In October, to mark the grape harvest season, our recipe of the month is 'Grape-Picker's Stew' - wholesome enough to keep the grape-pickers' energy levels up through the harvest! 

Ingredients

  • 8 slices of streaky smoked bacon
  • 8 large sausages (we recommend Toulouse, beef or venison)
  • 4 onions cut up into large chunks
  • 200g of dry green lentils (Puy)
  • 2-4 garlic cloves
  • 300 ml of beef stock
  • 150 ml of red wine
  • Fresh thyme

Instructions

  • Heat the oil in a large casserole dish and fry the bacon until it's crispy over a medium heat.
  • Remove the bacon, then add the sausages, browning them all over. 
  • Then remove the sausages and add the onion chunks. Turn up the heat so that the onions soften and caramelize.
  • Add the sausages back to the dish, adding the thyme, garlic and lentils. Then cook for about a minute, while continuously stirring.
  • Add the stock and the wine. Decrease the heat so that it's simmering slowly and cover the dish partially with the lid.
  • Let it simmer for about 35 minutes, so that the lentils are soft and the sausages are cooked all the way through.
  • Season it with salt and pepper, and add in the crispy bacon before serving with some fresh thyme.
  • Put the pot in the middle of the table so that people may help themselves. This is nice served with salad, crispy baguette and cheese.

 

France Just For You

Experts in self-drive tours in France

Travelers Reviews

5.0
Dan
I am a planner by nature and my wife and I found that Emilie at France Just For You exceeded all of our expectations for our trip to France. The daily itineraries the restaurant recommendations things to see and even things not to see. The B&B's we stayed at were outstanding. She even planned a few surprises for us on some of our activities. Do not …
David
Emilie was a joy to work with - we were completely pleased with our experience! Do not hesitate to use her services - she will do everything to make your trip perfect. We don't care for group/bus "one-size-fits-all" type of tours - but I didn't feel confident enough with my grasp of French to go it alone. France Just For You is the perfect solution …
Pamela
We just returned from a fantastic three weeks in Southwest France. I highly recommend the services of France Just For You, we could never have planned the trip ourselves as well as they did. Laura did the planning and gave us an amazing itinerary, and was available at a moment's notice when we had a plane cancellation on our flight to Bordeaux and …
Jan & Ray
We were overwhelmed by the wealth of information available when attempting to plan our 6 week self drive holiday in France. Never having been to France before we found the task daunting and sifting through forums full of information only confused us. We have traveled in New Zealand using a New Zealand based travel adviser and decided to look into …
Candy
Wherever possible we prefer to travel on our own as opposed to going on a tour package. With France - Just For You, they arranged for a vehicle and booked us into a couple of lovely B&B’s and a great Boutique Hotel in Paris and booked a couple of activities that we were interested in. Besides that, they put together a book for us with everything we …
Lucelle
I was amazed when I came across the website that ALL the reviews were excellent. From the moment I started dealing with Emilie I received amazing service in planning our wonderful trip to France. I will not repeat all the details that are in the previous posts but highlight some of the exceptional service that I received. The booking of the …