bleudauvergne

Are you going to go to Italy?

There is a restaurant in Paris that has Sot-l’y-laisse with ratte potatoes on its menu.

The most important driving factor in my cooking is the season. From there, there are different ways I approach the planning aspect. What signals I am picking up around me, ideas that come from other people, taste associations, yes, emotions, but also thinking about a kind of dish, and then adapting it to what's in season. One year later I often prepare dishes or even entire meals from soup to nuts I've felt particularly harmonized with the time and were succesful in that way. The themes themselves are often a source of inspiration and give a good base upon which to build. I guess you might say that these kinds of cycles are really my overall driving force. I like to think about symbolism in food when I'm planning something special. When a meal is planned to celebrate an event, I put a lot more thought into the symbolic meaning. When I do, while I do think about color and texture and the various formal aspects of the food, I tend to lean more toward associations of things and their literal symbolic meaning, the egg, for instance, or the language of flowers, or ways to put messages into code, to transmit them as something that can be really charged with meaning, but for someone who doesn't see it, for it to be accepted at face value and really be enjoyed as good cooking.

The 2 kilo (4.5 pound) classic international box costs €18 these days and takes about 10 days to arrive. Go to La Poste and ask the clerk for one. You fill & seal it, address it, they weigh it and you're done.

These are all really good ideas. Judy's idea of free talks to international expat groups, arranged through the consulate, local clubs, etc. for exposure is a really good idea. I recently asked a new expat friend if I could use her as a guinea pig just to see how I would do on a paid market tour. I acted like she was paying me and packed a whole lot of information into one morning at the market. So much good information came out from the interchange and her questions, things I never even considered that could be part of a market tour. It's good to try and anticipate any questions, but also anticipate the unexpected, and be prepared to talk non-stop. Every day of the season brings out something new to teach. You can get an hours' talk at the fish stand. At the same time, it's really important to cover the bases, and learn how to pace yourself. Let your expertise be the commodity in question, no amount of dedicated prep aside from your experience can substitute. Understand history and local uses of produce in addition to general information, because there will be questions out of the blue about simple things as well. Introducing your students to the best vendors and products is really key too, and knowing where to get the best of everything is really important. Learn everything there is to know about their product and convey it to your students, and then give them a chance to sample it and use it walking them through the important aspects: relavent history and general situation, identification, how to identify fakes, variations that might be found, qualities, general overview of its use in the local cooking, and then actually working with it. Menu interpretation covering a historical aspect and an overview of the local specialties is a good way to start a class. It is also good way to get a reading on the education level of your students, and introduce a dish. About the cooking classes, I like they way Judy lets her students decide what to learn. It's a good approach that ensures that people will be satsified with the experience. You should have a choice of things, maybe with pictures, to help them out if they're not sure after your talk & market visit. New expats might have an interest in expat shopping - once. You could schedule a group outing once a month for newbies, and then give your pitch for more understanding of the local cuisine. Even if people do want to cook their own dishes at home, and want to know where to find imports and subsitutions, your expertise is Dutch food, so get them interested to come back for more. Develop a pastry class, and themed classes around various menus or ingredients, and keep offering. You mght include in the ex-pat shopping tours a final Dutch food lecture and menu interpretation session that can spark their interest for the local food. Then all you have to do is make yourself seen in the community often enough to plant some seeds. Spoken like a true expert.

Soft cheeses are best buried in your luggage. Makes sense to me.

Many thanks, chicken oyster it is.

Hmmm, oxtails.

This all looks and sounds very good. I won't be able to make mine until Wednesday but it will be just the thing for a weekend guest. There is a recipe in Paula's Cooking of Southwest France...

Hey! Wait! Aren't you going to share the details with us? Pretty please? Well here's the website, anyway. Olivier Bajard

That is a beautiful meal. Paul, you have got to come over here. You can stay with us.

Looking through some of my traditional references I'm finding on my bookshelf for the Daube a l'Ancienne - I don't think it's a coincedence that several of them also include cognac.

A daube can be made with just about any meat or game. I think the big differences are thickening agents and the liquid, daubes involve wine, and traditionally used gelatinous thickeners like couenne or veal feet, whereas a ragout is just a general word for a stew that uses stock of even water, and are often thickened with flour.

Sure, we buy boxed wine from time to time. Doesn't everyone? We tasted something really nice at the wine fair this year too.

They're doing it in Paris too, with ratte potatoes, not so fancy but sounds delicious, doesn't it?

Sot-l’y-laisse - in the Amelie Poulain movie, the grandfather shares this delectable morsel with his grandson. It is that lovely soft and flavorful piece of meat located between the back and the thigh, there is a round indent in the bone and the meat is found there. I need an English equivalent for this term. Can anyone come up with a concise, clear word for this little morsel, not being a scientific term, since this word is required for a food article? Please help me find this word. Stories on your experiences with it would also help bring out the full meaning...

Judy. In 1988, I was desperate to get to Europe, an Art History student at Syracuse University, just itching for that year abroad in Florence. Due to cash constraints, I had to put my travel plans on hold. It was so dissapointing not to be able to go. I was crushed. But fate had other plans for me. 3 continents and 18 years later, it comes to light that I was meant to spend my life here in France. I think this strange coincedence means I will have to get down to see you soon, Judy. I would simply adore seeing photos of your kitchen, and hearing your thoughts on your discovery process of Tuscan cooking, more about how it began, some of the dishes that make it back to your curriculum time and again, how the seasons work into your class planning. Thank you for blogging, Judy! edited to add: Wow you posted photos of your kitchen and posted them at the same time I asked!

