Back soon...

I have to leave San Francisco earlier than expected to go back to the UK, but hope to be back in 2010 with more food, photos and news...

First course...

Chez Panisse continues to amaze and teach me more than I could have ever hoped. The chefs I work with are utterly inspiring, making the most incredible food night after night, with smiles on their faces and minimum fuss. Why aren't all restaurants this way and how on earth did I get lucky enough to be here? I have been really fortunate that they have so much faith put in me, as they not only let me help prep the meals with them - teaching me about the fantastic produce they use and showing me lots of great techniques - but the head chef Jean-Pierre and and sous chef Jerome (yes, I am back in with the French) have put me on the line each night, which means that I am actually part of the team of cooks getting to execute and serve the dishes to our guests each night.

As the set menu changes every day, I am constantly seeing new dishes, from amazing fish such as Catalina spiny lobsters served in a ragout with leeks and chervil or grilled Monterey squid and scallions with grilled peppers, aioli and salad, to wonderful locally-sourced meats, like grilled Sonoma duck breast with roasted fig relish, green beans and turnip and potato gratin or grilled rack, leg and loin of Elliott Ranch lamb with autumn vegetable tian and rapini. It's a masterclass in the best of Californian-French cuisine. Although I don't work on the pastry section, the girls work alongside us, always happy and proud to show me what they're making and offering samples. I didn't think I had a sweet tooth, but they are doing a good job of changing my mind...

But it's the core restaurant family to whom I will be eternally indebted: patient, wise, talented, brilliant and gracious (even with the relentless mocking of my English pronunciation, which seems to cause constant amusement, especially to the boys when I am calling out orders to the front-of-house team). Only a team of cooks as devoted to great food, to each other and to the restaurant that they love so much - and as confident and secure in their collective ability and experience - could be so generous with their time and energy. I am one very, very lucky line cook right now.

Back in the Bay

I'm back and have found San Francisco (and its inhabitants) as gorgeous as ever. Sunshine, beautiful views, wonderful people, great food and a few days of rest and fun before heading into my first stage at Chez Panisse. One of California's best-loved and most-respected restaurants, it has an impeccable ethos, serving the finest sustainably-sourced, organic, and seasonal ingredients, prepared with love, talent and unwavering care. Simple, yet brilliant - and representative of everything I admire and aspire to as a chef. So, it wasn't really a surprise to find myself shaking with nerves and excitement at the prospect of spending a fortnight in their kitchens. I had been assigned to work in the restaurant, which serves a set menu each night (as opposed to the upstairs café's more informal, à la carte menu). At 1.30pm, I arrived to meet the restaurant team, who were relaxed and friendly, whilst awesomely knowledgeable and passionate about food. With one chef off sick, I was truly thrown in at the deep end - Jerome, the chef in charge that night, assigned the starter to me, which - under his guidance - I prepped and served up to 100 guests:

Monday, November 2, $60

• Frisée and rocket salad with confit gesiers, hearts, pancetta, green beans and liver toast
• Poulet à lestragon: spit-roasted Soul Food Farm chicken with tarragon, crème fraîche, wild mushrooms, and fried potatoes
• Meyer lemon meringue tartlet with huckleberries

I'm learning that Chez Panisse not only makes its customers extremely happy, but it seems that you'd be hard-pushed to find a happier workforce, too. Unlike the grim-faced, ashen, exhausted creatures who inhabit some of London, Paris or New York's leading restaurant kitchens, the cooks here genuinely love their work - this isn't some ordeal to survive in order to bolster their CVs and to prove they can hack the worst that can possibly be thrown at them. Many have been Chez Panisse for two decades or more and obviously take enormous pleasure and pride in their work - and each other. I didn't here a single raised voice or cross word - just encouragement and gentle, constructive criticism where needed, which was always received with grace. Split shifts (where you work two shifts back-to-back with a short break in between) are totally frowned upon as it's genuinely understood that cooks working longer than a 9-hour day are too exhausted to work properly - and, more importantly, to have a life of their own outside of work. All very sensible, but sadly, all too rare in most restaurants. (The café chefs doing the early shift start at 7am, but go home at about 4pm, handing over to the evening team). Too perfect to be true? Time will tell, but it's not just the food that they seem to be getting completely right here.

