French Provincial Cooking - Elizabeth David [24]
And if after these descriptions anyone still thinks that a visit to Alsace would entail the consumption of quantities of the national and somewhat formidable choucroute garnie, or the noodles and pastes and cakes and breads and kugelhopf for which Alsatian cooks are famous, I can only say that there is no necessity, so long as you don’t eat at the brasseries, ever to worry about these things, although it would be a pity not to try them once at least.
Brittany and the Loire
Following the Loire from the port of Nantes in Brittany down through Anjou and Touraine to the Orléanais, the traveller in search of good food will find some of the most lovely and typical dishes in all French provincial cookery. Not extraordinary or spectacular dishes, perhaps, but, based as they are on raw materials of very fine quality and cooked in quite simple traditional ways, they make a strong appeal to English tastes. For not even the most bigoted of Englishmen could level the time-honoured taunts of ‘messed-up food’ or ‘poor materials disguised with rich sauces’ at the beautiful fish, the sole and mackerel and sardines, the mullet and the bass, the lobsters, scallops, clams, oysters, mussels and prawns of the Breton coast, at the lamb reared in the salt marshes, at the Nantais ducklings served with the tiny green peas or the baby turnips of the district. From Le Mans and La Flêche come chickens which rival those of Bresse, from the Prévalaye butter which has been famous at least since Madame de Sévigné’s day, from Angers and Saumur the delicious fresh cream cheeses called crémets which are eaten with sugar and fresh cream, from Touraine the rillettes de porc which figure in every local hors-d’œuvre, and which you can see piled up in gigantic earthenware bowls and jars in all the market places and in the charcuteries.
At restaurants in Nantes, Tours, Angers, Vouvray, Langeais, Amboise and many other places along the banks of the Loire is to be found the unique speciality of this country, the famous beurre blanc which, starting off as a sauce to counteract the dryness of freshwater fish such as pike and shad, has become so popular that any excuse to eat it is good enough. Made solely from a reduction of shallots, which are to Angevin cooking what garlic is to Provence, and wine vinegar whisked up with the finest butter, the beurre blanc is Anjou’s great contribution (although the Nantais also claim it as their own) to the regional cookery of France.
From Touraine comes another interesting recipe, a dish of pork garnished with the enormous, rich, juicy prunes which are a speciality of the Tours district.
This remarkable dish is to be found on the menus of at least two restaurants in Tours, and the recipe, given to me by one of them, is on page 362.
In Tours also, as well as in many Breton restaurants, are to be found palourdes farcies which are clams served in the shell with a lovely gratiné stuffing; then there are various versions of chicken cooked with tarragon, and a dodine de canard which is not the stewed duck in red wine usually associated with this name, but a very rich cold duck galantine served as a first course. Here, too, I remember wonderful wine-dark matelotes of eel, and a very excellent dish of alose à l’oseille, shad grilled and served with a sorrel sauce. It