Theoule market

 

We finally made it to the Theoule Sur Mer market! Though we have been living here for approaching two months, we have somehow missed the village market on every single Friday it has taken place! At first ignorance kept us away, and then a comedy of errors conspired to cause us to miss the market each week, first through apartment hunting, then due to the unfortunately timed business of closing on our lease and setting up house, and then through a variety of appointments and health emergencies cropping up at just the wrong time every friday in a mysterious ill-fated clockwork. Even today, we only made it back to the market by waking early in our big city apartment, and then dashing to just in time catch the train back here. 

But finally, finally we made it!

Out in the village square, which is really more of a roundabout than a village square, but whatever, I'm not going to run down dear little Theoule Sur Mer, the market was gloriously gathered. Now keep in mind this is not a big town, and it is Winter, so it is impressive that there was anything there at all, but, the market consisted of three vendors. 

Just three, but that's more than none.

And as for patrons, well, there was us.

So I did my part as well as I could.

There was the vegetable and fruit vendor (good prices on pineapples, but not local). There was an olive man. And there was a fishmonger. As for vegetables, we have a good supply on that at our two places in town so I gave him a pass. I was sad there was no cheesemonger, but really, fish was no small thing. There is nothing in the way of fish to be got in this town so I got a nice hefty salmon steak. There were a few other fishes, notably some extremely crude cross section chunks of something that almost looked like swordfish but I don't think was. I cooked the salmon today in olive oil, salt, lemon, and chunks of garlic. It was really good! I found it fresh and enjoyed the versimilitude of the flimsy bag the fish lady threw it in. The price was only five or six euros too, which seemed a fair deal.

I also bought, with a bit less alacrity, some olives from the man who emerged from his car to serve me (perhaps keeping warm in there?). I have had shocking few opportunities to buy olives anywhere and being in Provence it seemed high time I dug in. I got little black, nicoise olives and some green garlic ones. On the whole they were fine, with a similar touch of unrefined crudeness to them not unlike the savage cuts to the fish steaks. I also got some sort of tomato... thing (a sauce? a reduction?) that I'll try tomorrow. Mostly I was just proud to have taken part in the village commerce.

Tomorrow is the Theoule Christmas Celebration of some kind. We are not sure what to expect, but we don't expect much, though the lights are nice to see already. We do expect it nevertheless to complete our Theoule experience, and we will thus be ready to close up our airbnb and move on to regular big city apartment living.

 Where we're going to live comes with two markets six days a week both within walking distance from us, one very famous, and one supposedly much better than the famous one, but it would be unfair to make comparisons to here in Theoule. It's a different charm altogether. And one I look forward to.