Over a century ago, George Ohr, the ceramic artist known as the Mad Potter of Biloxi, Mississippi, called his handcrafted pieces his “mud babies.” I’ve long adored this phrasing and it came to mind last weekend when I saw these these beautiful glass babies.

The Glass Babies from La Ferme de Mesenguy

They are jars of pork paté from La Ferme de Mesenguy, the farm owned and operated by my friend Cécile’s family, located about an hour north of Paris, France.  She’s living and working in New York now, but every trip home brings a suitcase full of paté back through American customs.

For anyone who has established their hooks into New York, we all know the first few years can be slippery.  So on Saturday night, we toasted to Cécile’s arrival here one year ago.  To celebrate this important milestone, we also opened the paté.  In the words of Kahlil Gibran in The Prophet, “Work is love made visible.”  In this case, it’s also love made delicious.

It’s intriguing how life puts people in our paths.  In addition to Cécile’s upbringing on a farm and appreciation for the craft of making food, her long-time boyfriend, Damien Kuhn, has a sustainable food business in France.  It’s called Producteurs Locaux and he connects local French food producers with their consumers.  We didn’t have time on this visit for a full debrief of his work, but I promise to learn more on his next trip to New York.