Monthly Archives: September 2011

Seafood, Wine

Zee best in zee world

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Oyster stall at CancalEarlier this year we spent a few days in Brittany with our two French grandchildren. During the trip, we visited Cancale, which lies along the coast to the east of Saint-Malo. It is a picturesque fishing village popular with visitors, many of whom are drawn by its reputation as the “oyster capital” of Brittany. On the sea front there are many stalls selling crustaceans of all types – all fresh out of the sea. I’ve never seen so many oysters of so many different shapes, colours and sizes.

While we were there, we went into a shop owned by one of life’s “characters”! Everything we looked at was ‘the best in the world’… “Ah, zat box of snail shells, ‘ee iz zee best in zee world!” (Actually the guy was speaking French, but I’m sure you get the gist!!)

Well, it seems to have worked because we walked out clutching a bag of ‘goodies’ and were about 100 euros lighter in our pockets! However, one of the things we came away with was a small packet of Court Bouillon Marin (marine fish stock – and that’s a very loose translation!). I used it once and it was truly excellent, it really does add all the flavours of the sea to the fish. According to the packet, all it contains is sea salt, seaweed and herbs, but I can promise you, it really is “zee best in zee world”.

If your French is good enough, you can order this Court Bouillon Marin from the family that makes it… http://www.lehomedys.com/saveur.php. It’s perfect for (as the name implies) a court bouillon, but also for mussels, fish soup, or any sort of fish or crustacean.

SamphireSo, tonight, we’re going to be eating halibut, cooked in Court Bouillon Marin, and I’m really looking forward to it. However, we also bought some samphire (one of the salicornia species, also known as glasswort or pickleweed). If you’re not familiar with samphire, it is a succulent, salt tolerant plant that grows in salt marshes, on beaches, and among mangroves. Salicornia species can generally tolerate immersion in salt water and it is highly edible, either cooked or raw. Due to its high salt content, it must be cooked without any salt added, in plenty of water. It has a hard stringy core, and after cooking, the edible flesh is pulled off from the core. This flesh, after cooking, resembles seaweed in color, and the flavor and texture are like young spinach stems or asparagus… truly worth looking forward to with a nice crisp Chablis!

Cheese, Duck, Quail, Wine

La Petite Rôtisserie

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So – was it Salade des Gourmets or not???

Well, believe it or not, I was able to resist and, for a starter, I went for the Salade de Caille et Magret de Canard (Salad of Quail and Lean Duck Breast). Deeee-licious! Now I have two favourites to choose from! What’s a man to do, I ask?

La Petite Rôtisserie is living up to its reputation. The food, the service and the wines were just perfect. Starting with a little apperitif (M-D takes an Americano and I take a Cocktail Maison), diners are given plenty of time to study the menu and the wine list before having to choose. As a main course, M-D took Rognons de Veau (Veal Kidneys) which were cooked to perfection. I took a fillet steak, rare, with a sauce of Bleu d’Auvergne (a blue cheese from the Auvergne region of France). These were accompanied simply by a few sautéed potatoes and mushrooms… very simple but very effective.

We followed up with cheese from the amazing selection that they keep here. I took some Pont-l’Évêque, some Chaource and some Bleu d’Auvergne (yeah, I know, I’d already had that with my steak!). Nadine (the restaurant owner) keeps her cheese in perfect condition and the Chaource just melted on my plate (as, indeed, it should!).

Dessert (which follows the cheese in France) was, for me, an aumônière which, literally translated means a purse or sack. In fact, it’s ice cream wrapped in a crèpe (thin pancake) and tied with a strip of orange peel, the whole thing sitting on a bed of thick chocolate sauce, sprinkled with crushed almonds. Ooooo – I can still taste it!

And all of this was washed down with a 2001 St Julien. The wines of St Julien are the epitome of Bordeaux. Sandwiched as it is between Pauillac to the north, and Margaux to the south, this small commune still makes a huge contribution to the wines of Bordeaux, with a distinctive and elegant style and the promise of consistency which is perhaps unrivalled by its neighbours.

Well – we enjoyed it anyway!!

Duck, Salads

Confit for all

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I just finished posting Confit de Canard (Duck Confit) to the site and it reminds me how lucky we are to spend six months of the year in France. You see, we can get tins of confit from the local shops without having to go through the arduous process of making it. In fact, it’s so common that you can get it in most restaurants without paying the earth. Mind you, the prices can vary quite a lot because there’s quite a difference between the mass-produced commercial production and the more intimate ‘artisan’ producers. For that reason, we buy ours by mail order from Godard in Gourdon in the south-west of the country… and it is quite delicious.

Whenever we travel back to the Isle of Man by car (usually once a year) we always take back a supply of stuff (like confit) that we can’t get in Britain. We also have a habit of weighing the car down with wine, since it is so much cheaper (and better selection) in France. We will be going to the local wine fayre in a couple of weeks. That’s always good fun… it’s an evening of tasting of up to about 100 different wines, and the sellers are all determined that you should taste their wine, so there’s no ducking out after 10 or so! Must remember to book the taxi!

And talking of wine, M-D and I were just deciding what to pull out of the cellar for her daughter’s 40th birthday (coming soon). I noticed we had several bottles of Cote de Beaune Villages 1971, Chateau La Fleur 1975, and an absolutely stunning deep red wine called Chateau de Cayrou (1989 and 1990).

Maybe it’s time to pull out the Cote de Beaune Villages 1971 … same year as my daughter-in-law! It should be ready for drinking any time soon!

