A Pig in Provence (22 page)

Watching
boules
matches is a serious spectator sport in Provence, and crowds stand around, eyes shifting from
boule
to
coche
to players and back with every toss. Donald and I joined the spectators after we finished our wine and packed up our dishes. One of our friends was playing, and he had been nervous about the competition he might draw, since top players often come from neighboring villages to compete in the August 15 matches, where prizes are awarded.

The crowd was large, and many of the men were drinking
pastis.
We stood on the edge, close enough to see players give a good-luck pull to their cap’s bill, bend over and pick up a little dirt, and rub it between their hands to ensure a good grip on the
boule.
Everyone looked serious as a competitor stepped up to the line drawn in the earth and aimed a shot. We stayed long enough to watch the mixed teams—two men and one woman per team—play matches. The women were just as earnest and, in some cases, just as good or even better than the men, but their attire was more varied. One woman, very tan and sleek with blonde hair perfectly cut to shoulder length, wore a thin-strapped white cotton sundress that ended well above her shapely knees. A lot of the men in the crowd shifted behind her to watch her throw. Another woman, stern faced with a work-lined visage, her brown hair in a tight perm, wore serviceable brown shoes and a green-and-blue plaid skirt well below her knees. She drew the men’s attention not for her shape and attire, but for her unerring aim as she repeatedly knocked an opponent’s ball away from the
coche.

By four o’clock, Ethel and Oliver were getting hot and bored and wanted to go swimming in the lake. I was hot, too, and a swim sounded like a good way to end the day.

Traditions of the transhumance. No part of the lamb goes to waste.
A butcher at work. A
méchoui
from the Ivory Coast.

We had to stop the car. We were surrounded by sheep, and the narrow mountain road with its precipitous drop didn’t encourage cavalier attitudes about whether man or beast ruled. We rolled down the windows and waited, caught in a sea of moving animals and unfamiliar sounds as their clanging bells competed with their bleating and the sharp piercing whistles of the shepherds. Elegant, stately goats, mixed in the flocks, gracefully sprang over the backs of the trudging sheep to land on nearby rocks or scaled the cliffs on the far side of the road to eat an especially tasty branch or morsel of grass before being nipped down by the grayish black sheepdogs. The sheep, keeping their long, smooth faces slightly bent toward the ground, steadily moved forward and past us, pushed on by the determined pressure of the shepherds and the dogs.

As the animals brushed against the sides of the car, we could smell their wettish wool, permeated with the strong resinous scent of the scrubby forest they had just passed through. We could see the bits of juniper and pine needles clinging to their matted coats.

The shepherds that day were a mixed bunch, some in full-blown Provençal shepherd regalia with broad-brimmed flat-crowned black felt hats, sweeping brown or black coats with capes, and strong well-worn shepherd’s crooks. Others wore heavy wool bérets pulled down over their eyes and knobby, thick sweaters, hand knitted, I suspected, of wool from a previous season’s shearing.

“Is this the
transhumance?”
I asked the man tending the small
café
where we stopped for sandwiches just short of our destination, the Col d’Allos, as we watched the streets of the village fill with the sheep, goats, dogs, and shepherds we had passed through earlier. The shepherds were working hard to keep the animals away from the trees lining the road and the flowering plants in the small park across from the restaurant, snapping whips over the sheep’s heads and calling at the dogs that ran alongside. I could see the sweat dripping down the face of the shepherd closest to us as he hurried by, completely focused on the animals in his charge. The proprietor turned back from the doorway where we all stood watching, and as the last of them passed through the street, he answered me.

“Yes. They come through here every June 25 or so. We’re the second to last village before they climb up into the high pastures. They’re coming from around St-Rémy, and it takes them ten days to get here, and then one more day to the pastures. They’re going to stop just on the other side of the village and camp until around one o’clock in the morning. Let everyone sleep. Animals too. It’s too hot to walk in the afternoon.”

We sat down and he brought the drinks we ordered, cold, clean draft beer for me and Donald, Oranginas for Ethel and Oliver. He reappeared shortly with a plate stacked with four
baguette
sandwiches of ham and butter, each wrapped with a small square of parchment paper. Almost nothing tastes as good for lunch as a French-style ham sandwich with a cold beer. The bread, at least one-third of a crusty
baguette
from a late-morning bake, is cut lengthwise and heavily slathered with sweet butter before two or three slices of thin ham are folded in half down the center and the sandwich closed up. That’s it. Three tastes, three textures.

We were hungry after our long drive and all the excitement, so we ate quietly for a few minutes, savoring each bite before we started talking about what we had seen. We had caught glimpses of sheep before, in the distance, and heard their bells, but this was the first time we had been amid the moving flock. It would happen again over subsequent summers, and also during the fall, when the sheep are brought down from the high pastures to spend the winter in the low country.

Sheep have been an important economic resource in Provence since Roman times, and the
transhumance
has been practiced since “the night of time,” as shepherds like to say. No evidence exists for the prehistoric period, but in early Roman writings there are references to the
drailles,
or trails, followed by the sheep. Sheep, like goats, are suited to the hardscrabble life of the dry Mediterranean ecosystem and have adapted to eating its sparse grasses and herbs. When the weather becomes torrid, as it does in the summer months, they don’t eat and consequently they lose weight and their health can suffer.

