Notre Dame de Pepiole: A 5 C chapel and a light lunch

We decided to have a light lunch and take off for the afternoon to leave home chef and house chief Jean-Pierre enough time to prepare the farewell dinner. We opted for an all Corsica lunch. Corsica is a French Mediterranean island south of the French Riviera, north of Sardinia, and west of Italy. It is full of wild beauty and very nationalistic inhabitants to protect it!We started the meal with a light spinach, corsica tomatoes, and olives salad, seasoned to perfection by Michele. She had peeled the tomatoes as I learned to do when I arrived in France.Then followed a platter of Corsica charcuterie or cold cuts bought at a speciality store in Sanary.

Among them, a coppa and boar (sanglier) saussage. The coppa was very lean and delicious. The difference between Italian coppa and this one is that it is lightly smoked. We learned that most Corsica charcuterie is smoked, but lightly.

After the salad and cold cuts, we had a cheese platter. When I thought of taking a picture of the rose wine we had .. the bottle was already emtpy, but here it is! A Corse Porto Vecchio rose that we had very chilled.

We then left for Six Fours, a nearby town, to visit the ancient Notre Dame de Pepiole chapel.

This small chapel was built here in the 5 C, it has had some addings several times, but the largest part of the building keeps the architecture of the time. It exists today thanks to the perseverence of Dom Paul-Celestin Charlier, benedictin monk and priest, who throughout his life worked and collected funds to restore this chapel. He died in 1976 and was buried here.

After a walk in Sanary - and some shopping - we returned home.