Ptipois

I love the little chocolate slabs on top of it. Was it good?

"Gutsy" sounds perfect. (Happy Christmas John, happy Christmas everybody!)

More on the rabelaisian, roguish, devilish side than on the "rough and ready side" since a "canaille" dish can be very elaborate . "Canaille" means saucy, naughty, improper but good, or rather all the better from being improper. "La canaille" originally means the underworld, the lower classes as referred to, in a contemptuous way, by the upper. The culinary use of the term refers to offal-centered, high-in-flavor, plebeian dishes like tripe, andouillette, kidneys, a substantial part of the bistrot répertoire. Lyonnais specialties served in bouchons are often described as "canaille". Veal kidneys in mustard sauce, tripe with onions, boudin noir with apples, ox tongue with sauce piquante, tête de veau are perfect plats canailles. I do think it has to involve organ meat, since a coq au vin could not be described as "canaille".

Merry Christmas, Dave. But how do you deconstruct a turkey?

Pretty much right, yes. The shopping and sightseeing tips are OK. Le Louvre, Carrousel du Louvre, designer clothes in Le Marais, les Puces, can't get more basic than that. Not taking any risks but that's precisely what that kind of article is about. Restaurant choice is not so great though. (I don't know the couscous place either so can't say anything about it.) But for various reasons I don't think it's wise to recommend Le Comptoir anymore, especially in a media with such a large audience. I'm surprised also that they recommend cimetière de Montparnasse for a time range of 48 hours. If visiting cemeteries is an option, rather head to Père-Lachaise as a first choice.

The problem is that Le Comptoir is not (no longer?) worth all the fuss. I think Grace3 is right in preferring the many less pretentious and better places Paris still has to offer. This is the last meal I was served there.

Labeyrie may be found at every good chain supermarket like Monoprix (but not Franprix). The brand also has a shop on rue Montmartre, near Les Halles. The foie gras I like is the bloc de foie gras de canard avec morceaux, wrapped in black foil. Only a bloc, but great taste and texture. Don't look for it in fancy places, this morning I tried to find some at Lafayette Gourmet and they didn't have any. Instead they had lots of "Les Maîtres Occitans" foie gras, plain and peppered, more expensive than Labeyrie. I tried some, it's ok, but not as good as the cheaper one I was looking for. I suppose Labeyrie uses a good marinade and good cooking methods.

I've made some foodies cringe by saying this, but for years I've hardly bought any other duck foie gras than Labeyrie. Normal quality, not even "grand", and not even the whole foie gras: the "bloc", wrapped in aluminum foil. I've tried others, but I always go back to this one. I think it is the best.

In France there's "escalope cordon-bleu", or the abbreviated version "cordon-bleu" and it's just that — a thin veal (or turkey) steak folded over ham and cheese, then breaded and fried. It's been here for ages, a frequent occurrence at school lunches, office cantines, streetcorner bistrots. You may also buy it at the supermarket.

About street markets, as a general rule: if their fixed days are Sunday, Monday, etc., they will still be held on said days, no matter if it is a holiday or not. However, street markets seldom take place on Mondays.

I wouldn't hesitate to buy wines in supermarkets like Auchan and of course there's nothing wrong with a low price. Those companies (with their buying power, as Dave says rightly) know where to get their margins from and if they decide to sell their Fitou with hardly any profit, well so much the better, and they'll compensate with something else. Price means nothing, the label says it all. If it is dirt cheap but a genuine Fitou, with the AOC, well that's just what it seems: good Fitou at a low price. No further complications. Supermarkets generally take low margins on wines, the storing conditions are not always perfect but the turnover is fast, a condition that is made easier by the low margins... But the more interesting points are that these companies generally are counselled by very good sommeliers and wine experts. You can have genuine bargains and sometimes real good bottles. Look for the foires aux vins, particularly. I'd avoid Carrefour, but feel free to browse through Auchan, Champion, Leclerc. In the Paris region, I particularly like Champion and Monoprix. Franprix — which is pretty low-quality for many other things — does have a "tradition" of interesting wines; it does sometimes carry château-crémade, the only available palette apart from the famous château-simone. Just make sure you don't buy any baguette, there, but French supermarkets are interesting to shop at, especially in the provinces, where Champion is famous for the quality of the local food distribution. In Brittany, for instance, it carries butter that makes Bordier taste boring.

- Is œufs à la neige a traditional Christmas or holiday dish: no. - Might it be served at Christmas: yes, as part of the Christmas dinner, but there still should be a more christmassy pastry on the side. Œufs à la neige are not associated with any holiday.

