So you’ve got a vast network of damp, dark, underground, limestone tunnels. What do you do with them? Grow mushrooms of course. We visited a cave used to grow shiitake, champignon de Paris, oyster and ‘blue foot’/Pied bleu mushrooms. The blue foot were my favorites, but Sylvia, surprisingly, was a fan of the Parisian. We got to pull some directly out of the beds and eat them. Later, in the shop we purchased a half kilo and made risotto for dinner out of them. I brought back a jar of the blue foot and have yet to decide what to do with them.
The tour was officially in French but our guide spoke English so she took the time to either translate for us or to pantomime so effectively that we didn’t need to know exactly what she said.
Of interest: the shiitake mushrooms are grown in cubes resting on the floor and they said it was important to their growth to periodically whack the cubes. I’m wondering if ‘mushroom walloper’ is a good thing to put on your resume.
Of course there’s extra tunnel space. What to do with it? In this case a stonemason and and artist came down and carved an underground village there. Many of my photos didn’t turn out. There were shop doors, with a cat sneaking along, trees and balconies.
And just outside there was this pretty little cluster of flowers.