Another great travelogue. Thank you so much, Arne. These cellear rats look like just the thing to give the man who has everything. Thanks for the idea! Moderator's note: I am moving this topic from the Adventures in Eating forum to the France forum to make sure those active in the forum here have a chance to see it, and make it easier to find for future travelers interested in the regions Arne has visited. Feel free to continue posting!

No special requests except that you keep on blogging -- It looks amazing. How far in advance do you plan your classes?

We usually aspire to a well roasted turkey a l'ancienne when we prepare the Thanksgiving meal. Yes indeed. I now won't have it any other way, and we go to great lengths every year. Things have been getting easier though. There are some who claim to prefer gibier, but I can get that any day of the week, its too easy. Turkey's the dope. A big one too. More stuffing that way. Two kinds by the way, oyster and cornbread.

Dear Dorie, It is really great to see this Spotlight Conversation with you, thank you so much for taking the time to answer our questions! As an American doing my best to try and bring my culture and history to my new French family and friends, I had to laugh when you told the story about how your French friends were aghast that you actually prepared your dessert at home. I have experienced the same thing! One of the best ways to raise your status to that of Goddess in this country is to serve a really good home baked dessert! Something that was really terribly difficult for me to understand, in fact, something that took years of struggling for me, was adjusting my American recipes to accomodate the differences between French flour and American flour. My first baking attempts in France turned out flat gummy cookies, fallen cakes, strange and otherwise unexplained catastrophes - it was quite terrible. Trying to get to the bottom of the mystery of French flour took me years. Even now after baking and preparing desserts for some time, I have an inner secret fear every time I try out a new recipe because of that harrowing time of adjustment to a new kind of flour. I am so thankful that your books are now available in French for the French kitchen here. Honestly, really good books with seriously good recipes for home baking are few and far between. My question to you is about how you managed to accomplish translating the flour element of the recipes - I can imagine that the French pastry chefs you worked with in your collaborations had some pretty precise and technical requirements. How did you manage to come to ratios that would work with American flour? Was it a problem you spent a long time working out? Did you have a general rule for conversion of certain gram weights (as they are listed in French recipes) to American cups and spoons, or did you adjust one at a time, from recipe to recipe?

Paul, I am sorry that your friend left dissapointed. Sometimes we have big rock candy mountain writing to blame as well, writing that extols the virtues of France as if it is a happy lucky place where you just sit back and sip the nectar of the gods and feast from the great cornucopia of the land. I have found that life is hard in its own way everywhere in the world. France is a country where certainly a great beauty lies underneath, and knowledge is a virtue, just like any other place. But people don't mention that. You have got to scratch the surface and dig. About the wine, they should never have spent €35 on a bottle and felt they had to throw it out. It may have been cooked (a likely possibility given the weather last summer, and depending on the conditions at the wine seller). In any case, if you pay €35 for a bottle of wine you can reasonably expect it to live up to a certain quality, and any caviste should take it back and replace it for you if its been cooked or corked or whatever. Pouring it out is kind of a wierd thing to do. And kind of melodramatic. Hiring a knowlegeable guide who will steer you clear of the tourist traps and can show you what they know about a place is useful when you are here only for a short time. Otherwise you definitely have to be prepared to do some homework, that's true.

Wow, thanks Sophie for that excellent information. I very much enjoyed learning about Pineau which has a permanent place in our aperetif cabinet. It would definitely be worth your while to visit a vigneron that produces it, and taste it on site. I do enjoy beurre Echiré's flavor, which is a bit different than other butters, due to the cultured cream in production. Clean, light, but also distinctive, albeit very subtle flavor. It is great for pastry, because it has a higher fat content than other butters. I would not use it to enrich a soup, though, there are other butters that would serve that purpose much more effectively.

Abra, I have actually put extra duck necks on my list with the intention of preparing this again within the next week, enough to freeze and take out one by one, slice, crispen in the hot pan and put into soups or over salads, or serve with aperetif, or serve maybe half a neck per person as a first course with a btter green salad, for two reasons. Reason 1: flavor) Have you ever had freshly rendered craquelins? Not the old stale ones you never can tell if they're going to taste good. I'm talking guaranteed absolute freshly rendered craquelins. The ones that have that great tasting salty flavor and every so often you get one that's still soft and has a kind of bite to it, just amazingly delicious. The stuffed duck neck in this recipe is soft enough to cut cleanly and evenly, and is just one big fresh soft duck craquelin cone that tastes delicious. The flavor is all about the skin. You've had chicken skin that's crisped brown? This is it, just crispy browned duck skin flavor. Reason 2: appeal and creative element) Not only does it taste simply amazing, it makes a good presentation when sliced. It's a more complicated dish that you have to plan out, yes, but less effort than a terrine, or duck confit, because you can start with the necks and be done with the whole thing in several steps. No long marinades. If you keep stock on hand you could conceivably get this done in an hour. The recipe does not call for any resting time between the deboning of the necks and the time you stuff it. I would prepare this dish for a fellow gourmande or someone who specifically asks for it. I definitely can see serving this in small doses to blind crowds because it really tastes good and I cannot imagine that anyone who isn't averse to poultry skin would turn it down. I would not serve this as a main dish to a group I didn't know - because you never know who might not approve of the fat content.

Well, it could be a sign, Hathor. Maybe it means you should go ahead and use what is fresh and readily available to you. You won't be able to make a stuffed duck neck from a sows ear, in any case, but perhaps something just as good. Dave, this soup is one from my kitchen notebook, using the seasonal pumkin-like squash we're seeing in slices at the market these days and a lightly smoked poitrine. It's a recipe where I puree the meat along with the vegetables. I made a similar soup in my first eG Food Blog.