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A culinary mystery by Alexander Campion.
 
The Grave Gourmet is a first time mystery novel written by Alexander Campion. His heroine, Capucine Le Tellier, a young and beautiful French detective, takes us on a thrilling journey as she attempts to unravel how the body of a top automobile industry executive has ended up in the refrigerator of one of Paris’ most celebrated restaurants.
Along the way we are treated to a wonderful blend of hip police humor, gorgeous three star restaurant menus, and just a touch of smoldering Parisian sexiness. Campion’s ability to capture the French attitude towards food, morality and crime makes this not only an enjoyable read, but an informative one as well. It had me turning the pages, hungry for more and learning as I went.
Campion, who spent most of his professional life in the business world, lived in Paris for 35 years and has obviously absorbed a lot of Gallic culture along the way. His stint as a restaurant critic assures us some mouth watering descriptions of elegant French gastronomic fare. His knowledge of the French police and judiciary system shine through as well. Descriptions of a few police interrogations are downright frightening and should be enough to convince anyone planning a visit to France to keep their nose out of trouble.
Blending perfectly with the slightly violent atmosphere of French police work, is Campion’s description of many French “delicacies” – at times less delicate than we may imagine. I particularly enjoyed his discussion of ortolan. These are small song birds that are traditionally captured, fattened and then filled with armagnac before cooking in their own juice. The truly astounding and somewhat horrific practice of chomping these little critters down entière (blood, bones, bowels, and all) while hiding under your napkin is French food extremism at its finest.
Along with a brief biography and a few reviews for The Grave Gourmet, a visit to Campion’s website, reveals a number of tempting recipes. I could not agree more with his cooking philosophy as revealed in the following quote:
“The idea is that it all adds up. You can cheat one ingredient, but if you cheat on them all, your cooking with have a nasty institutional taste to it.”
The Grave Gourmet has all the ingredients to add up to an entertaining and informative read. Anyone interested in French culture will be amply served, and can expect a fine meal and twisted mystery along the way. And best of all, Campion promises more Capucine mysteries in the near future.
To learn more about how to order The Grave Gourmet visit Kensington Publishers.
When I saw this easy tarte flambee recipe on The Quince Tree, I knew I’d be trying it soon.
Lunches can be a challenge, even here in the glorious food-loving Hexagon. I am usually pressed for time and never sure who is going to show up or when. The hardest part though is coming up with new menu ideas. (I love leftovers, but don’t always have them.)
This tarte flambee recipe is a great response to the challenge. Quickly fixed, it can be re-warmed for latecomers, and the ingredients are all things I am likely to have in the fridge. And fortunately, yahoo, it also tastes good!
Tarte flambée, also known as flammekueche, is a speciality of the Alsace region (and beyond) that is normally cooked on a thin crust, similar to pizza dough. The tart is often served in long slender slices that are rolled up to eat and enjoy. This is one of the rare times you are likely to see a French person eat with their hands. Like much of the food in the Alsace region, it is a rich affair, featuring lots of cream, bacon and oftentimes cheese.
Here the crust is replaced by a horizontally sliced baguette, putting the recipe squarely in the easy and quick category. This recipe is still very rich, so try serving this with a simple tossed salad to balance out the meal. An Alsacien would probably recommend a pint of beer as well.
And be sure to drop by The Quince Tree. Fellow blogger Sue, who lives in England with her family, serves up a charming mix of recipes, home crafts, and nature. Thanks Sue for making lunchtime a little easier chez nous!
Tarte Flambée Express
- 1 baguette, sliced in two horizonatally
- 1 tablespoon butter
- 7 ounces lardons (or lean bacon, cut in small strips)
- 1 onion, peeled and chopped
- 1/2 cup crème fraiche (I didn’t have any so I used heavy cream and that worked fine)
- 1 cup shredded cheese (Gruyère or similar)
- Melt the butter in a medium skillet on medium heat. Add the lardons and the chopped onion and cook until the bacon is cooked through and the onion soft (about 10 minutes).
- Spread the crème fraiche on the cut side of the baguette. Spread the bacon and onion mixture even on top. Top with the shredded cheese.
- Place under the grill for about 2 minutes or until the cheese has melted and the bread is warmed through. Serve immediately.
The inspiration for this bacon and beet salad comes from Larousse de la Cuisine. They refer to it as salade vigneronne, which is a bit puzzling.
