carol's kitchen

Friday, October 27, 2006

dante al dente

I’ve been wandering around the exquisite countryside of Provence, driving down sun-dappled, tree-lined roads, eating fabulous one-star lunches, visiting Roman ruins, staring at old stones, admiring French fashions (especially shoes) in shop windows of beautiful little towns, sipping coffee on sunny patios, & shopping for food in the market in Uzes on Wednesdays.

If I ever move to Provence I want to live in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence.

I’ve been reading Dante’s Inferno, one of the heavy books I brought on this journey, and it didn’t surprise me when I learned that Dante passed through this region & visited Les Baux-de-Provence & the Val d’Enfer, just as I did a couple of days ago. The turbulent, dramatic landscape of this place surely inspired his descriptions of hell – except that this place is magnificent & there were no punishing fires or rivers of burning pitch. It was all astonishing visual pleasure.

At the Château of Les Baux I purchased a cookbook by the world-class chef of the Oustau de Baumanière, one of France’s great hotel & restaurant that I visited many years ago & where I wanted to return to eat lunch -- until I discovered the price -- 175 Euros!!

Nostalgia ain’t what it used to be.

I was intrigued by this cookbook for many reasons: it is beautifully illustrated, it mentions Dante’s visit to the Val d’Enfer, and because all the recipes are about vegetables. In his introduction the chef, Jean-André Charial, says that on a trip to India, which he loved, he discovered the pleasure of vegetarian cuisine & that one can be satisfied with a meal without meat or fish. He added a menu to the Oustau’s “carte,” with vegetables we gather & cook on the very same day.”

I read the book as soon as I got back & can’t wait to try some of the recipes, in spite of all the cream & butter & truffles he likes to use. But there were mistakes: ie. he says “now add the potato,” when there is no potato in the list of ingredients; and I’m not familiar with xerxes vinager, & what exactly is star anise? He likes to use its fruit & seeds. So I called the Oustau & told them I had some questions for the chef. I was told M. Charial would certainly speak to me next Monday when he returns from a trip to Paris & that I should call around 9:30 in the morning.

I can’t wait to speak to the great man. I’ll tell him I ate the greatest peach of my life at the Oustau de Baumanière 35 years ago, and will relate the story about how, in one thousand nine hundred and eighty-fourteen, I challenged five of the great three-star Michelin chefs to prepare a meal for me with no meat or fish (or dairy!), and how gladly they accepted & brilliantly achieved the task. I have a fantasy about this phone call & all that will come of it: Falling in love! Writing a book together! France! India! Vegetables! Free lunch!!!

I can dream, can’t I?

too good

WRITTEN ON OCTOBER 12th.

I discovered yesterday that I can’t zipper up my jeans. I’ve got to stop eating the delicious bread & pastry I find in the boulangeries-patisseries everywhere I go. Think of buttery light croissants & brioches, long crusty white loaves, rich dense whole-grain loaves, flaky, light-as-air tarts: smothered with onions & anchovies, filled with golden custard & ham, glazed apples, berries, nuts… Nowhere in the world do they make such great baked goods. How can I resist? And on top of that I can’t turn away from the wonderful produce, vegetables & fruits & fresh fish that appear before my eyes in the markets & shops. And the cheese! The butter! Those freshly laid eggs given to me not once but twice. My cooking has been truly inspired; my meals are feasts – with a good glass of red.

Friday, October 06, 2006

green eggs and....

I went to the Wednesday farmers market in Uzés; not as big as the one on Saturday, but for my needs it was fine & I didn’t have to deal with crowds & parking problems. I wanted only some fruits & vegetables &, after picking a few branches of rosemary in the garden this morning, had a little lamb chop on my mind as well.

In the center of town I found a parking spot where one had to pay. I asked a fellow how to go about it & by his answer I knew he spoke English. So we continued in English & he explained that as it was already 11 o’clock I need only pay for one hour (1 Euro), until noon, because the police didn’t give out tickets between 12 & 2, the lunch hour. How civilized! Imagine such a thing in West Hollywood. He also complemented my French, asked where I was from, & said my French was so good he never would have taken me for an American. Made my day.

Down the Avenue de la Liberation, just one block away, I found the archway that led into the market, a sunny circular square called the Place aux Herbes, filled with large plane trees & surrounded by antique arcades. I wandered around admiring the fresh produce & other goods offered by the farmers & merchants: olives, wine, oil, cheese, fresh fish… I would look at everything first, then decide what to buy. I had made up my mind not to buy too much, only what I needed.

