In much of southern Europe the local produce plays a leading part in defining the scenery. Olive trees in Tuscany, vineyards in Bordeaux, citrus orchards in Andalucia and Sicily - and chestnut trees in Corsica. Accurately described by the 19th-century German geographer Friedrich ÂÂRatzel as "a mountain in the sea", Corsica may have an image as a spot for summer sun but, in the winter and spring, the real life of the island takes place up in the steep hinterlands.
The scrubby herbs of the maquis on the rocky hillside where the independence fighters once hid are still interspersed with thick groves of chestnuts.
The village of Bocognano, in the hills behind Ajaccio, is proud of its annual winter chestnut fair. It was freezing cold and snowing when I visited but this did not reduce any of the enthusiasm of the 20,000-odd visitors to the event (though those who later had to abandon their cars in deep snow drifts on their return over the high pass to the island's 18th century capital and university town of Corte may have had their doubts).
This heavily wooded island has about 30,000 hectares of chestnut groves growing on the foothills below about 900m in altitude, although these days only about 2,000ha are actively cultivated.
At the fair was the produce of the chestnut groves in every conceivable shape and form: sweet chestnut biscuits and cake, soft goat's cheese wrapped in chestnut leaves, chestnut honeys and jams, dried chestnuts to be cooked in milk for soup, chestnut beer - and even a chestnut whisky. But most attention was concentrated on the competition for the best chestnut flour.
These days chestnut flour, or pulenda, is a luxury item but until relatively recently it was food for the peasants, with each family owning a chestnut grove from which the nuts were used primarily to make flour, which is similar to Italian polenta.
The chestnuts are harvested in late autumn and the flour is milled at the turn of the year, 4kg of chestnuts making just 1kg of flour. But the chestnut groves have another useful purpose: they provide food for the pigs.
Corsican pigs are big, black and rather fierce - or at least that was the experience in my one brief encounter. According to pig breeder and charcuterie shop owner Paul Marcaggi, by the time it is ready for slaughter at two years old, a true Corsican pig should weigh more than 100kg and should have spent at least a season lunching in the chestnut groves in order to give its meat a distinct flavour.
Many families still keep their own pig. Most use the local slaughterhouse now but not so very long ago the turn of the year was the time for pig-killing festivities, with locals helping each other in the busy week of making sausages, hams and blood puddings after the slaughter.
"I never understand why the tourists only come in the summer," Marcaggi said (Corsica, home to just 255,000 full-time inhabitants, attracts more than 2m visitors a year). "Those of us who are lucky enough to actually live here know that the winter and spring are the best times of year."
And then, like every Corsican I spoke to, Marcaggi turned to food. "Only in the cooler months can we eat the sausages and hams." The fish, it turns out, is largely for the tourists, though I was impressed by the men who had been diving for sea urchins on a distinctly chilly winter's morning. "It's our job," they shrugged. And on a day when it was too rough for the small fishing boats to go out, the urchin sellers were doing a brisk trade.
The Corsicans who have remained on the island are few and far between. After the male population was decimated by conscription in the world wars, emigration has been rife. The joke still goes that you cannot go anywhere in the former French colonial world without finding a Corsican policeman or customs officer. The Foreign Legion was full of them. But for those who have stayed on, the traditional lifestyle is precious indeed.
Take father and son team Paul and Joseph Sabiani, who milk their ewes twice a day in their state-of-the-art dairy outside Corte and then produce brocciu, the fresh whey-based cheese that is another defining character of Corsican cooking.
Ideally it should be eaten within a few days of being made, though Joseph prefers his still warm from the ewe, mixed with the local honey. For three months each year, during the early summer when he and his father decamp with their flock high into the hills to their bergerie, he enjoys it this way every day for breakfast.
While they are in the hills, the men milk their 300-plus ewes by hand, the milk taking on its distinctive flavour as the sheep graze on the aromatic plants of the mountainside.
Then there are Antoine and Marina Guelfucci, who run their 19th-century ancestral family villa on the outskirts of Corte as a chambre d'hôte, or bed and breakfast, after restoring the property themselves ("Even though under Napoleonic law we only inherited the cellars," Antoine mentioned with a wry smile. Napoleon, son of the island, is not a popular name around here). They now offer their local produce to their guests. Yes, they still slaughter their own pigs, as well as lambs and young goats for special occasions.
Over aperitifs of local walnut and mandarin wine, Antoine, who comes from a long line of fervent nationalists, explained that after training in agriculture at university in Bastia there was never any question that he would leave the island. Marina shrugged her shoulders: "I am an engineer who met her farmer." Both want their children to grow up learning to speak Corsican as well as French.
On my last night on the island I had dinner with René Orlandazzi at his Auberge du Prunelli in Bastellicaccia outside Ajaccio, the family house that was once a staging post on the road to Bonifacio. As black and white photos show, over the years the sophisticated René has fed and entertained many of the rich and famous, such as violinist Yehudi Menuhin and French film star Alain Delon. But if you really want to get him going, you have to talk about food.
"We ate eel caught in the local river when it is full flood, attracted by dried pigs' blood, and then young kid roasted over the wood fire," said René, who proceeded to show pictures of how he had trapped blackbirds by hanging nooses between the fruit trees. He explained how they were roasted on a spit over the wood fire or used forpâté de merles, which features on a menu from the auberge in 1958 that hangs on the wall.
We drank a little of the local eau de vie over coffee in front of the wood fire and then he made a most tempting offer. Would I like to join him the next morning when he went to gather wild herbs for salads from the mountainside? He wanted to give me a true taste of the maquis, in special spots he knew above 1,000m. Never have I more regretted the need to get on an aircraft.
For those who want to eat well, the true delights of Corsica are to be discovered in the cooler months, even if it does snow from time to time.
ISLE OF PLENTY
■Sarah Woodward was a guest of Air France (www.airfrance.co.uk), which has flights from London City Airport to Orly, connecting with flights to Ajaccio. Prices start from £214 including all taxes. She was a guest of the Corsican Tourist Board on the island
■U Stazzu, Paul Marcaggi’s excellent delicatessen, is in the centre of Ajaccio, near Napoleon Bonaparte’s house at 1 Rue Bonaparte. Paul cuts his delicious hams by hand on Friday and Saturday mornings. Tel: +33 4-9520 0275.
■Casa Guelfucci is at Pont del’ Orte on the outskirts of Corte. Tel: +33 4-9561 0641; www.osteria-di-l-orta.com
■The restaurant the Auberge du Prunelli, on the banks of the river of the same name, is found in the village of Basteliccia, to the south of Ajaccio and near the airport. Tel +33 4-9520 0275 (booking recommended).
The next chestnut festival in Bocognano will be held in early December 2006
