JANUARY! You have to be in it, to win it... Hi again, to all of you darlings, standing patiently on Platform 13, nodding politely to 2026 and all she promises. The middle of January doesn't announce very much to the kitchen - the farm is not really yet on its way to our forks, AND... darlings..Kris and I are moving house.. Oh the stress and the strain of it. But good discovery... you really get to see all the stuff you have accumulated, not just kitchen stuff, darlings, but 9

Chef Kris Báhn Strydonck was born in Nong Kai, in Thailand and raised by his bar-tender Mother, who claimed to work for the CIA. His culinary journey started with a Street Food cart, which he refused to push himself, saying "Darling. ..my hands are my precious".. Hello darlings on Platform 13 and welcome to the New Year !! "Sawatdee Pii Mai "... as we say back home in Thailand. I send you greetings from my adopted home in France, that I love so much.. so many moustaches, so

Hello and Seasons Greetings to all of you standing on Platform 13, in your woolly hats and Christmas knitwear. It's cold out there... Many of you will be looking forward to the usual Turkey for your festive holiday dinner this Christmas, which is fine - if you enjoy that dry old buzzard of a bird.

Hello again dear Platform 13 readers. Is it December already? Wow. . where did the year go? Christmas ... Some, like my husband Kris, just don't like it, but most people love that dark period of the year where lights and candles shine and give us a special feeling. Our eldest son especially loves this time of the year, just because of the lights everywhere. On the streets, in the gardens strung around the house …

OK.. I will admit, I did not know that was what a pre-picked lentil looked like. Which got me thinking around what else I did not know about lentils - and don't imagine I am suicidally bored, or at the wrong end of a bag of California's finest gummies. There is always a tin in the cupboard, thanks to Vanessa, who will gleefully stir them into to pretty much anything. I saw lentils more as a food to be consumed when all else is gone. When the sirens blast, sending us scurrying

In France, where "bread is life", what happens when the bakery closes? Few countries keep such extensive data around bakeries as France does. According to a 2017 government report, 73% of the French population lived within half a mile of a Boulangerie. Of course, in a country where 8-out-of 10 people live in largely urban areas, it is plainly not a city-dwellers problem. It is in rural France where the loss of the village bakery strikes like a family bereavement. For the purp

Is food really better in France? Not in that romantic "strolling through the market with a cute wicker basket" way, but in a pure sense of basic taste. And I am not talking about Michelin-starred fine dining or €500 truffle tastings. I am referring to bread, cheese or tomatoes. A roasted "poulet frites" in a budget bistro. The kind of food that should be pedestrian enough not to even warrant effusive praise, yet still makes you pause, mid-mouthful and smile. Butter, infused w

Hello to Platform 13 and to their dedicated readers... So a brief intro to me... I am first and foremost a food lover. Originally from Antwerp in Belgium, I trained as a chef in the culinary schools of France, but the kitchen garden is where I feel most at home. All that is cooking for me and for my partner Kris, is about love, feeding our guests, friends and family with the goodness of our adopted French seasons. Simple stuff, done with love.

There are few ingredients as humbly useful as the onion. It appears in every kitchen, at every stage of unprompted regrowth and under every list of ingredients. Raw and sharp in summer salads, melted and brown in winter stews, or quietly working in the background of rich sauces, often without due credit. The French don’t just cook with onions — they have built the entirety of French cuisine around them. France grows more onions than any other country in Europe, and you can ta

The rather sultry soundtrack of November is not only about cold fingers tapping on the barometer and raindrops on rooftops. Over the ploughed and purposeful fields of Lot et Garonne, the air is full with the honky tonk of departing geese. Like feathered fighter jets, you will hear them before you see them — a ragged, cloud-bound squadron, formed as a straggly V, calling desperatey to each other to keep things together. It's comfortingly instinctive - a DNA thing. I love seein

Ah, the walnut tart - that quietly confident dessert that needs neither hot custard nor sticky jam to make its entrance. Born in the hills and valleys of southwest France, it’s what happens when fistfulls of rural walnuts meet a good curl of butter, a wide ribbon of cream and a decent crackle of sugar. No drama, no tiers, no soufflé to collapse — just a golden crust holding everything in perfect balance.

Let’s start with the obvious: the French eat. With butter, with wine, with joy. Meanwhile, across the channel or indeed the big pond, we seem to eat with an undercurrent of apology. We talk about “being good” when we skip dessert, or “cheating” when we don’t — as if a pastry were a moral failing. Somewhere between the calorie counter and the confession booth, food stopped being nourishment and became a referendum on self-control, by which we often judge ourselves unkindly...

October in the Dordogne is quieter now. The fields are slowing, the walnuts gathered, the vines picked clean. But for bees, it’s still very much office hours. The hum in the hives may have softened, but inside, a busy workforce is still clocking in.

October is the opal month of the year. It is the month of glory, of ripeness — and of walnuts. It's a grand month in France, is October. The days are still and temperatures kind. It's good market weathr land walnuts are everywhere. Craggy little treasures, it feels so good to plunge your hand into a sack of them just for a grin.I am not sure which nut wears the kingly crown, as they could all make a pretty good case, but the walnut could easily be annointed. They have that re

Vineyards are surely the most civilised of our ancient cultivations. Humanity seems to have evolved liking its plants arranged in tidy rows, but while carrots and corn stand tall and straight, like obedient soldiers, vines have a rebellious elegance that cannot be stood to attention. They lean and twist with weary dignity, brothers in arms, performing more important work.

On a rainy day last November, the humble baguette was acknowledged and enshrined forever by UNESCO as “a thing of exceptional interest for the common heritage of mankind.”

If you ever thought wood and clay had nothing in common, Stéphane Miglierina would like a quiet word. From his workshop in Monpazier, he takes the humble tree and the stubborn lump of clay and persuades them into a marriage so harmonious you’d think they’d been courting for centuries.

Larders. Everyone either has one or wants one. Even the word is a delight to say. Lah-dah....lah-dee-dah, I'm in the lah-dah.. The word of course, has Latin roots, and derives from Lardum - meaning pork fat or what we now call bacon. It was (and still should be) a kitchens inner sanctum. A holy place, robust and well-filled with strong white ceramics and jarred beans and jams. It's an interior designers dream..