label Rouge). It follows several standards of quality : they have to eat 75% of corn, they have to be raised outside, they have to live x days and have to be killed in good conditions (no stress !!!)…

If you want to go to the capron fair



– the fair exists since 2002- it always takes place in Janzé, the week end before Chrismas. You have a market of several poultry and you can meet chefs that are giving their recipes…

Caprons are sold from the 15th of December to the 15th of January…

Cock-a-doodle-do

Read it in French : le chapon de Janzé à la foire du dernier week end avant Noel : entre terroir et tradition