I watched one of the fish mongers whack live trout on the head with a wooden mallet, lay them down on his board & slice off their filets. I looked closely to see if the flesh still trembled. It reminded me of a story by MFK Fisher who described a great meal in a restaurant in Provence where the fish was cooked immediately after the same kind of treatment. Maybe hers weren’t even knocked out first. I think, if I remember well, they were filleted alive, immediately fried in butter & served. What some people won’t do for a piece of fresh fish!

I noticed a long line waiting at one of the stands near the center of the market place. I walked over to see what it was they sold. Meat! Pork, in fact, & pork products; all kinds of sausages, blood sausage, spicy sausage, terrines, patés, head cheese, fresh bacon, or what was labeled, “poitrine,” and hams. I stood nearby & watched to see what people were buying, & nearly everyone bought the raw ham which was sliced, not too thin, by hand. (Forget prosciutto; this was something altogether different.) I asked one of the women on the line if one ate that ham raw or did they have to cook it somehow. Raw, I was told, just like it is. So I got on the line & patiently awaited my turn. While the lady sliced my one not-too-thin slice of raw ham I noticed a huge chunk of cooked ham that looked pretty great to me. So I asked for some of that too & stopped her after 3 slices, also done by hand. While paying for my purchases I asked her if it was true that one eats the raw ham raw. Oh yes, she said, eat it raw; it’s very good. She nodded & smiled as she handed me my change.

I could wait for the raw ham until I got home but the cooked ham I had to taste immediately; I knew there was something special about it. I sat myself down at a table in a sunny spot at one of the cafés in the square & while I waited for my cappuccino I pulled out the package of cooked ham, pulled off a corner & tasted it right there and then. Damn, it was good; shockingly good, better than I could have imagined; the best ham I ever tasted. How could God have told the Jewish people not to eat something so delicious? At first I thought I’d just take a taste but before the coffee arrived I had devoured the whole slice.

I would have eaten more but just them the waitress showed up & I hid my secret from her. What would she think? My eyes popped when she set my cappuccino in front of me, a large cup piled high with whipped cream. What’s this? I asked. Cappuccino, she said, what you asked for, & she turned away to serve the white-haired lady at the next table a vodka with tomato juice.

I picked up my spoon & dipped it in. Ahhhh… How marvelous it is to eat French whipped cream – just a tiny bit sour, like the crème fraiche, thick & light at the same time, naturally sweet without sugar, &, how can I say it? Voluptuous…creamy! I ate it all telling myself, okay this is brunch: ham, whipped cream, a dry ginger cookie which was served on the saucer with a wrapped cube of sugar (which I don’t use), excellent coffee & voila! I looked across the square at the restaurant, recommended by friends, where I planned to eat lunch after my shopping, sighed & shrugged.

Only Victor will criticize me; he says goodies are baddies. But I’d never tasted such delicious ham in my life, & let me tell you I’ve eaten my share. The meat was boiled, perfectly pink, dense & unctuous with absolutely no fat except at the borders, moist, tender (think of the texture of boiled cold tongue), & so tasty I could make a meal of it, which I will do tonight, together with the lovely red heirloom tomatoes I found at another stand, & a piece of the ugliest, smelliest, most wonderful aged sheep’s milk cheese whose name I’ve forgotten, purchased, after tasting, from a cheese merchant who made up a poem for each of his customers, & a hunk of the black rye bread-roll with bits of walnuts I found at the bakery under the arcades. And a good glass of red. Pourquoi pas?

I remembered my old friend Sammy Dietsch, restauranteur extraordinaire from San Francisco, who was planning to put together a cook book entitled, Jews On Pork. What a great idea. Too bad he didn’t live long enough to do it. I’ll never forget Sammy’s great pork roasts with all the trimmings that he used to prepare for Thanksgiving.

Later, after lunch, in the impressive boutique of the restaurant, I bought a bottle of fruity olive oil from the region, & another bottle of unbelievably marvelous syrup of violette to add to the water I drink when I swallow my anti-cholesterol omega-3 gel capsules & all the rest…

Say what you will about the French; I say this: they know what good food & wine is; how to prepare it, eat it, drink it, & enjoy it, & there’s nothing wrong with that.