Although the departure dates vary, the great
troupeaux
from southwestern Provence in the region around St-Rémy and Arles, each numbering in the thousands, set out around the tenth of June
and head northeast to the Valley of Ubraye, to the Piémont and the mountains of the Alpes-Maritimes, crossing the Col d’Allos. The
troupeaux
from the southeastern part of Provence, around Manosque and Aups, where the temperature stays cooler longer, leave for the high pastures around the fifteenth of June. The trek takes ten to twelve days, and the animals and their human companions walk about fifteen kilometers a day, starting well after midnight, when it’s cool, and stopping in late morning when the sun begins to beat down. Part of the traveling occurs along roads, like the one we were on near the Col d’Allos, but much is done along dirt tracks, the
drailles,
that cross the countryside, cutting through forests, along the edges of cultivated fields, and through the scrubby
garrigue.
Trucks carrying the food, cooking gear, grain, and medicine travel with each
troupeau,
ready to pick up any unfit traveler, beast or human, and to set up the daily camp.

There was a time during the 1970s when it looked like the tradition of the
transhumance
on foot might die out, superseded by diesel trucks filled with the bleating animals that could make the journey from the sun-parched south to the mountain pastures in a day. But due to the stress of the travel by truck, the sheep lost weight and some even died, so the older, kinder—and more practical—movement of animals resumed, much to the delight of the villages along the way whose residents counted on seeing the sheep and shepherds at the same time every year.

Although thousands of sheep are still trucked, the threat to the traditional
transhumance
seems to have dissipated. Young entrepreneurial sheepherders, both men and women, are taking professional training to prepare themselves for what used to be only a hands-on learning experience. Part of the training is in the classroom and barns; the remainder is on the road, as apprentices in the
transhumance
with a master shepherd.
After a brief training session, friends and interested parties can participate in the
transhumance,
something that I have always wanted to do.

My friend Joanne went once and declared it to be a transcendental experience. “There is nothing comparable to being out on those high plateaus with only you and the stars, surrounded by the warmth of over a thousand animals. Their smell becomes part of your world, and you learn to distinguish the differences in their sounds, even to tell them apart. There were ten of us, and each of us was responsible for one hundred sheep throughout the trip, making sure they didn’t eat the geraniums in the villages, fall off a cliff, or run in front of a car.”

I asked about the rain, and Joanne said it didn’t really matter. It wasn’t cold except on the highest passes, and everyone dried out while they walked, as the sheep did. A few people, she told me, had bloodied feet after the first few days and had to drop out.

“Everyone helped cook when we stopped. The truck carried tables and benches and basic food. One night a deer wandered into the camp, and a shepherd shot it. We had it for dinner the next night, but I couldn’t eat it. It was tough and tasted like the smell of blood.”

In the days before supply trucks, much of the food was supplied by hunting, whether it was humble fare like squirrels and marmots or the deer and mountain sheep that inhabit the higher elevations, or the unlucky sheep or lamb that was mortally injured on the trek.

Since sheep have been such an integral part of their lives for centuries, supplying not only meat but wool and skins for clothing and tallow for candles, it’s not surprising that the Provençaux
have devised ways to eat every part of the animal.
Les abats,
the offal, are still considered among the most desirable parts of the animal, and great attention is given to preparing the kidneys, heart, and even the tongue. Lamb’s tongue salad is a
bistro
favorite throughout France. The tongue, small and delicate, is poached in broth, seasoned, sliced, and then tossed with olive oil, parsley, and minced garlic. Less likely to be found, if at all, are two preparations, one for the stomach lining and feet, the other for the feet alone. Both are distinctly Provençal and speak eloquently about the culinary passion of the Provençaux and the importance of sheep.

Pieds-et-paquets,
literally “feet” (or lamb trotters) “and packets,” are a Marseille specialty that rivals
bouillabaisse
as the culinary signature of the city, although Sisteron lays claim to them as well.

The packets are made by stuffing squares of stomach lining, also called tripe, with minced garlic, parsley, and bacon, then folding the squares into packets. These are cooked for about five hours in a sauce of tomato, white wine, and aromatics, along with the trotters and a thick slice of pork belly. No thickening agent is added because the sauce is naturally thickened by the gelatin in the feet. It is a rich and rustic dish, one that I love for its complex flavor, delicate yet slightly chewy texture, and orange-red sauce. Not everyone relishes the idea of eating such strange fare, but the dish holds an iconic place in the familial memory of Provence, and I know many people who rapturously tuck into a plate of
paquets
swimming in the thick sauce, and even pick the scant meat from the feet.

By the time the packets have cooked in their fragrant sauce, the tripe has become mild and so tender that the thin, meaty bits melt with the first bite, releasing the garlic and parsley stuffing to blend with a little of the sauce. Sometimes minced tripe is added
to the stuffing, making for a slightly more intense, but no less succulent, eating experience.

The last artisanal
pieds-et-paquets
factory in Haute-Provence is in Sisteron, the gateway to Provence. Sisteron, located at the crossroads of the Alpine and lowland regions of Provence, and thus at the crossroads of the
transhumance,
has several large slaughterhouses and is well known for its
pieds-et-paquets.
If I see ready-made
pieds-et-paquets
for sale at butcher shops in Sisteron or elsewhere in the upper region, from Manosque to Forcalquier, I buy them. They are easy to spot. The feet, ivory white and very smooth, are stacked neatly on stainless-steel or white-enameled trays, with the tripe-wrapped packets next to them, usually garnished with sprigs of parsley. I have never made my own
paquets
from start to finish, though I’d like to. However, I’ve never been disappointed by the ones I’ve purchased. Whether making homemade or ready-made
pieds-et-paquets,
the sauce is the same. Canned tomatoes and their juice, white wine, pork belly, bay leaf, thyme, salt, and pepper are brought to a simmer and the
paquets
are added. The pot is covered and the sauce is simmered for two hours. The feet are added, and after another two or three hours of slow simmering, the tripe is tender and the dish is ready to serve.