French Provincial Cooking (116 page)

 

Cuisiniers à Roanne, les recettes originales de Jean et Pierre Troisgros
. Editions Robert Laffont, Paris, 1979. Translated by Caroline Conran and Caroline Hobhouse as
The Nouvelle Cuisine of Jean and Pierre Troisgros
, edited and adapted by Caroline Conran. Macmillan, London, 1980. Papermac edition 1983. (American edition Morrow, New York.) It was the Troisgros brothers who in the 1960s were responsible for the escalope of salmon in sorrel sauce which became the restaurant cliché of the 1970s. Regrettably, the charming Troisgros restaurant also introduced the outsize plates of the
nouvelle cuisine
style.

La Cuisine Gourmande.
Michel Guérard. Editions Robert Laffont, Paris, 1978. Translated by Caroline Conran and Caroline Hobhouse as
Cuisine Gourmande.
Edited and adapted by Caroline Conran. Macmillan, London, 1978. Papermac edition 1981. (American edition Morrow, New York.) Guérard first leapt into the limelight with his 1976
La Grande Cuisine Minceur,
a work often, and mistakenly, confused with
Cuisine Gourmande
.

Ma Cuisine du Soleil.
Roger Vergé. Editions Robert Laffont, Paris, 1978. Translated by Caroline Conran and Caroline Hobhouse as
Cuisine of the Sun
. Edited and adapted by Caroline Conran. Macmillan, London, 1979. Papermac edition 1982. (American edition, Morrow, New York.)

Cuisine à la Carte
. Anton Mosimann. Introduction by Quentin Crewe. North-wood Books, London, 1981. Anton Mosimann is currently maître-chef-des-cuisines at the Dorchester Hotel, London. His book is addressed primarily to the profession, but provides some useful tips such as how to clear a consommé with ice.

The following books are concerned with regional and classical French cooking, not with the currently fashionable
nouvelle cuisine
.

La Bonne Cuisine en Périgord.
La Mazille, first published 1929, (
see
p. 466 of my original bibliography) long unobtainable, was reprinted in a hardback edition by Flammarion, Paris, 1965, and remains unsurpassed by later publications on the same region.

Gastronomie Bretonne d’hier et d’aujordhui.
Simone Morand. Flammarion, Paris, 1965. This lovely work on the traditional food and cookery of Brittany was inadvertently omitted from my previous additional lists. Scores of interesting recipes including over thirty for Breton
galettes,
many for unusual local preserves, cakes, fruit tarts, potato dishes, seafood specialities, (but don’t look here for the fictitious
homard à l’armoricaine),
Breton junkets,
maingaux
and other dairy foods. Real country cookery.

Ma Gastronomie
. F. Point. Flammarion, Paris, 1969. The celebrated Point, reputed progenitor of
nouvelle cuisine
, died in 1956, and this book is a hotch-potch of recipes, reminiscences, menus, a kind of
hommage
to Point and the Pyramide at Vienne. Recipes include his
poularde
en
vessie
and his
gâteau marjolaine.

Les Secrets de la Mère Brazier
. Avec la collaboration de Roger Moreau. Preface de Paul Bocuse. Solar, Paris, 1977. Madame Brazier presided over the kitchens, first of her restaurant in the rue Royale, Lyon, (
see
pp. 41, 43 & 151 of this book) and subsequently at her beautiful lunchtime establishment at the Col de la Luère above the city. She retired, alas, in 1975 and died the following year. Recipes in the book include one for her light brioche, invariably served with her sumptuous vanilla ice cream and her delicious
fromage blanc à la crème.
Paul Bocuse served part of his apprenticeship chez la Mère Brazier. He found her tough to work for, but remarks that many of the procedures considered revolutionary in today’s
nouvelle cuisine
were quite simply, in her case,
des trucs
de
bonne femme.

