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The flock of sheep in the meadow at La Borie

Saint-Austremoine · 43380 · Haute-Loire

The farm at Saint-Austremoine

67 hectares of meadows, woods and crops. This is where the harvest we cook in Paris sets off from, every week.

Watch the farm film

The project

A farm that isn’t after profit, but living soil

La Borie is a not-for-profit farming project: 67 hectares kept free of all pollution for more than twenty years.

We farm using agroecology and permaculture, with no pesticides or chemical fertilisers. The commune climbs from 527 to 1,044 m above sea level: the seasons here are clear-cut, and they decide what grows, and so what we serve.

We raise poultry, sheep, snails and bees, and grow vegetables, herbs and fruit.

67 hectares kept free of all pollution for more than twenty years
527 – 1,044 m above sea level across the commune
37 colonies of bees
No pesticides or chemical fertilisers

The farm today

Who lives and what grows at La Borie

Right now at the farm

8^°C

Clear night

low6° · high8°

night has fallen on the farm

Wind: 5 km/h
Humidity: 81%
Sun: 07:19 → 17:40
Altitude: 527 – 1,044 m

Meanwhile, on rue de Pondichéry: 10°, 2° warmer than at the farm.

Friday16° / 5°
Saturday12° / 4°
Sunday10° / 3°

Reading taken at 20:29 · DataMET Norway

Livestock

37bee colonies
Sheep · out to pasture, on the slopes
Poultry · for the day’s eggs
150,000Snails · in the pens
12,500Snails gathered in one Friday · at the big gathering

The orchard

260Raspberry canes
50Peach trees
50Fig trees
50Plum trees
50 mRedcurrants, blackcurrants and gooseberries

What’s growing

Chilliessix varieties, from mild to hot
Squash
Sweet potatoes
Tomatoes
Sweetcornsweet, multicoloured, black, popcorn
Strawberries
Beans
Beetroot
Herbs

The farm on film

Come and see where it all comes from

The meadows, the woods, the crops and the people who work them: a few minutes at La Borie before you sit down to eat on rue de Pondichéry. (The film is in French.)

The closed loop

What leaves the soil comes back to it

Between the farm and the restaurant, nothing goes to waste: what grows travels down to Paris, and what’s left goes back up to feed the soil.

The harvest
Every week, the farm’s harvest heads to the restaurant on rue de Pondichéry.
The kitchen
Raphaëlle Bathellier, our head chef, takes delivery and writes the week’s menu around whatever has arrived.
Back to the soil
The restaurant’s food waste goes back to the farm as compost for the soil and the animals.

Fruit
Vegetables
Herbs
Eggs
Poultry
Lamb
Honey
Snails
Churned butter

01 — Market garden

Vegetables, herbs and fruit

Clarisse and Mathilde look after the market garden: chillies, squash, tomatoes, and everything that heads to the kitchen each week. The crops are shared between the polytunnel and the growing plot, where the heather turns the stony ground a rosy purple.

Seeds are chosen in winter: the sweetcorn served in September (sweet, multicoloured, black, popcorn) was decided in February. In autumn 2025, we planted a new orchard.

Chillies: six varieties, from mild to hot
Orchard: 260 raspberry canes, 50 peach trees, 50 fig trees, 50 plum trees
Soft fruit: 50 m of redcurrants, blackcurrants and gooseberries

Picking a strawberry — Picking

Chilli plants in the vegetable garden — Chillies on the plant

Cosmos in flower among the crops — Cosmos among the crops

Cherry tomatoes in the vegetable garden — Cherry tomatoes

Harvested maize and sweet potatoes — Sweetcorn and sweet potatoes

Inside the polytunnel

Heather in flower on the market-garden terrace — Heather on the growing plot

02 — Bees

37 colonies on the hill

Dylan looks after the hives, with real passion. The wildflower honey they give us ends up on the table, at the Sunday market and in our honey sweets.

October means getting the hives ready for winter: a last visit to each colony (honey stores, queen, health), entrance reducers against the cold and the field mice, roofs checked, hives tilted forward so the rain runs off, and a varroa treatment with formic and oxalic acids. Next year, with Axel’s help, we’ll introduce new queens to bring fresh vigour to the genetics.

A year in the life of a hive, and the honey subscription

The La Borie hives on the hillside — The hives on the hill

A bee inside a squash flower — Deep in a squash flower

Bees at the entrance of a hive — At the entrance to a hive

03 — Snails

150,000 snails in the pens

It was one of the very first things we raised on the farm, and one of the first we got wrong. We set it up with Nicolas and Antoine, of the L’Escargot des Murailles snail farm in Jumeaux.

The first year was a bit of a catastrophe: the snails kept escaping, and every animal around came to help itself, raccoons first. Through trial and error, we now have more than 150,000. Dylan looks after the pens, and the big October gathering is a team effort. At the restaurant and at the market, you’ll find them à la bourguignonne or in puff pastry.

With: Nicolas and Antoine, L’Escargot des Murailles (Jumeaux)
Two cycles: May → October, and July → July after a winter in the cold room
One Friday: more than 12,500 snails gathered

A young snail from the pens — A young snail

The snail pens

Our story with the snails

One of our first livestock ventures, and one of our first failures

The beginning
One of our very first animals

Snails were among the first animals to arrive at La Borie. We set everything up with Nicolas and Antoine, of the L’Escargot des Murailles snail farm in Jumeaux: the pens, the cycles, the know-how.
The first year
A proper disaster

They escaped from the pens, and every animal for miles came to help itself, raccoons first in the queue. One of our first livestock ventures, and one of our first failures while we were at it.
The years after
Trial, error, start again

Season after season, we fixed what wasn’t working. Most of what we know today, we learnt by getting it wrong.
Today
Over 150,000 snails

The big October gathering has become a team affair: in 2025, for the fourth year running, we picked up more than 12,500 in a single Friday.