La Fin

After 182 days, 1,000 dinners, 700 breakfasts and 1,800 hours in the kitchen, my stint in France is coming to an end. I'm looking back at the past six months and trying to sum them up... but I just can't. I arrived not really knowing what to expect, yet it became strangely familiar almost immediately as Peter, Orlando and Monique swept me up into their extraordinary Raynaudes existence. For six days a week I've been up early to make breakfast and have fallen into bed sometime after dinner is over, leaving me so tired at times that I could fall asleep standing up. That kind of exhaustion can leave you feeling raw and was sometimes made worse by intense loneliness - life can feel pretty empty when living somewhere so isolated, the only contact with friends and family is over the internet or phone and the excitement about a brief visit from someone is tinged with the premature dread of saying goodbye. But since leading this active life in the middle of the countryside, I've been healthier and fitter than ever and - for much of the time - happier. I have laughed more in this job than any other, as Peter oscillates between dry wit and high jinks and Orlando relentlessly regales me with his hilarious anecdotes and observations (when he takes a break from teasing Jude, who has popped back throughout the season to help with front-of-house. Her calm, warm charm has not only worked wonders with the guests and the team, but our girly chats have played a big part in keeping me vaguely sane). And I've never felt such a sense of achievement, amazement and satisfaction - and that makes it all worth it a hundred times over.

The visits from friends and family have really shown me how lucky I am to have lived and worked here - whilst also making me appreciate the people I love all the more. I had my youngest ever visitor in September - what he lacked in years, he made up for in extreme importance. Hunter Jefferson Crawford, my heavenly godson, born to my dear friend Cat on 4th July, made the journey from Edinburgh via Paris, accompanied by his gorgeous mummy, aunty Johnnie and Gus (over from Chicago) and Gus' parents, Richard and Leonee. Staying in the Cévennes meant they were almost a four-hour drive away, but distance was not going to get in the way of coming to dinner at Le Manoir. Cooking for close friends is a nerve-wracking experience at the best of times... doing so for a fellow (and more experienced) chef (Cat) really ups the ante, but they made it one of the most special meals I have ever cooked and I was so proud and touched that they came all this way. We then drove all the way back to Valleraugue, arriving at the house at 4am. The next day was perfect - Johnnie, Cat and I made up for months of missing each other and catching up, with Hunter a peaceful, much-adored focus of all our attention.

Then back for more Toulouse fun to say goodbye to Jude... rather worryingly, I've now been back to my new favourite city there a few times and - despite walking around it for hours at a time - I still can't get my bearings and spend half my time happily lost. We have, however, found a fantastic wine bar - I have no idea what street it's on, but it's called "Au Père Louis". If you come across it, do stop in for a "quinquina" - their house apéritif that has something to do with quinine and wine. Whatever. After a couple of those, you won't be able to get your bearings either, but you probably won't care...

What next...? London, southern Italy and then California to do stages at Chez Panisse in Berkeley and Zuni Café in San Francisco. I'd love to tell you what the plan is after that, but right now I have absolutely no idea. Watch this space...

"C'est normal"...

... a frequently-heard phrase in these parts - but it doesn't mean exactly what you'd think it does. For the French, it's more a way of saying "of course" or "don't mention it". But I hear it so often that it has made me realise that what I hold as "normal" has taken on a whole new meaning since I've been here...

After being so accustomed to the hubbub of London, I'm now quite used to the tranquility of Raynaudes (ok, admittedly punctuated by the odd bellowing animal), although the stillness continues to captivate me, even after five months - I could listen to the cicadas for hours at night, their chirruping a continuous, soothing presence that I will sorely miss when I leave. And the bone-chilling, face-numbing, spirit-dampening cold and rain of home seems unimaginable as I am warmed every day by the blazing Occitan sunshine. I can't imagine how my daily routine used to involve a cramped commute on London Underground into work, where I would then spend most of my 50 working hours a week sitting in front of a computer screen or trying to stay focused during a three-hour meeting. Now, of course, my working hours total more than 80 a week and are mainly spent in an infernally hot kitchen, trying not to give myself third-degree burns or chop any fingers off, but that's my chosen life now - and I wouldn't swap it for anything. I honestly can't think of a better day's work than one that involves cooking the produce I've selected from our local market and suppliers with vegetables, fruit and herbs that I've picked from our garden to create food for enthusiastic, lovely guests to enjoy. And then, of course, there's the pool and sunshine to concentrate on for a couple of hours in the afternoon...

