Cinq à sept is a Quebecois term for cocktail hour. The term is not generally used in France, but I find it a delightful turn of phrase, which literally refers to the hours between five and seven pm. A time to unwind after work and enjoy a drink with friends …

Contributor blog post by Aixcentric: The Musée Regards de Provence does a great job focusing on local artists who haven’t had much national recognition and their latest show, David Dellepiane arts et modernité, is a case in point. Born in 1866 to a Genoese family, Dellepiane came to Marseille aged …

Contributor blog post by Aixcentric: It’s suddenly very chilly and autumnal so warming dishes are very welcome, and this especially so as it makes use of some of the colourful pumpkins that are brightening market stalls in Aix. For this, I used a shiny red potiron but any sort of …

Contributor blog post by Aixcentric: Wandering through Les Docks Village last week, late morning, I was surprised how quiet it was. It’s been open a year now and is an imaginative conversion of a very characterful industrial building. Built in 1858, as a dockside warehouse, it is 365m long (for …

Contributor blog post by Aixcentric: This is a massively popular event and I read that places are filling up fast. The Rallye Découverte des Vins de la Saint-Victoire The official closing date for registrations is Friday 16th September but it could be full earlier. The rally, which is the 15th, was started …

Contributor blog post by Aixcentric: For those learning French, Kristi Espinasse’s blog French Word A Day is a must. Our bloggeuse lives with her French husband and teenagers in a vineyard near Bandol and relates incidents from her daily life while introducing useful bits of vocabulary to her myriad followers …

Contributor blog post by Aixcentric: If you do decide to follow Ester Laushway’s advice on eating out in Vaucluse (see post on le Guide Ganité), you may like to make a day of it; so here’s details of a really good website dedicated to the département. Through it, you can subscribe …

Contributor blog post by Aixcentric: Just having posted an image from the current Van Gogh exhibition in Arles reminded me that there are big changes afoot for the town. Van Gogh’s view of Arles; it’s hardly changed in 125 years. The Luma Foundation is building a cultural complex on the …

On July 14, 1789, an angry mob stormed the Bastille in Paris, a prison that housed only seven inmates. To incensed crowd, the medieval structure represented a landmark which symbolized all of their frustration with the reigning monarchy, a weak economic environment, high taxes and a lack of personal financial …

Contributor blog post by Aixcentric: This book, with an initial print run of 10,000 in September, sold out in two weeks. It would normally take three years to sell such a number. It sold like hotcakes at Christmas and Hachette have printed 300,000, a record. So what is this phenomenon? …