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As parents ourselves, we have always wanted Maison Esmeralda to be a family friendly holiday destination. Situated as we are, in Biert, on the banks of the River Arac, in the beautiful Massat valley there is so much for adults and children to do, explore and discover. There’s a myriad of experiences on offer here; with horse riding, fishing, mountain biking, cycling and kayaking practically on the doorstep, and para-gliding, hot air ballooning, waterfalls, prehistoric parks and much more a little further afield.
However, we know, possibly better than some, that sometimes holidays are about simply spending time together relaxing in the sun.
With that in mind, we’ve developed our meadow by the river into an area for children to play and have fun, but also, for parents to relax and enjoy their surroundings. We have cleared an area for ball games, have built a substantial climbing frame with swings and will soon be adding a sandpit. And, we’ve also set up a barbecue area, as well as plenty of comfortable seating options, for those who prefer to have their fun in repose!
Please see the photos on our gallery to get a clearer idea.

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Tailor Made Group Packages

We are now offering tailor made group packages for friends or families who want to celebrate birthdays, anniversaries, end of exams, or who just want to get away together and be well looked after. Stag and hen parties catered for.

Facilities available at Maison Esmeralda:

• Airport pick up for groups
• Accommodation for groups of up to 18 (Various options depending on group requirements – includes En-suite rooms and dormitory)
• Extensive gardens with child play area, barbecue and outside eating and drinking areas. Set in beautiful countryside on the banks of the River Arac
• Child safe swimming pool
• Plenty of communal inside space as well as private rooms
• Shops and bars near by
• Party areas (Various options)
• Shopping service and kitchen facilities (We can provide hampers for your arrival)
• Catering service – Picnics/ Buffets/ Sit down meals (Indian/ Mexican/ Thai/ Italian nights etc.)
• Baby–sitting service (Large selection of kids films available)

Activities we can arrange (Some are date or weather dependent)

• Horse riding, donkey walks and trekking
• VTT (Mountain biking) Drive to the top of nearby mountains and enjoy hours of descent)
• Skiing/ Nordic Skiing/ Sledging
• Fishing Permits (Disabled fishing platform very near by)
• Kayaking
• Hot air ballooning/ Paragliding and other air sports
• Many exciting days out including – Animal parks/ Prehistoric park/ Tree top Adventure Park and the longest subterranean river in Europe
• City visits – Toulouse/ Carcassonne/ St Lizier etc.
• Picnics at local beauty spots (Swimming possibilities)
• Thermal Spas
• St Girons Saturday Market (Others available depending on dates)
• Festivals and Fetes
• Walking/ Hiking for all ages and abilities
• Bat Cave excursion with child assault course en route
• Large selection of films available
• Large selection of wines and beers (Some on request)
• Relaxing days by river and pool with drinks on tap…

Prices start at just €220 per person for 5 nights. (Sterling payments possible.)
Includes: Airport pick up/ Room with breakfast/ Evening meal, with wine, on night of arrival.
(Example price only, based on rooms being shared.)
Please contact us for your personalised group package price.

Check out our Gallery for new pic’s of our new swing set and seating and BBQ area in our meadow by the river, here in Biert, Ariège, Midi-Pyrénées.

http://www.maisonesmeralda.eu/gallery/

The weather here has been beautiful in recent weeks; the garden is bursting with the jolly bobbing heads of spring flowers- so every opportunity has been taken to enjoy the wonderful outdoors.

(See our Gallery for photos – http://www.maisonesmeralda.eu/gallery/)

We’ve been doing lots of gardening; tidying up all the lovely bushes and trees, and trying to extend our fruit, veg and herb gardens. This has mainly involved lots of digging, which is obviously hard work and fairly monotonous, but I don’t mind much when the sun is on my face and I’m convinced that it does more to fend off the old bingo wings than the gym ever did.

My main adversary has been the nettle. There was quite a plantation of them on our furthest plot. Even the roots seemed capable of stinging, even through thick gloves and I’m really not that keen on pain. I’d started to take it all quite personally, and was beginning to get a bit paranoid; seeing them as sentient beings, working together in an organised fashion in order to wreck my life.

I decided to get a grip (literally) and turn my enemies into friends- by having them for dinner.