But the "norm" around here is not all pastoral, idyllic perfection. Despite the Brits returning from their French holidays full of praise for the more relaxed approach to life taken by our Gallic cousins, they can seem like a bunch of absolute slackers when you've got a short amount of time to get a lot done. I'm sure we'd all welcome the idea of a two-hour lunch break every day, with a working week capped at 35 hours, but trust me - it simply isn't practical. Not an awful lot ever gets achieved around here - and nothing is ever open when you need it. After London's 24-hour culture, where you can get almost anything anytime, we must now grit our teeth and bear rural France's more "relaxed" attitude to business. Not only do many shops and restaurants close daily from 12-2pm - as well as all day on Sundays and Mondays - but many don't open on Wednesdays as French children have the day off school in order to received the religious instruction of their parents' choice (it isn't provided as part of the secular school system. Of course, they don't do anything of the sort - Wednesday is unofficially "teenage-loafing" day around town...) And, on the subject of shops - how on earth did the store-planners for our local supermarket decide that the dental floss belongs in amongst the condoms? The locals might have a good explanation (as did Jude, although I'm not repeating it here), but I'm still trying to figure that one out - and am rather worried about French attitudes to both oral hygiene and contraception...

And yet... if we think the local ways of life are a bit unusual, what on earth must Le Manoir's guests think when they see Orlando paddling around the lake in a red kayak, hurling white powder all over the surface (and himself) or catch sight of Peter on the back on a tractor being driven around the field? And it's not every hotel owner who sits down at the piano after dinner to sing "I am 16, going on 17" to the chef while she's dressed in a candy-pink dirndl, doing her best Julie Andrews twirls? (Yes, there are photos. No, you can't see them). If you think that's a bit unusual... well, I never promised you normal, did I?

All creatures not so great and small

Mother Nature has a funny way of reminding you who's boss... For any city-dwellers imagining that the countryside is the place for peace and quiet, think again. Once the hotel gets full, we ship out, so I have spent a number of nights staying with our lovely farming neighbours, Monsieur and Madame Regourd. They live next door to Georgette Cayre, a plump, no-nonsense widow with a living larder - not, as some of our guests innocently think, a bunch of pets. She keeps them for food, plain and simple. I used to feel sorry for the poor little things (non-sensical, I know, as I eat and cook meat), but having been woken up every morning at quarter to five by her pair of competing roosters, if she doesn't do something about them soon, a new dish of "coq au vin" is appearing on the Raynaudes menu...

And once the roosters have had their early-morning crowing competition, the woeful braying from the Regourds' donkies starts up - apparently they're not deeply distressed, as we'd all feared - they just do it for the hell of it... Or maybe they, too, are being subjected to regular nibbles from the mosquitos? But nothing has come close to the recent fly infestation - the worst in living Raynaudes memory and of quite biblical proportions. Thankfully, as the heatwave has passed its worst (we hope), the flies have abated a bit - in the nick of time, as we were being driven completely insane by the constant buzzing and swatting. Teetering on the brink of insanity is not the time for shocks - luckily when I discovered the lizard having a swim in the loo, I was too exhausted to bat an eyelid....

There's definitely mischief in the air - the Regourds' Red Setter Sam has a new favourite nighttime"frolic": he waits for the front door to open when I come home and then streaks out and off into the night, with me giving chase all over Raynaudes while he antagonises all the neighbourhood dogs, eliciting much snarling and barking from the dogs and much cursing from me. He comes back eventually, with a smirk on his face and a Mutley-style snigger...

To escape the crazy animal kingdom that is currently ruling Raynaudes, I went to the Sunday market at Saint Antonin Noble Val on the River Aveyron - a touristy kind of scene, but with a buzzy atmosphere and some lovely food stalls in amongst the over-priced, ubiquitous tie-die creations. I had a leisurely lunch in the dappled sunshine of the courtyard at Restaurant Beffroi - the staff were busy and I was happy to take my time, which meant that I spent more than two hours enjoying a glass of rosé, salmon with couscous and chocolate fondant. Apparently being patient and a French-speaker helps, though - after just a brief exchange with the waiter, who had expressed amazement when I told him I was English, my bill only listed the main course - "the pudding and wine are on me", he said in perfect English, with a little smile as he sailed past me. I left with a big grin on my face. Never mind the discount and light flirting - he'd thought I was French...

The end of the world? No, just the start of August...

