bleudauvergne

And with regards to the violet taste, it looks like Menton1 has got a source for the good stuff!

As far as the pain d'epice keeping, you don't have too much to worry about. Once you toast it, even if it is a few days old, it will be fine. A nice way to present it with your fois gras is to cut it into shapes, any shapes you want. Something nice to do is to make oblong strips. It will soften up in the hot oven, but once you have pulled it out and it sits for a few minutes, it will get nice and crispy, like a crunchy toast. The contrast between the nice soft terrine de fois and the crispy toasted pain d'epice served together is nice. Don't forget to serve some nice fruity alsacian wine with that!

Thanks Margaret, that sounds like a nice shop to visit. I will check it out the next time I'm in Paris!

Oh I thought that was just what people say while looking at the sunset after having had too much Pastis.

Of course you can get water! They just won't slap it down in front of you the minute you arrive! The best thing to do is carry a secret flask of water in your breast pocket for emergencies. Speaking of breaking all the rules. My husband and I went out for dinner the other night to a pretty nice place. A young couple came in, did NOT say hello to the entire room, and immediately asked for water of which they were graciously served a pretty carafe. Then they asked for more! Can you believe that? Then, we were approached twice by the owner during the meal to ask if everything met our expectations! I'm telling you I was surrounded by a bunch of cretins that night! Midway through the meal there I was with a large piece of frisee lettuce staring me in the face and absolutely no way to fold it, it was just too fresh! I managed finally to open my mouth wide enough to wedge some branches on one half in and then shoved the rest in by force. The whole room came to a stop in admiration of my excellent manners. The waiter then appeared with a warm cloth to wipe the vinaigrette from from the left side of my face, a practice they were apparently accustomed to. Robert, as for your accent, I always thought your voice sounded like Thurston Howell III. I guess we probably should speak in French if you do ever take me up on my invitation to dinner at my house.

Ooooh I'm going to be hooked on your blog all week Jamie. I can just tell.

I think John means this thread!

On the cheap gift for multiple family members in stores like Monoprix and Price Champion line of thought: The peanut flavored cheetoes (I don't know if these are available in the US but they weren't last time I was home) are a must for the niece studying French in school. While you are in the candy asile, something else that certain members of my family appreciate are the large bars of dark chocolate, for eating, and for baking. You don't have to bring back the very best most expensive kind from the chocolatiers if you're looking for stocking stuffers. They should run you 2-3 euros each. The bars always state in the ingredients what percentage chocolate they contain. Choose your chocolate bars based on that, and on whether or not they're made with cocoa butter (and not hydrogenated vegetable oils). Thinking back, Olivier & Co. has nice little gifty things. It's a chain and rather expensive, and they might have already crossed the pond into places like NY and Atlanta but I found that their bouquet garnies were cute gifts. For kids, the kids shampoos come in lots of cool flavors and wonderful novelty packaging, plus you might find some mouchoir packets with a pretty design to give to kids for their knapsacks. You can also use these to cushion your baggage. Pickles, little pickled jars of things are cute gifts. Also the various mustards. For packing your little glass jars, etc. I suggest that you pick up some freezer bags and wrap them individually, just in case. A couple of years ago I found a cool way to present gifts from France to kids is in the recyclable grocery bags from Price Champion. They are the store with the best ones because the bags are brightly colored, cheerful, sturdy bags with simple pretty graphics, easily a gift bag. I think they cost about 50 centimes. You can get them in Blue, Orange, Pink, and Yellow, I think. After the kids open their gifts, they can use these sacks to put their toys in. When you buy them, tell the lady they are gifts and she won't scribble all over the bar code on the bottom with a pen. What else. Savon de Marseille in large blocks is cheap and people appreciate it, being so expensive in the States.

For the maple syrup, it's the dark and flavorful 'grade B' that I have found is truly a great gift.

Culinista, I think we actually agree. When in Rome... Your comments are helpful, I appreciated them. After all this thread is about gastronomic cultural differences. I'm sorry, my post above does seem a bit disagreeable, doesn't it. I meant that the people who make faces when things aren't done the way they are at home have nothing to complain about. Wow, sounds like Nicolai has had some pretty bad experiences in France. Sorry to hear about that. I have never ever gotten the impression that I was being pre-judged.

Thanks to Menton1 for pointing us to the old thread which we have merged with the new one!

I think Steven is right about not letting ourselves push too far into stereotype, and Jack hits it the nail on the head with . The French are not nearly as clueless (or put off) about the tourists not being experts in the complexities of French etiquette. The only real custom that is taken badly by everyone involved is talking at a decible level above that of everyone else. To assume that you're going to get an intolerant server and a consequent rudeness by fork switching, cutting your salad, touching your frites, failing to say hello to all of the fellow diners, or by asking for water is pushing it a bit far, don't you think? Lets say an American in France gets exasperated because they aren't offered water when they arrive, a matter of their own custom and habit. They roll their eyes and start to make comments about the French, which very often the French understand, by the way. It's not asking for water that puts off the sommelier, it's the American getting exasterated at the sommelier for being so 'clueless' that gets him riled up. Lets not pretend that France is full of automotons who cannot comprehend that someone is foreign and therefore are completely intolerant when it comes to some table manner issues that may or may not be observed these days, even in the French home! I have no specific memories of rudeness anywhere. My one pet peeve - is my presence not being acknowledged. In a cafe, if my presence is not acknowledged, really, a glance from a passing server is enough, within my personal time limit, I move on. I don't dwell on it. After all these years I still do have problems with servers who completely ignore you as if you don't exist for long periods of time, and this happens from time to time as well at service counters, ticket booths, when entering a store, etc. How someone can carry on a long conversation on the telephone without even acknowledging the arrival of someone in person, even with a nod, is beyond me, and the same applies for people arriving in a cafe. But, as Steve, says, maybe it is not a custom, but universal rudeness. If it is rudeness, I can say I've experienced it plenty of times. When this happens in a cafe, I simply put on my gloves and move on.