Anyway, it’s La Petite Rôtisserie tomorrow night. Let’s see if I can resist the temptation to take Salade Gourmet as a starter. There are so many good things on the menu, it seems a shame not to work my way through the whole list!

Chicken, Salads, Salmon, Vegetables

The End of Summer

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While the UK (and the poor old Isle of Man) is suffering from 80mph (130kph) winds and floods, here in France, the weather is a very pleasant 27C with just a gentle cooling breeze to take the edge off the heat. But even so, I sense that the summer is coming to an end. The birds are circling and the fields are being harvested (us country folk know about things like that!)

Caesar SaladMeanwhile we’re making the best of what good weather we still have. We’re eating salads like Caesar Salad or Salade Niçoise at lunch time and simple fayre in the evenings like Chicken and Ham Soup or Leek and Smoked Salmon Rolls

Often the simplest of meals are the most satisfying. M-D and I have just had a salad that was nothing more than a cooked chicken breast and Marinated Carrot Salad.Simple, yet tasty and filling (and very few of those nasty calories!). I just finished adding a recipe to the site for Roast Belly Pork Dinner. Now that’s serious comfort food! But maybe I can wait till those dark winter evenings!

M-D is busy planning for our return to the Isle of Man in about 3 weeks. She’s digging out all sorts of stuff that we have duplicated here in France (like a wok, for example) and creating a “heap” for us to take with us. We’ll be going by car this time, so we can carry lots of stuff (including the obligatory cases of wine!).

Until August we lived in a small apartment when we were on the Isle of Man. However, we decided that we needed somewhere bigger since our families are always made welcome. Within six weeks we had found the right house, bought it, moved in and rented out the apartment! But it took a bit of a toll on us physically and mentally so we came back to France for a rest.

Now it’s time to go back and sort out everything we didn’t manage to get done before – like a couple of extensions to the phone line and a desk each and…. a wok, it seems!

Japanese Cuisine, Seafood

The Japanese Connection

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Well, last night didn’t quite end up the way we planned it. Originally we were going to go to our favourite local haunt, La Petite Rôtisserie (65, chemin de Halage, 95610 Eragny). However, M-D has been suffering from a bad back all week (probably a reaction to moving house a couple of weeks ago) and she didn’t feel like making a big effort to get ready and drive a few miles up the road. So we ended up walking 100m to the local Happy Sushi, where she got stuck into a dish of sashimi and I took half a dozen seafood kebabs. Along with the miso soup, cabbage salad and rice that come as part of the meal, we had a good feed, and all for 38 euros ($53 – £33) and that included a drink while we waited to be served and a pitcher of the house rosé with the meal.

SashimiWe keep hearing of the so-called dangers of eating raw meat and fish, but neither of us has ever suffered any adverse reaction from either. M-D regularly eats sashimi and she also eats carpaccio on a regular basis, and about once a fortnight she will eat a raw steak (no – not blue – raw!). The last time I looked, she still had one head, two arms and two legs.

I firmly hold the view that, as long as you use saltwater fish, you’ll have no problems eating it raw. Freshwater fish may contain parasites that are killed by cooking. Saltwater fish do not contain these parasites. And, as far as mercury levels go, you’re at a lot more risk from filled teeth than from raw fish. On the other hand, if you are eating raw (like M-D’s sashimi) it pays to get the freshest fish available, from a fish market on the wharf, not from a supermarket.

As far as raw meat is concerned, buy only good quality and the risks are pretty minimal. Of course, one way to eat raw meat is to eat horse meat! No, I’m not kidding; remember, for the majority of mankind’s early existence, wild horses were hunted as a source of protein.It is slightly sweet, super-tender, low in fat and high in protein. So get over the taboo and, next time you have a chance to try it, see what you think.

Anyway, we plan going to La Petite Rôtisserie next weekend instead – presuming I can wait that long! I don’t know whether to order the raw horse or raw squid! … Just kidding!!

Salads, Seafood, Soup

Salad Days

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I got thinking about seafood today. That’s my problem … I see food and I eat it! And I reminded myself of an outstanding starter I did a while back. You can read all about it at Prawn Perfection. The problem is that I wanted to do it for my brother and my sister-in-law when we go back to the Isle of Man (they’re great at looking after the house for us, and a meal together to say ‘thank you’ is the least we can do).

Salade GourmandeSadly, I remembered that Jeanette is allergic to prawns (last time she ate them, apparently she glowed like a traffic light for days after) so I have to come up with something a bit different. And then I remembered Salade des Gourmets which is seriously one of the best starters of all time. In fact, we’re going to our favourite restaurant tomorrow evening (La Petite Rôtisserie – 65, chemin de Halage, 95610 Eragny, France) and without doubt I’ll be tempted…

Life in France ticks along as usual. It’s no more exotic than anywhere else, but I do confess to enjoying the food culture. Mind you, it doesn’t always work that way. Last weekend, M-D and I went into Paris to meet up with a couple of her cousins and their partners. We arranged to meet at a restaurant called “Le Dalou” in Place de la Nation and have lunch there. This turned out to be less than average. Those of us who had steaks found them overcooked (not normally a fault in France) and my French Onion Soup was luke warm and tasteless. Probably we could have lived with that if the bill hadn’t arrived totalling 350 euros – that’s 50 euros each ($70 or £45). We left declaring “never again” for that particular establishment.

Hopefully tomorrow night will be different. I’ll keep you informed!