Mists drift past the dripping hills, shrouding the oaks and walnuts in their delicate, damp veils. As they shift and part shafts of topaz light pierce the scene and a breathtaking world emerges. The countryside is spiced with cinnamon and saffron, peppered with cayenne. Autumn has finally arrived in all her blazing glory.

Summertime - and the living is easy… Okay so it’s not very original, but in countries where summers are hot, harvests are lavish and lazy rivers run full of fish, it’s so very true - nowhere more so than here in the Quercy. The fields are dominated by harvesters, crawling across the landscape like vast locusts; the markets are full of eye-popping colour and equally full of misty-eyed tourists.

It was an education, but this sort of thing can happen in France. All the great chefs have to start somewhere and it’s frequently in little out-of-the-way places, where they hone their skills and bide their time, and where a few discerning customers can experience their talent for a lot less than it is worth…

So, If you want to see old Cahors at night and be wined and dined like a medieval prince whilst you doing it, this is the place…

May in southern France is like June in England. Soft air, the first of the season’s brides, markets stuffed with hopeful herbs and leggy tomato plants - and roses, roses all the way. The huge gallica by my kitchen door is smothered in breaking bud, lime green goblets filled with a deep magenta that simply spells summer.

As I drove down through the vines yesterday, delicious spreads of butter-yellow cowslips covered the verges. The crowded woods created a chartreuse backdrop and the enticingly warm breezes lured me from the car for a quick ramble through pristine fields of new meadow flowers.

The sun is hot now, despite the still-cool air, hot enough to eat lunch outside - and on the spreading pavements and boulevards of Cahors that is exactly what they have been doing.

It’s a strange phenomenon, but as winter loosens its iron grip and the first spring bulbs begin to feel their way into the exhilarating air of a Quercy February, my mind takes a retrograde step. I start to think of truffles.

Down in the markets the winds have caused hibernation to set in. Only the hard-core stall-holders remain, well wrapped against the elements and displaying the stalwarts that will see us all through the short, cold winter months. Baby turnips, leaves still on, a vast pile of cardoons, stacks of leeks and endives and boxes of muddy, knobbly Jerusalem artichokes, just nudging the winter pears. And of course there are onions - sacks and sacks of onions. One euro-fifty for five kilos and enough onion soup for a month. ‘Would you like some celery leaves?’ asked the girl at the stall where I bought a slice of pumpkin and a good-looking bunch of turnips, ‘just to help with the stock.’

It was early this year and most of the grapes have now been picked. On every bend of every country road little purple smudges reveal the presence of laden tractors. The distillery at Castelfranc is beginning to assume its fruity autumn fragrance, as the newly pressed grapes are stored there, waiting to be made into Eau de Vie and Brandy. I noticed it particularly the other day, as I was inspecting the walnut trees on the other side of the road trying to second guess the timing of the next harvest. It’s an unexpected aroma and as it matures and the year draws to a close, there’s really only one thing that can possibly compare. Christmas pudding. Odd, but true.