We are in the Landes de Gascogne. And Gascons like to eat, and to share. Mimizan has some very good restaurants, but every gîte also has a full kitchen, a large table and a gas plancha on the terrace (or a barbecue).
Here is how to organise the week’s shopping while avoiding the supermarkets.
Friday morning: the Mimizan-Bourg market
This is the week’s big event, on place Félix-Poussade, behind the town hall, on Friday morning. In high season it gathers up to a hundred stallholders: market gardeners, poultry, Pyrenean cheeses, preserves, duck in every possible form, and fruit stalls you can smell from three metres away.
Go early, around nine. By eleven in August you shuffle along at walking pace and the best producers have already made serious inroads into their crates. It is three kilometres from the estate.
Every morning: the covered hall at Mimizan-Plage
The resort’s covered market runs every morning in season, with around twenty permanent stalls. It is the intelligent fallback: the day’s fish, oysters, a roast, a tart, bread. You stop by before or after the beach, which saves a separate trip.
The night markets, in July and August
This is the summer atmosphere at its purest: you do not do your shopping, you eat standing up. Producers and artisans set up their stands at the end of the day, you buy a plate here, a glass there, you sit on a bench, and there is often music. The night markets rotate between Mimizan-Plage and the surrounding villages all summer — ask us for the week’s calendar, it changes from year to year.
With children it makes for an easy evening: they eat what they want, they run between the stalls, and nobody worries about restaurant service.
The markets in the neighbouring villages
They are smaller, more local, and often more interesting. Aureilhan, our own commune, holds its market on Wednesday; Bias, Pontenx-les-Forges and Mézos each have their morning. These are markets where you meet more residents than holidaymakers, and the prices reflect it. Here too the days can move: a phone call to the tourist office, or a question to Emmanuelle, and you will have the right one.
What goes on the plancha
The Landes plancha is not a barbecue: it is a hot steel plate, it gets very hot, it does not smoke, and it cleans in two minutes. It is particularly good for:
- Sardines and prawns, barely oiled, two minutes each side.
- Duck breast, skin side first, at length, until it is golden. It is the dish of the south-west, and it costs little from the producer.
- Summer vegetables: peppers, courgettes, aubergines, tomatoes halved with garlic. Often the best thing on the plate.
- Piquillos and chipirones, if you find them at the fishmonger’s stall. This is where the south-west starts to resemble the Basque Country.
- Asparagus from the Sables des Landes, in spring, if you come out of season.
To go with all that: a white from the coast, a rosé from the Landes, or a Tursan wine if you want to stay within the département. And to finish, pastis landais — the brioche, not the aperitif.
And for everything else
Mimizan, three kilometres away, has a hypermarket and all the everyday shops. A bakery is reachable on foot or a few minutes by car. In other words: you can arrive on Saturday evening with nothing planned, and it will be perfectly fine.
All the kitchens at the estate are equipped identically — fan oven, microwave, fridge-freezer, coffee makers, kettle, toaster, dishwasher — and every terrace has its plancha or barbecue and its large table. La Serre takes the principle as far as twelve places in the garden, which makes it the gîte for big tables.
