From the château kitchen

our favourite seasonal recipes

Freshly baked almond croissants topped with flaked almonds and icing sugarped with falkes

almond croissants

Almond croissants are super easy to make and are a great way to use up leftover croissants. You definitely don’t need to be a pastry chef and they are actually…

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Blackberry And Apple Clafoutis

apple and blackberry clafoutis

I love a clafoutis – it’s a properly comforting nursery pudding. A soft, sweet batter with slightly boozy fruit nestled into it. I make it with cherries in the summer…

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72290, Teillé, France

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This week got away with me, somehow it’s already

This week got away with me, somehow it’s already Thursday and I haven’t had a moment to tell you a few stories about last week. It all feels very distant now, our summer days passing fast. It was full of apricots, bubbling away into jam in the preserving pan and being turned into a beautiful tarte aux abricots (recipe on our website).

The rain came and gave us a brief respite from this hot summer. The garden and I let it drench us and we were both so grateful for it. A few grey skies were a welcome break from the bright summer blue, a bit of variety makes all the difference to morale.

Tilly was lost and then found again, Rufus got his exam results and Alain brought me sunflowers which made my day. You can of course read all about the rest of our week in my journal.

And finally, we opened our 2026 calendar for the Chambres d’hôtes and the gîte and our retreats for next year too, which has kept us very busy indeed.

Everything moves slowly, frame-by-frame, blink-by-

Everything moves slowly, frame-by-frame, blink-by-blink, the moments stretching out as the summer afternoons get warmer. Butterflies move from flower to flower as if in slow motion, the sunlight catching on their many coloured wings as I watch them.

Swallows swirl lazily in the sky and the cats slope out from under bushes, stretching their backs and flexing their paws. On the terrace the heat shimmers, and a sluggish breeze half-heartedly stirs the leaves on the trees.

As I pass from bedroom-to-bedroom making beds, folding towels, I see the guests dozing in the shade of a warm summer afternoon, reading books in dappled sunlight, a glass of wine in hand, their shoulders sinking further downwards the longer they stay.

These summer days are busy for us, it’s true, but that busyness makes it possible for someone else to spend a well deserved afternoon relaxing in the shade.

I pull the shutters closed, turning their old oak backs to the sun, shading the bedrooms so our guests have somewhere cool to retreat to when the days get too hot.

We have reached the halfway point of our summer season already, the light is shifting, the colours in the garden turning dusky as we slip towards late summer. Before we know it, it’ll be our time to rest. There are still a few rooms left available to book this year though, still more guests arriving and hoping to relax - and we’ve just opened our calendar for next summer too. If you’d like to come and stay we’ll be waiting to welcome you.

A cool breeze brought life back into the countrysi

The old stone walls and tommette floors, the heavy

The old stone walls and tommette floors, the heavy shutters and our protective council of trees help to keep the house cool as the temperatures soar. But there comes a moment when even our careful choreography of light and dark, of cool morning air and late night breezes, can’t quite compete with the ferocity of the sun.

It’s been a sticky week, so we’ve made the most of early morning walks and long cold drinks to take the edge off hot nights cooking in the kitchen. Our guests relaxing on terrace, their laughter and chat sweeping in through open doors as we try to capture the evenings as they cool.

Read more about our week behind the scenes at the château in the week’s journal.

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