My first batch of nettle soup (made simply, with fried onions, garlic and potatoes, some home-made chicken stock and a little cream) was wholesome and tasty, but a teeny bit ‘worthy’, so I added a little depth and decadence with some Roquefort- it was gorgeous.

So the nettles have been transformed from a painful nuisance into a useful crop. I’ve harvested most of them, and now when I see a newly sprouted leafy spear, I just smile and reach for my gloves.

Well, today I have been here in beautiful Ariege for exactly 6 months, the rest of the crew for nearly 9. In some ways it seems longer: my last birthday, when I felt wrung-out and fairly miserable, seems a lifetime ago, but in other ways, this adventure of ours still seems to be just beginning.

Goings on outside continue to amaze and entrance me; now we are in a season of warm (yes warm!) days, characterized by immaculate blue skies and then very cold nights; the wood burner is fed perpetually and we don’t tend to stray too far from it.

After a hectic but enjoyable Christmas spent with hordes of visiting family, this quieter time seems like the perfect opportunity to look back and take stock- on what we’ve managed to achieve; new wiring, better plumbing, vastly improved gite, much extended veg garden and fairly well settled kids. On what we’ve enjoyed; learning new skills, working together, meeting new people and just being here in this remarkable place. And  we should probably ponder a little on mistakes we’ve made and what we would do differently, but a more private and personal space would be more appropriate for that methinks…

It’s probably also very unwise and very unprofessional to look back and comment on the visitors we have had in our first year, but our guests are really what all this is about, so it seems wrong not to really! We met so many lovely people last year and I promise that I am not fibbing in the slightest when I say that we’ve enjoyed the company of everyone who has stayed with us (so far!). When Michael and I were doing our obligatory travelling bit, one of the best aspects of those days was meeting diverse, exciting and adventurous people from all over the world. Now that we’re a bit older (and less energetic) it’s wonderful that this now happens without us having to leave the house.

We did seem to have a particular affinity with one certain demographic though; the ones who arrived on 2 wheels followed by a plume of smoke. Jean-Francois and his 13 friends and family who came for a picnic, a musical festival in Biert and then a bed for the night were all so kind and complimentary when all this was so new for us. Mark and Graham were such great company it seemed wrong to take any money off them (but we soon recovered from that particular peculiar sensation). And finally, Johann, Alex, Rudi and Cor -our wonderful Dutch bikers- one of you has already returned and another of you is scheduled to reappear in the Summer.We can’t wait. In short, it’s been fab, long may it all continue- I look forward to the next 6 months.

At the weekend we picked loads of our grapes and came up with this easy recipe for Black Grape Jelly.

Ingredients:

2 kilos of fresh black grapes
2 apples (For pectin)
350 gms sugar
1/2 a lemon

Sort, wash and de-stalk your grapes and chop your apples into thin slices.

Place grapes & apples in a large, heavy bottomed pan and heat until juices emerge. Mash to extract all juice. After about 20 minutes pass through a sieve; you should have about 1 litre of juice.
Sterilise your jars in the oven at a lowish heat for about 10 minutes.
Return juice to rinsed pan and heat. Add lemon juice and sugar and to a vigorous , rolling boil and keep stirring until jamming point is reached, about 20-25 minutes. Test by dropping a small amount onto a cold plate and once a skin appears to be forming, take off the heat, pour carefully into hot jars and screw lids on tightly. Leave at room temperature to set and store in a cool, dark place.

See the results here.

