And so it came to pass that Cakeadoodledo turned off its ovens, cleaned up the trail of flour and icing sugar and headed off for its annual holiday to France. This year it’s Provence – a change from the usual footling around the South West. We’ve headed East. Yeeee harrrr. Except there are no cowboys. Lavender, herbs, and lots and lots of lovely fruit and vegetables. This is the only place where I think I could happily be vegan.

In the village where we are staying (Velleron) there is a farmers’ market every evening – apart from Sundays. It is the most civilised and sensible way of shopping I have ever seen. For one hour only the market is open. Farmers line up and open their van doors. They each have a table and might sell only one or two products. There might be peaches and nectarines. Or tomatoes – six varieties of tomatoes. Or just red peppers. Or maybe aubergines. You wander up and down selecting where you are going to buy your lettuce, tomatoes, melons, olives and then get the pre-measured tub of goodies tipped straight into your bag.

It is amazingly good value (1 Euro for two enormous and delicious lettuces – fancy ones, mind, none of your iceberg nonsense), 6 euros for a whole tray of white nectarines and peaches that are so juicy you need to eat them over a sink. 2 euros for a bag of snappy, crispy fine haricots verts.

I have found that I decide what to cook for supper based on what haul I have taken from the market that evening and incorporate the protein we’ve bought earlier.

Last night’s supper was baby courgettes peeled into thin strips and then doused in lemon juice, garlic, olive oil and flat leaf parsley and left to fester for an hour served with big, pink, whiskery langoustines I had found earlier in the day. A great excuse for massive dollops of aioli…

Then we had a quite straight forward salad with three sorts of lettuce, haricots verts, olives, green tiger striped tomatoes and some fresh tuna. I made some croutons from left over baguette. I suppose if there had been egg and some anchovies it would have been a Nicoise…

Tonight some shiny, almost black aubergines will be sliced and roasted with white, almost round aubergines and served with a yoghurt, lemon and saffron sauce. Well, that’s the plan. But there are some red peppers the size of Italy in the bottom of the fridge smiling at me…oh, and the artichokes need eating…