Ceret - Domaine Alquier

Today we started with a walk through town and then returned to the bakery 2 doors down for our morning croissants. This was recommended by our landlady(for the brioche, not the croissant).

Mum, croissants in hand.

Yesterday, via e-mail, Heather asked; why is it a boulangerie and not a pattiserie? On looking this up: A boulangerie tends to produce bread and those items requiring a crust. A patisserie is for pastries, sweets, tartes, etc. Well here is one that calls itself a viennoiserie (also artisanale). A viennoiserie is an upscale boulangerie that serves breakfast bakery items that were associated with Vienna but actually originated in France, ie brioche.

Priority not given to croissant here, they are on the second shelf down with fruit and custard pastries
on the top shelf.

Another display case, this with savories. This looked like a pizza, think we will have to try it to
be sure. In the name of research of course.

 My observation of  all these types of stores (bakeries of one kind or another), in Paris and here, is that they all tend to sell bread, croissant, a selection of pastries and lunch type items (pizzas, crepes etc). They are basically trying to appeal to everyone, at breakfast and lunch, and maximize their income. In spite of the recommendation, and very friendly serving lady, we still prefer our mainstay from our previous visit, for the croissant (they seem  more buttery) and will continue to patronize that establishment.
We didn't have much on our agenda for today (did a lot yesterday and still cold and very windy today) but we did decide to get out of the house and go and find a winery recommended by our landlady. We are drinking predominately locally made wines as this region has quite a wine making history and reputation. So we set out, again without a map (we really are going to have to get better organized), just a small brochure with an unreadable little diagram. We drove around, hoping for a signpost and spent some time on a lovely winding, narrow,  mountain road, going nowhere. Mum would probably have been happier sitting on the other side of the car where she couldn't see the precipice down to our right. Luckily very few cars to have to creep by in the opposite direction. We had just about given up and turned for home when we found a likely road and then, the winery.

Sign was a little wind blown.

Sales room on the side of the barn. The door was locked but a woman came out of the house to open it. She asked, in French, if we spoke English and when we said yes, continued with a barrage of French.

A selection of 8 wines, red, rose and white. The two reds on the right won awards in Paris (we couldn't afford them).

We bought a white 2013 Cotes du Roussillon and a red, Les Corts. Each were 7.50 Euro (about $10) and we have been drinking wine about $5 or $6 a bottle. Interesting to see if they are better.

The winery is in  the valley of the river Tech and that is the mountain Canigou in the background.
Its a lovely location and I hope we will like the wine and return (now we know where it is) and
watch the vineyards burst into life.

Old vines, pruned and ready for spring with the foothills of the Pyrenees in the background.
I find it surprising how stoney the ground is, but vines like this sort of terrain.  Part of the Terroir;
the geographical environment that impacts vines, grapes and therefore wines.