Chamonix valley pays tribute to the Golden Age

In 2015, the Chamonix Valley will be celebrating the 150th Anniversary of the year 1865 and the Golden Age of Mountaineering, an intense period of alpine exploration and conquest that was pioneered by the Victorian mountaineers.

1865 was an exceptional year in the Alps! It was immortalised by 58 “first” ascents and 7 in the Mont-Blanc Massif, including the Aiguille Verte, the Grandes Jorasses and the remarkable Brenva Spur on Mont Blanc. 1865 was a bitter sweet year of triumph and disaster, too – Whymper’s ultimate victory over the Matterhorn turned rapidly to tragedy, when three mountaineers and Chamonix guide Michel Croz fell to their deaths on the descent. It was the 14th July – Bastille day.

Next summer, between June and September, the valley will pay tribute to the mountaineers, guides and artists of the Golden Age through a programme of exhibitions, memorial climbs, events, films, conferences and book publications. They will have the privilege of exhibiting the “treasures” of the Alpine Club (the first club of its kind, founded in 1857) and other private collections.

More information: http://1865.chamonix.fr/En

Fait maison

When is home-made, really home-made?

Visitors to France, especially those concerned about what they eat, should keep an eye open for a new sign – Fait Maison – intended to flag up restaurants where the food really is home-made.

It may come as a shock to many that in a nation renowned for its cuisine, many French restaurants simply re-heat pre-prepared food, rather than cooking it from scratch...not that this practice is peculiar to France, of course.

Conservative estimates suggest that barely 50% of restaurant meals were home-made, while the Union of Hotel Skills and Industries claims that 85% of restaurants make use of frozen or vacuum-packed food.

To many people this seems at odds with the perceived view of French culinary traditions, so a law designed to uphold those traditions was passed earlier this year, and came into force recently.

Now any restaurant that serves a home-made dish can indicate it on the menu with it new logo – in the form of a casserole with the roof-like lid. From next January it will be compulsory for all menus to carry the logo. So, if you don't see it, the food is not fait maison.

And does it matter? No-one is suggesting that any of the practices currently adopted results in poor quality food. But a high proportion of people think that the use of pre-prepared food by restaurants is incompatible with what they expect.

How will it pan out in practice? No-one can be sure. But it's an interesting development to watch.