A couple of years ago, when my husband and I were only boyfriend and girlfriend, we got invited  to a summer wedding in the beautiful town of Cognac. Yes this variety of brandy does take its name from a little French town, in the West of France. 

As a French person living in the UK since 9 years now (!!!), I have always been fascinated by the number of cultural differences that exist between these two (or maybe one versus four actually) countries that only a strip of sea separates. Some major differences that I have noticed come down to wedding celebrations. From the three weddings I attended in the UK and the countless ones I have attended in France I have witnessed the below.

In the UK people tend to have family and close friends attending the pre-evening drinks/dinner and  they may have additional friends joining in for the party afterwards. In France, we may invite additional friends for pre-evening drinks (l’apéritif) whilst the dinner/party will be for the family and close friends only.

In the UK venues generally don’t allow you to celebrate past midnight whilst in France we tend to party until the sun rises again. As such most people will “sleep” around the premises and attend a brunch the following day.   

Anyway, back to our friend’s wedding… It was a beautiful summer day. The light was flowing through the shutters of the hotel room decorated in pastel tones with furniture imitating the ones you could find in the Versailles chateau. We were waking up from a night of celebrations, slowly putting together our suitcases and preparing ourselves for brunch. We caught up with our friends downstairs and walked through the refreshing streets to our friend’s house. His mum welcomed us with the warmest smile and as we sat, discussed with the other guests she filled up a buffet full of cold meats, quiches, salads and breads. When the time for dessert came, she served us this indulgent yet ethereal frozen dessert: un vacherin glacé. This creamy treat with its fruity coulis melted in our mouths and it felt like the perfect way to end of this wonderful week-end of celebrations…

I was pleasantly surprised to discover that it had only taken her 10 minutes to put this amazing dessert together the day before, which makes it ideal when you are entertaining. The children will love it as well and you may get them involved in making it, as it is only made of  3 ingredients: crème fraiche, meringue and sugar. I made my own coulis to go with it but you can buy an already made one if you really need to. This would be ideal after a summer barbecue. Enjoy!

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[yumprint-recipe id=’17’]I am taking this opportunity to link to Dead Easy Desserts this week, a great blogging event listing 30 (or less)-minute desserts hosted by a new blogging friend of mine who I met at Food Blogger Connect the week-end before last: Sarah, from Maison Cupcake.