http://www.maisonesmeralda.eu/gallery/

Well, Autumn has supposedly arrived in Biert, but it’s not at all what I’m used to. The mornings tend to start a little unworldly; misty, cool and crisp. I pack the kids off to school snugly booted and layered-up (I’m a little over-cautious, so sometimes they have a bit of difficulty bending their limbs.)
And then, within an hour or so, the clouds un-ravel themselves from the hills and we are left with beautiful blue skies, sun as hot as it ever gets in England and red-faced, over-heated children.
Where I come from it is obligatory to take full advantage of any vaguely warmish day by downing any tools, dropping any plans, pointing your face at the sun and drinking. If I carry on along those lines here, I’m going to end up very leathery and quite poorly.
However, despite the heat, there are distinct signs that the season is changing. The mountain behind Massat that I don’t know the name of, but gaze at a lot, is turning different shades of gold and red and sometimes seems to glow in the sun. The plum glut has been superceded by an equally ridiculous amount of apples (although amazingly, the raspberries are still going strong). There is a mushroomy tang in the air, as well as a definite hint of wood-smoke.
It is Autumn, but not an Autumn I would have dared hope for. When I’m sitting by the river in sun still hot enough to paddle in, and a slight breeze scatters hundreds of tawny, needle-like leaves across the meadow in what seems like slow-motion, I don’t quite believe it. I feel like I’m inside a Disney film and a singing trout is going to stick its head out of the water, or a troupe of rabbits in outfits are going to tip up. But they don’t. ‘Cos it’s real. It really is.

Enjoy Autumn with us here in Biert and if you book directly through our website contact form for October or November, we’ll give you a 10% discount on either the gite or a room and a free bottle of wine to drink whilst cosied up to our wood burning stove.

We spent all last week updating the kitchen in our Gite, in Biert, near Massat in the Midi-Pyrenees. Mick got his hands dirty doing the tiling, I hung some new pictures and we both got stuck in to the painting .

Take a look at the Maison Esmeralda Gallery and let us know what you think. If you fancy a nice Autumn break, the Gite is free at the moment, do get in touch. Click here for contacts

As Wednesdays are officially our day off and the kids aren’t at school, we try to get out of the house and soak up some of the beautiful surroundings in which we now live. Today we went to the opposite side of the valley for a couple of hours; we saw some deer, birds and beautiful landscapes. Frank had asked for an adventure and thought he’d had one after the precipitous descent. Check out the Maison Esmeralda Gallery for the pictures.

Here’s my recipe for a moist fruity cake, I hope you like it; I know we did, I’m panting on the sofa as I write. Any suggestions for a name for this cake are welcome.

5 Eating Apples
1 Pear
100gms Brown sugar
1/3 of a cup of apple juice
1 tsp cinammon
4 cloves
110gms butter
Peel and chop this fruit and stew in a pan along with the rest of the above ingredients.
When softened, mash, allow to cool a bit and add:

2 Bananas (Mash these in)
250 gms Fromage Blanc
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla essence

In a large bowl, sift:
420gms plain flour
200gms sugar
2 tsps baking powder
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp salt
1 tsp cinammon

Mix these dry ingredients then make a well in the bowl. Add the cooled(ish) fruit mixture and fold in just until the flour is incorporated. half way through add:
120gms raisins

Place in two 20cm cake tins – Or in loaf tins if you prefer (We did one of each) – Bottoms lined with grease proof parchment and sides buttered.

Place in a pre-heated oven 180 degrees C for around 50 minutes, or until cooked.

Serve on its own (with a cup of tea), with cream and berries (If you want to be posh), custard (if you don’t), or cold with butter (if you’re not on a diet)

You can see a photo of this cake on our facebook site if you like.

We keep being asked for the recipe for our home-made muesli, so here it is, don’t let this stop you coming here and trying the original first-hand though:

English

150g groundnuts (Unroasted and salted)

50g Almonds

50g Hazelnuts

250g Porridge Oats

150g Cornflakes

100g Raisins

150ml Honey

De-shell groundnuts, place all nuts on baking trays and dry roast 10-15 minutes. Crush all nuts and mix with oats and crushed cornflakes. Mix with honey and put back on tray and into oven for a further 30 minutes. Cool and add raisins. That’s it, enjoy with milk or Fromage Blanc.

French

la recette du muesli

150g cacahuètes
50g amandes
50g noisettes
250g flocons d’avoine
150g cornflakes
100g raisins secs
150g miel

Faire rôtir les cacahuètes, les amandes, les noisettes 10 – 15 minutes (four à 170°). Ecraser et mélanger avec les cornflakes écrasés et ajouter le miel; remettre dans le four pendant 30 minutes.  Laisser refroidir, ajouter les raisins secs.  A savourer avec du lait ou du fromage blanc.
Bon appétit!

(Many thanks to Josie for her help with this recipe and to Ralph with help in correcting my mistakes in translation)