For the most part, Roellinger lives the life he mapped out for himself as he recovered from his injuries, a life both passionate and serene, and wholly linked to the ocean he loves. But his success has brought growth. The Roellingers have become a minor industry in this small community, managing 66 people. When they discovered that guests sometimes wanted to stay the night, they did up five rooms in a granite cottage called Les Rimains. It clings to a cliff facing the bay, with a view of Mont St. Michel, which, on a clear day, sits up on its rock like a sacrificial offering. In haze, it seems almost a hallucination. There are benches in the orchard, perfect for contemplation or for napping while the gulls cry above the breaking waves.
Then, a decade ago, Jane and Olivier purchased the Château Richeux, a 1920s pile situated on a point four miles south of Cancale. Once owned by Léon Blum's mistress, it was the setting for intellectual gatherings in the years before World War II. Jane was thinking of that when she furnished the salon with plump leather armchairs, a piano, and inviting volumes.
Like Les Rimains's, Richeux's 11 rooms and two suites are named for the spices that are Roellinger's hallmarks—ginger, caraway, galangal, clove, star anise, black cumin—and they're decorated with a restraint and style unusual for Relais & Châteaux. Two paneled reception rooms with broad water views have become Le Coquillage, the Roellinger bistro, with many dishes—like the subtle scallop brochettes with artichokes and white beans—cooked on a simple wood-fired grill. And when you order a plateau de fruits de mer, you can be confident that Roellinger knows the beds from which each oyster and mussel was harvested, as well as the names of the harvesters' children.
Overnight guests at the Roellinger properties are invited to spend a day aboard the chef's 80-year-old ketch, the Étoile de Bricourt, being introduced to the very fishermen who landed their supper of the night before. The chef can identify all the birds—gulls of every stripe, teal, sandpipers, and crested lapwings—and regale you with tales of seamen of yore.
He can certainly tell you about the 15-mile-wide Baie du Mont-St.-Michel, one of the phenomena of the water world. The tide flows with dramatic speed—often at more than three feet per second. (Victor Hugo compared the pace of the incoming tide to that of a galloping horse.) Twice daily the water rolls into or recedes from the relatively shallow bay, going out as much as 15 miles, leaving boats perched on their keels.
Roellinger characterizes the sea's "rendezvous with the moon" as "the pulse of the universe." He is convinced that human beings—"more than fifty percent composed of water"—have an inborn synchronicity with these rhythms that must be respected. Nature, too, respects these rhythms, as he points out. "Wise Breton farmers," he says, "still plant their carrots and leeks in the time of the waning moon." On the other hand, plants that must grow upward—pine trees, say—should be planted when the moon is waxing. It is perhaps this understanding of, and respect for, nature in all its manifestations that makes Roellinger's deeply personal cuisine—and his waterside getaways—such satisfying sources of pleasure and well-being.
Les Maisons de Bricourt
maisons-de-bricourt.com
Le Relais Gourmand O. Roellinger
1 Rue Duguesclin, Cancale
02-99-89-64-76
Closed Tuesdays and Wednesdays (open Wednesday evenings in July and August) and from mid-December to mid-March.
Les Rimains
62 Rue Rimains, Cancale
Doubles from $140; two cottages are also available, each with kitchen and sleeping four adults and a child.
Le Chateau Richeux
Le Coquillage Bistrot Marin
St.-Mélior-des-Ondes
011-33-2-99-89-25-25
Doubles from $140; closed Mondays and Tuesday lunch, as well as Thursdays except in July and August.
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