I didn't mention the galette des Rois because I thought it was about Christmas pastries only. If you wish to include New Year pastries there is also a little-known specialty of Rouen called aguignettes: heavily buttered puff-pastry cakes (on a galette des rois basis, without the filling) shaped like animals (ducks, chickens, pigs, lions, etc.) and adorned with currant eyes. They're easy, about 12-15 cm long, just cut the pastry, glaze it, add the currant, bake until puffed. Delicious.

Apart from the bûche de Noël, which is a recent creation, there are a few traditional Christmas pastries in France, all revolving around the theme of a crown-shaped brioche including candied fruit. One of the best being the fouace de Noël, a Southern version with orange flower water. The pastry is glazed and sprinkled with coarse-grain sugar (sucre casson). It is often decorated with glacé cherries and angelica. In Provence, it is traditional to serve thirteen desserts for Christmas eve. They are : pompe à l'huile (a brioche made with olive oil), raisins, figs, dried plums from Brignoles, apples and pears, candied citron, jams, quince cheese, nougat (black and white), fresh cheese, small brioches (fougasses), fried bugnes, cumin and fennel seed cookies.

Hi, I'll help a bit with the translation of a few terms. Beurré-hardy pears = I'm not sure this translates as butterbur pears but I wish it did. Praires {Ok: trans: dog cockles, feel better?} = the late Alan Davidson refers to this as warty venus (not sure that helps much more). Merlan = whiting. Daurade = two different kinds of sea bream, either the gilt-headed bream (dorade or daurade royale) — hint: if it's below 800 grams, it's most probably farmed — and daurade grise or daurade rose, both being types of porgies (sometimes called pageot). Those two, not being expensive fish, are not farmed. Mâche = lamb's lettuce. Physalis {yah, I looked it up, didn’t help} = or coqueret du Pérou, amour-en-cage: this is the tomatillo in a miniature orange form (husk tomato, cape gooseberry), Physalis alkekengi.

I think I'll try the place, just for the utter silliness of the dish names. "Bugs and Bunny terrine de lapin", wow! And "Le Pèlerin de Compostelle" for 5 small skewered scallops, surely there is some creativity at work there (the 35 euro part is very creative too in a not-so-funny sort of way though).

Dear John, that was not me eating at Chez Jean. As for the Gérard Depardieu restaurants, A la Fontaine Gaillon is fine. Nothing extraordinary, but very decent food and nice setting. I think Depardieu has been doing better with his restaurants than with his wines.

About Spring, you'll find a few pictures here.

(5) a transition for some white wine drinkers to white. I remember one year it was banana and bubble-gum. At least it was fun. (Okay, I'll taste it this year too.)

Hello Nuppe. In France surimi is mostly for home consumption, and you'll see a lot of it in supermarkets. You're unlikely to find it in restaurants but I think it is not absent from places like cafeterias, school or corporate cantines, any sort of collective catering.

Airelles = a family of small shrubs (Vaccinium) including the blueberry or bilberry (myrtille), the "airelle rouge" (Vaccinium vitis-idaea) and the cranberry Vaccinium oxycoccos. They are all related. But the cranberry is not the same berry as the red airelle, which is smaller. The French for cranberry is canneberge. The English for the airelle rouge, I have not found.

Indeed. "White fuzzy" was my own addition.

Oh I should have added that "hase" is a female hare and "levraut" a young hare. And "laie" is the marcassin's mom. "Lagopède" is actually the white fuzzy alpine ptarmigan. It thrives in the Alpes and in the Pyrénées too. I think this is the one that's called "poule de neige".

This too is spot on. Very sound advice.

Come to think of it, I remember a very nice cassoulet I had long ago in Castelnaudary. The restaurant was in a hotel, on the main square. L'hôtel de la Poste et de Notre-Dame or something like that. Who knows, might still be there. That kind of place usually stays where it is. The sausages were home-made especially for this cassoulet, and they were very tender from lengthy cooking and melting and all speckled black from plenty of black pepper. More recently, I was visiting Carcassonne with friends in August, and though they decided to dine in La Cité (which I wouldn't have chosen to do), we did very well. I don't remember the name of the restaurant but it looked like the perfect place to avoid — the sign outside being an iron coat of arms painted with gothic letters, and the inside being complete with Robin-Hood-movie-style dark red curtains and exposed beams. However the cassoulet was delicious, well reduced and refined, with a delicate sauce. It even had some partridge confit, as there should be in Carcassonne cassoulet. See, you never know.