Is it poo or is it mud? The question lay heavy on my mind during our tour of the farm at La Maison du Carnard. Jim and I had driven to Sebastopol, near the East Coast, in torrential rains. We were there to meet Béatrix Rambert and taste her farm-to-table food. Béatrix, the daughter of two generations of butchers in Belgium, moved to Ile Maurice sixteen years ago. With her husband she purchased farmland a few years ago and set about stocking their pastures with ducks (she makes excellent foie gras), pigs (tasty charcuterie), capons, goats and snails. She grows fruits and vegetables – we able to taste her tender green curly leaf lettuce and guavas – and takes a sustainable approach to farming.
We were constricted to the indoors upon arrival and took glasses of freshly squeezed local citrus juice by the roaring fireside (yes a fireside in Mauritius!).
Two-thirds of the way into our repast of foie gras and duck gizzards on a bed of lettuce, followed by a pot-au-feu type dish of capon and pig’s knuckles, washed down with several glasses of South African Pinotage, the clouds parted and the sun came beaming through. This meant, of course, that we were able to tour the premises on foot after lunch.
“Don’t wear nice shoes,” she insisted when I called to make the appointment to spend the day with her. Alas, my stinky old trainers were in NYC and so I grabbed a pair of flip flops and considered it sufficient. I was wrong. I squelched through the muddy grass and lagged behind our host but managed quite well considering. That is until we reached the pigpen. Muslims and Jewish everywhere I now understand your scorn pour le cochon and I know where the term ‘fat pig’ comes from. There were the lazy buggers luxuriating in the mud, pressed together in some sort of savage orgy. There were pigs out in the open and others enclosed and it was in the enclosed quarters when I must have stepped in it. I didn’t notice until afterwards and I thought, “please let it be mud”. It had traveled from the soles to my toes. I loitered behind and tried to wipe the goo off with a leaf. I stared longingly at her crocs and JR’s white sports trainers, two items of shoe wear I would normally not be caught dead in. The horror, the horror.
Despite the inappropriate footwear and the unsightly, grunting livestock, I take my hat of to our farmers. I loved the honesty and integrity with which she raises her animals and grows her produce. The taste of her food said it all and we stand with some of the best chefs on the island that come to Madame Rambert for tasty farm fare.
