A day in the life of our French cook Marlene

Our French cook Marlene lives in the sun-soaked ‘garden’ of France, discover what a day in her life is really like…

On an average day with the guest I have breakfast around 9.30 and then we’ll head off to meet some of the many fantastic local producers in the region.

There are so many farms around us, everything is grow here it really is the garden of France and I love giving guests a taste of the life here. And they really re-discover things they think they know, like tomatoes, the tomatoes here are completely different to what you buy in a supermarket.

Then they come back for lunch and have some time to relax and then at around 2pm we start the cooking lessons. Then in the evening we enjoy the meals we prepared over some local wine.

When we don’t have guests Marc and I are always busy maintaining the house and property. We also have two little girls to raise and do homework with in the evenings. Then I spend hours and hours every day researching recipes and looking for presentation inspiration, I want to teach people new techniques and keep the courses interesting every year. Theres always the classics but I like to do new things.

In the evenings both Marc and I cook when there are no guests, there’s always fresh veggies around from local suppliers so we eat very fresh food and I bake a lot. If we don’t have guests we often have friends over for dinner. It’s a busy lifestyle but we love it and we’re very lucky to be able to live the way we do.

Want to know more?
Read Marlene’s story of learning to cook from her grandma and why she loves sharing her passion
Discover Marlene’s much-loved cooking holiday or cookery shortbreak or French pastry cookery course for yourself
See what others have to say about Marlene’s holiday in recent reviews