Simple French Food
. Richard Olney. Atheneum, New York, 1974. English edition published by Jill Norman and Hobhouse, London, 1981. Also in Penguin paperback. The author lives in Provence and his recipes tend to a natural bias toward the cooking and the produce of the region. Technique highly polished, recipes not too difficult.

La Cuisine du Marché
. Paul Bocuse. Flammarion, Paris, 1976. Translated by Colette Rossant and Lorraine Davies as
Paul Bocuse’s French Cooking,
Random House, New York, 1977. English edition published as
The New Cuisine
by Hart-Davis, London, 1978. Reissued under the title
The Cuisine of Paul Bocuse,
Granada, London, 1982. This huge exposition of classical and traditional French cooking has very little to do with the
nouvelle
style of Bocuse’s colleagues. Bocuse himself acknowledges most of his recipes to Alfred Guérot ‘one of the great chefs, the most comprehensive chef of the first half of this century. . . . Thanks to his profound knowledge and his writing skill . . . his recipes are the most perfect in existence. . . . I have adapted Guérot’s recipes, transformed them.’ I know nothing of Alfred Guérot; but among many things to be learned from Maître Bocuse is that if confronted with one of his own particular specialities, sea perch in a crust stuffed with lobster mousse, you do not have to eat the crust, it is there to keep the juices in the perch; nor do you have to trouble to eat the lobster stuffing in the centre. ‘It is there to retain a certain moistness without which the perch has a tendency to dry out.’ Wonderful.

Great Chefs of France.
Quentin Crewe and Anthony Blake. Marshall Editions Ltd., Mitchell Beazley, London, 1978. The Crewe/Blake journey around the three-star chefs of France was a tour de force in its own right. From ‘exalted simplicity’ at Barrier’s in Tours to a recipe for a
pêche de foie gras
created by Outhier of L’Oasis at La Napoule we are in a world of opulent temples where the customers may well consume a pound and a half of truffles per day and wine cards are two feet across. Their world and welcome, but Quentin Crewe is always instructive and Anthony Blake’s photography both revealing and beautiful.

French Regional Cooking
. Anne Willan, Hutchinson, London, 1981. Another perambulation, and a very thorough one, round the produce and traditional cookery of the French provinces. Many of the dishes, like those I recorded myself, now exist only in books and it is good to find them again here. Recipes are very careful, and photography ravishing. The author founded and runs the much-respected La Varenne cooking school in Paris.

Savouring the Past: The French Kitchen and Table from 1300
to
1789.
Barbara Ketchum Wheaton. University of Pennsylvania Press and Chatto & Windus, London, 1983. The author views the history of French cooking mainly through the cookery books, and treats the subject with much insight. Documentation is meticulous, illustrations unusually well chosen.

They include the 1759
nouvelle cuisine
mentioned in my note above.

BOOKS on bread and breadmaking. With today’s interest in the quality of bread, whether in Europe or the United States, and the growing awareness that a working knowledge of breadmaking techniques is as essential a part of cookery as frying, boiling, grilling, roasting and sautéing, the following books should make useful study.

Le Livre du Pain
,
Histoire et Gastronomie.
Jacques Montaudan. Edita, Lausanne, 1974. French, Swiss, German, and other European breads. A chapter on
la cuisine au pain
offers some useful recipes. Handsome photographs of many different shapes and types of loaves make the book a worthwhile work of reference.

The Blessings of Bread.
Adrian Bailey. Paddington Press Ltd., London and New York, 1975. Nothing specifically on France or French bread but good general history and splendid picture research.

English Bread and Yeast Cookery
. Elizabeth David. Allen Lane, London; 1977, and Penguin Books 1979. (American edition with Notes and U.S. measurements by Karen Hess, Viking Press, New York, 1980, and paperback 1982.) Included here for its chapters on French bread and French yeast cakes—brioche, savarin, etc.—and recipes for
pissaladières
and quiches based on yeast doughs.