150,000+snails today
2–3 mmthe young snails, when they go into the pens in May
× 500their hatchling weight, gained between May and October
12,500gathered in a single Friday in October

A snail’s year

Two cycles, twelve months

We run two breeding cycles at the same time. Pick a month: what the snails in each cycle are up to, and what’s happening in the pens.

Sheltered: indoors, cold room
In the pens
Gathering
Airing and sealing (operculation)

January · Winter

The long sleep

The classic cycle: The autumn ones have gone to the kitchen: you’ll find them at the restaurant and at the market, à la bourguignonne or in puff pastry.
The second cycle: The snails born in July are asleep in the cold room. It’s a controlled hibernation: winter, without the frost or the predators.
In the pens: Empty. Last year, the snow arrived on 7 January.

February · Winter

Tucked up in their shells

The classic cycle: Nothing in the pens for now.
The second cycle: Still in the cold room, tucked inside their shells, sealed with an operculum. They live in slow motion, on their reserves.
In the pens: Resting, under the cold.

March · Spring

Waiting for the last frosts

The classic cycle: The classic cycle is getting ready under shelter.
The second cycle: Still hibernating. No question of bringing them out while it can still freeze.
In the pens: They’re waiting for the last frosts, just like us.

April · Spring

Hatching, under shelter

The classic cycle: The young snails of the classic cycle hatch indoors, under shelter.
The second cycle: Their last weeks in the cold room.
In the pens: We get them ready for the snails’ return.

May · Spring

Everybody out

The classic cycle: After the last frosts, the young snails go into the pens. They’re barely 2 to 3 mm across.
The second cycle: We take the snails out of the cold room and put them back in the outdoor pens.
In the pens: The pens fill up: two generations at once.

June · Summer

Growing

The classic cycle: They eat and grow, mostly at night.
The second cycle: Last year’s catch up after the winter.
In the pens: It was in the pens that the first year went off the rails: the escapes, and the raccoons.

July · Summer

Grown-ups, eggs and the first harvest

The classic cycle: They usually reach adulthood and lay their eggs right there in the pens. Each snail is both male and female, but it still takes two.
The second cycle: Harvest of the second-cycle snails: the first of the season. After hibernation, you can clearly see on their shells the line that marks the operculation. And in the pens, July’s newborns start the next second cycle.
In the pens: The first snails gathered this year.

August · Summer

Growing through the summer

The classic cycle: They keep on getting bigger.
The second cycle: The little ones born in July grow in the pens.
In the pens: When water runs short, the animals come first: the snails stay safe.

September · Autumn

The final weeks

The classic cycle: Last weeks of growing before the gathering.
The second cycle: The July babies still have a long way to go.
In the pens: We keep an eye out for the cold.

October · Autumn

The big gathering

The classic cycle: Most of them have grown to 500 times their hatchling weight. We gather them, the whole team together (more than 12,500 in one Friday in 2025), then air them to simulate hibernation so they seal themselves in.
The second cycle: Too small to eat: we gather them before the first frosts to put them into hibernation.
In the pens: The Friday of the big gathering.

November · Autumn

The pens go into winter

The classic cycle: Sealed in, they go off to be prepared.
The second cycle: In mid-November, Dylan picks up the last “pen stragglers” by hand, still too small. Off to the cold room.
In the pens: The pens are put to bed for the winter. In 2025, the snow fell as early as 23 November.

December · Winter

Everyone in their place

The classic cycle: In the kitchen on rue de Pondichéry, and at the Sunday market.
The second cycle: In the cold room, until May.
In the pens: Empty until spring.

04 — Livestock

Sheep and poultry

We raise sheep and poultry. So lamb, poultry and farm eggs reach the kitchen alongside the vegetables.

The milk comes from our neighbour Aurélie, at the Ferme du Blot.

The sheep in the meadow — The sheep out to pasture

Eggs from the farm — Today’s eggs

05 — Foraging

Jean-Pierre’s ceps

Jean-Pierre takes care of the foraging. In early October, when the ceps are out, he gathers plenty of them, and off they go to the kitchen.

A cep mushroom picked in the woods — A cep in the woods

The farm woods, covered in moss — In the farm’s woods

The place

The meadows, the woods, the track

Between 527 and 1,044 m above sea level: meadows, hedgerows and woods. And in winter, snow: in 2025 it fell as early as 23 November.

The hills around Saint-Austremoine

The valley meadows above the farm — The little valley

The farm track — The track to the farm

A meadow between the hedgerows

The farm team

The people who make it grow

Around Tanguy Hanoun, farmer and cook.

DylanThe hives and the snails
Clarisse and MathildeThe market garden: chillies, squash, tomatoes
Jean-PierreForaging, the ceps
AurélieOur neighbour at the Ferme du Blot: the milk, and three kittens she gave the farm

The year at the farm

Season by season

A few markers taken from our journal.

Jan. First snow last year, on 7 January
Feb. Choosing the sweetcorn seeds
May Young snails go into the pens
July First snails gathered · Fresh walnuts knocked down for the walnut wine
Aug. Watermelons and “Mexican” cucumbers · La Borie tomatoes
Sept. Sunflower oil pressed at the farm · End of the sweetcorn, start of the sweet potatoes · Walnut wine is back
Oct. Squash drying in the barn · Ceps · Snail gathering · Bees put to bed for winter
Nov. Planting the orchard · Chillies and peppers · Snail pens put to bed for winter · First snow

Follow the seasons

The farm journal

Every Sunday, we write about what’s happening at La Borie in our letter. The journal is in French.

The whole journal (in French) The restaurant