Speaking of Monoprix and the idea someone had of picking up little pudding treats for kids, a friend who knows me very well stopped by to bring me a sample of her new discovery, which she knew I would get a kick out of - It is a product found in the milk products, in the Monprix Gourmet line, called TRIO. You get a package of three simple little pots de creme, each which hold 35 grams of creme dessert in different flavors. There are instructions on the pack about what order you should eat the contents of the pots, to appreciate them the best. They are small and cute. She said the chocolate ones were the best, which come in white, milk, and dark chocolate, but there are other flavors. Now you'd have to get this just before leaving and pack in your suitcase and refrigerate immediately. Aside from the novelty of eating them in order out of the little pots, the person has these cute pots leftoever that they can keep using for other things because they're made of glass and have screw tops.

Sigh. This is all so beautiful. We only clean our house because we were having guests, and sometimes we don't even clean when guests come... When the house gets out of control, we think - who should we invite to dinner? I know that market booty bag syndrome well. One way to take care of it is pretend it is of the utmost importance to take everything out and photograph it. I look at those two jars of marmelade and think that she must have been in a really beautiful mood when she finished that first batch, and then the second batch must have taken awhile so she was tired when she marked the label. The first batch is always like that, isn't it. Of course this is all just my imagination. But June Taylor must be an interesting lady. Thank you so much for doing this. I just signed up for the Ladybug Newsletter.

Exactly. Or the chefs keep some precious details to themselves (which is particularly true of pastry chefs, but not only). The "ratte" detail puzzles me. Of course the primitive "ratte" potatoes that used to be grown in private gardens in the South and Center of France were top quality, and probably good for purée. They sometimes reached large sizes that could make them suitable for mashing. But they are a rarity, and whoever should try to make a purée from the modern "rattes" (small, tough, slightly bitter little things that go green in no time) would end up with a sticky mess. Better choose a mealy potato like bintje or, if available, very large, organic charlottes. ← Ptipois, do you know of anyplace where they may be still producing these large sized primitive rattes or are they long lost history?

So the ratte choice in the recipe is not a purposeful misleading "tweak", it is a certain choice made based on the flavour of the potatoes, which calls for the second "tamis" treatement...

I just rediscovered Pim's eG foodblog. CLICK Memories.

So... a mix, for the flavour. Yes?

Most likely depends on what language you're speaking...

Alright, I'm going to make some mashed potatoes. Ptipois, I am going to follow your advice and do some investigation into the best potato to use. I'll start with the other potato in the recipe, BF15. What are the characteristics of the BF15, and are there any other names for it? Any insight would be appreciated! Here is one website with a chart, and they say that neither the ratte nor the BF15 are good for puree. I do see the Bintje everywhere at the market. Perhaps a mix? Potato Chart

I gave my sister-in-law a box of fleur de sel one year and she sent me a note thanking me for the relaxing bath salts. Be sure to tell them what it is and the uses if there is any possibility they might not know!

I think the veg thing really depends on the flavor of the meat. If you have a nice flavorful old hen, for instance, vegetables will only add dimension, you're not going to run any kind of risk of getting a vegetable soup flavored stock. However if you aren't perfectly clear about what you're going to get at the end you're probably better off leaving out the vegs and adding them at the end if you feel they will improve the stock. I think that the addition of the ground meats at the end in clarifying it does do a lot to lift the flavor of a stock quite a bit - Even if I don't plan to serve a stock alone these days I'll take that extra step that Jack describes in his class On Consomme, and clarify it with the egg white and ground meat. I'm glad I have started using that technique for clarifying a broth, it both takes the flavor one step further and makes it crystal clear. Pig skin does not add any taste if you add it without browning it. It does add a nice quality in terms of texture to the stock. Another very good way to get gelatin and texture is the veal foot. A pigs foot, however, I think might impart a certain flavor, mainly because pigs feet have a lot of meat that's going to give it a pork taste. The split veal foot, though, won't overpower a stock.

Wow cutting the butter content down to 1/2 of that in the real recipe is certainly "tweaking" alright. This all brings me to another question. Do you think that the recipes and techniques being taught, for example, at the Paul Bocuse Institute, could possibly be altered in some way? What about the Cordon Bleu? Where does the learning material come from?

That gratin still looked pretty good. I wish I'd had some. We're still eating turkey pot pies - hey maybe you could make a cardoon pie! Hmmm, pennance is satisfying in its own way. I'm enjoying your blog so much. Keep it up!

A call to Robuchon is in order. If a chef's written recipe is not a reliable source I would assume that none would be.