The Breads of France and how to bake them in your own kitchen.
Bernard Clayton, Jr. Bobbs Merrill, Indianapolis and New York, 1978. Assiduous on-the-spot research and recipes for French breads from
pain
de
ménage
and
pain
de
campagne
to
pain complet,
a wholewheat health bread with the inevitable honey among its ingredients. From Poilane, the Paris bakery which has become something of a tourist attraction, comes a decorated peasant bread. Among fancy breads are
gâteau Basque
,
brioche Vendéene, brioche aux pruneaux:

Abatis d’oie en ragoût

Abricots

compote d’

croûtes aux

au four

glace a l’

soufflé aux

Absinthe

Académie du Vin de Bordeaux

Acton, Eliza,
Modern Cookery

Aga-type stove

dish of pears suitable for

Agneau

ballotine d’

carré d’, aux haricots lorrain

cervelles d’, au beurre noir

épaule d’, boulangère

épigrammes d’

filet d’, au four

poitrine d’, Sainte Ménéhould

ris d’

selle d’, au four

Aïgroissade

Ail

Aillada

Aillade de jarret de veau

Aïoli

chick peas with

garni

with langouste à l’américaine

with meat (le grand aïoli)

with snails

Aix-en-Provence

Albert, B.,
Le Cuisinier Parisien

Alexis, Paul, his account of catching fish for and eating bouillabaisse des pêcheurs

Ali-Bab,
Gastronmique Pratique

Alicot d’oie en ragoût

Aligot

Aligoté

Allen, H. Warner, on wine with foie gras

Allspice

Almond; almonds:

cakes

and chocolate cake

sauce aux amandes du Var

truites aux amandes in set menus

tuiles

Alose à l’oseille

Alouettes sans tête

Alsace: bacon of

cookery of

duck pâtés of

eaux-de-vie of

ham of

horseradish sauce of

onion and cream tart of

wines of

Alsace, L’
(guide)

Amboise, beurre blanc of

American weights and measures

Amidon de blé

Amis, Kingsley

Ammerschwihr, Armes de France at

Amunatégui, Francis

Ananas au Kirsch

Anchoïade

Anchois

céleris aux

pain grillé aux

Anchovy

anchoïade

sauce, with celery; with salted and marinated leg of veal

stuffing for olives

tart, of Provence

Andouille de Vire

Andouillettes

André (shop) of Cousances

Andrieu, Pierre,
Fine Bouche

Angelica

Angélique

Angers, beurre blanc of

crémets of

Angoulème

Anis

Anisé cheese

Aniseed

Chinese

Anisette

Anjou

beurre blanc of

white wines of

Anjou, L’
(guide)

Aperitif drinks used in cooking

Appareil à soufflé

Apples:

baked in pastry

with boudin

with Calvados

cooked in butter

with escalope de veau cauchoise

with pheasant

open pie with yeast pastry

in stuffing for goose; for turkey

tart, Alsatian Norman

Apricots

baked

compote of

croûtons

crystallized; of Apt

dried, soufflé of

gâteau, English

ice

open pie with yeast pastry

soufflé of

Apt, Provence

Arbellot, Simon,
Un Gastronome se Penche sur son Passé

Ardéche

marrons glacés of

rosette sausage of

truffles of

Ardennes, hams of

Aries

Lion of

saucisson of; alternatives to, in England

Armagnac

Armes de France at Ammerschwihr, meals cooked at

Aromates, les

Arpajon haricot beans

Arrowroot

Art Culinaire, L’
(English translation of)

Artichauts

à la barigoule

fonds d’; en salade; with truffled foie gras

à la grecque

vinaigrette

Artichokes (globe or leaf) with aïoli

baby, in oil

boiled, with melted butter; with sauce hollandaise; vinaigrette

camus de Bretagne

hearts, preparation of; in aïgroissade; filled with scrambled egg; à la grecque; and lettuce, salad of; with sauce hollandaise; tinned or bottled

stewed in oil

violet-leaved

Artichokes (Jerusalem)

with cream