So, I'd been told that the weather can get a bit unpredictable in August, but this is truly ridiculous... Having been lured back to Toulouse, I spent the day roaming the city in glorious sunshine. When day gave way to dusk, it brought a change in the weather as the clouds rolled in and the wind picked up. By the time I was in the car driving home, the rain was falling hard - and then things really got interesting... Lighting bolts lit up the sky as I drove through the vineyards of Gaillac, but the full extent of the storm was wreaking havoc closer to home. My first hint was the foliage covering the road approaching Cordes-sur-Ciel and, by the time I reached the town itself, I was swerving to avoid whole trees that had fallen across the road.

Numerous diversions and a white-knuckle ride later, I finally made it back to Le Manoir de Raynaudes, trying not to run over the frogs hopping all over the driveway. I ran through the rain into the house, where Orlando, Peter and the guests were intact and jubilantly recounting the evening's dramas and heroics, including chopping up trees that had fallen across the driveway (one guest even fell into the lake in the process), dodging flying roof tiles and giant hailstones, cooking dinner through an hour-long power cut and chasing after airborne pieces of garden furniture.

This morning saw another hurricane take us by storm: our housekeeper,

Monique. A force of nature in her own right, she came to us on her day off to help clear up the mess. Within hours, we had returned the place to a near-normal state, with no more lasting damage to the buildings than a few shattered roof tiles. However, many of our plants are wrecked and we'll never be able to prove to the doubting French that you really can grow seedless grapes, since our especially-imported vines were destroyed. But we survived, the guests thought this was the best entertainment they'd had in ages - and life goes on. As planned, we're still on to serve dinner in an hour's time, but I think we'll be eating indoors tonight...

The heat is on

Chefs have a complex relationship with heat...  Too much and the food burns, too little and nothing ever cooks.  A few degrees out and a dish can go horribly wrong - especially true when tempering chocolate or taking sugar syrup to the right stage, but also the difference between deliciously pink or overdone meat.  The source is also highly important (most cooks prefer gas, but I've been forced to convert to induction hobs here and they're slowly seducing me, especially when it comes to cleaning).  A powerful fridge-freezer not only preserves our food, no matter how hot it is outside, but it can save a pastry dough that needs rapid chilling or set the perfect sorbet for that evening's meal.

But the most interesting effect of the heat here isn't on the food... it's on the people.  The sun is high, the days are long, the evenings are balmy and our guests visibly start to relax and glow as the sunshine takes hold.  Given half a chance, I tend to gravitate towards a patch of sunlight, stretch out and read, my basking punctuated by a few lengths in the pool.  But the deeper we get into summer, the more guests come and therefore the more mouths there are to feed...  so in the kitchen I must stay.  "Hot" doesn't even come close to describing the Manoir kitchen midway through service on a busy July night.  Foie gras slides, salads wilt, the flies go crazy and ice cream doesn't just melt, it disintegrates if left out of the freezer for longer than a minute...  Only when service is over do we stop, exhausted, panting, a bewildered look and hopefully a satisfied smile on our faces.  I half-stumble, half-fall out of the kitchen - usually straight into the pool, which has become my sanctuary, especially when tempers rise along with the mercury.  We're now mid-way through the season - nerves are frayed, sleep is scarce and cabin fever is setting in.  Tough, but only natural in a team of just four people striving to provide perfect service whilst working and living in such close proximity to one another, with no time and little opportunity for a life beyond these walls.

Thankfully, though I may not have much time to get out into the world (although I did manage two speedy trips back to the UK for weddings), occasionally it comes to me.  My latest visitors were Pete and Maggie, who made it to Raynaudes for a couple of days in the middle of their European extravaganza.  Having come all the way from San Francisco, I did my best to ensure that they saw the majestic cathedral in Albi, the castle in Najac and the ramparts in Cordes - yet I swear that Pete took most of his photos when I snuck him into the kitchen...

The guests have been particularly entertaining lately.  Although they don't have to sing for their supper, they seem more than happy to, with Orlando accompanying anyone game enough on the piano, be it to "Cabaret", "The Boyfriend", Abba or "The Sound of Music".  The high camp continued with the arrival of Peter's youngest son, Andrew, whose stay happily coincided with his father's birthday and Bastille Day, which of course necessitated Champagne, candlelight, poetry reading, dancing and skinny dipping.  Not sure that our noisy renditions of Julie Andrews' songs at 1am in the depths of the garden were quite so necessary, though...