Lots of French recipes call themselves salade vigneronne (or sauce vigneronne, or poulet vingneronne, or whatever vingenronne). Vigneronne is the the French word for vintner, so you’d expect to
find some wine, or at least some grapes in these recipes. However, the only trace of wine in this salad comes from the vinegar.
Notes on Ingredients
 Mâche
 Lardons
Mâche – You may know this as lamb’s lettuce. Lamb’s lettuce seems to be a good name, because this is a very docile green. Great for kids who sometimes balk at the stronger flavors adults might like in their salad.
Beets – Here in France you’ll find cooked beets sold in vacuum packs. This is a great convenience and the taste is fine in a salad like this. For this recipe, you could substitute fresh cooked beets or even canned beets.
Lardons - I love these convenient little bits of French bacon. You can substitute another sort of bacon if you wish, just cut it into small pieces.
Walnut Oil – I used a pure walnut oil for this – which means it’s a mix of virgin and refined oils. This makes it ok for gentle heating – all virgin walnut oil is not recommended for this.
Bacon and Beet Salad
Salade vigneronne
Prep time: 10 min -
Cook time: 10 min
- 6 cups mache – about 4 ounces
- 1 large beet – about 8 ounces
- 6 ounces lardons (or other bacon)
- 2 tablespoons walnut oil
- Freshly ground pepper
- 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
- Wash and spin dry the mache if it needs cleaning. Slice the beet in thin strips. Place the salad greens and sliced beets in a salad bowl.
- Warm two tablespoons walnut oil in a pan and add the lardons. Cook them just until they are done – do not turn them into crispy fellows. Pour the bacon with the oil on top of the rest of the salad and grind some pepper on top.
- Return the pan to the heat and add 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar. Stirring continuously, heat the vinegar for one minute, then pour it on top of the salad. Toss the salad to mix and serve immediately.
Makes 4 servings.
Review
This salad was pretty good and the kids thought it was fine. I’ll be redoing it soon and whipping it into something more interesting with some more lively greens, red onions, grilled walnuts, and cubed comté cheese.
Did you know mushrooms are sweaty fellows? If you store them in a plastic bag, they’ll get slippery and slimy in no time. Try a paper bag or a tray.
The common, cultivated mushroom (Agaricus bisporus) is known in France as a champignon de Paris. French agricultural history notes the appearance of this basic white mushroom at Versailles during the reign of Louis XIV (1638-1715). Mushrooms were subsequently cultivated in the catacombs of Paris, until the construction of the Metro pushed this activity out of the city.
It was also in Paris at the Pasteur Institute in the late 19th century, that sterilized mushroom spawn was first produced, marking a great advance in the commercial cultivation of mushrooms. So their name in French highlights this breakthrough as well.
However, these days, the area of Anjou in the west of France, is the country’s largest producer and you’ll have to look hard if you want to find a mushroom growing in Paris.
Here’s a tasty little recipe for stuffed mushrooms that you can make with champignons de Paris or whatever sort of mushroom you might feel like stuffing.
 This over-sized French cookie, called a cornuelle, is traditionally made and eaten several weeks before and after Palm Sunday in south-west France. In times of yore, they were sold in front of the church, and worshippers would place a blessed palm branch in the hole in the center of the cookie. These days you’ll need to go to a boulangerie to find one.
The exact origin and symbolism of the cornuelle is up for debate. The religious angle is that the three points on the triangle represent the Holy Trinity. The secular version sees a symbol of female fecundity in the shape. It seems quite logical that the Church adopted what was probably a pagan tradition and molded it into something new. Personally, I think it bears a resemblance to the Eiffel Tower.
The cookie itself is rather plain, making it acceptable eating for those who are observing the austerity of Lent. A short bread dough is shaped into a triangle with scalloped edges and a hole is cut from the center. Before baking, the cookie is washed in egg yolk, which will give it a shiny appearance when it is cooked. Just a wee bit of decoration is allowed to sneak in with some pink and white candied anise seeds.
My neighbor brought a stack of these treats back from a recent trip to Bordeaux. She recommended I try them with my morning coffee. They have a wonderful butter aroma and a not too sweet taste.
Need More Bling?
These days boulangeries are straying somewhat from tradition to attract a broader clientele for the cornuelle. The same shape might be made from puff pastry or choux pastry. It may then be filled with whipped cream or pastry cream and come in various flavors, in particular orange flower water. Some French towns also boast their own version, as well as claiming the original idea as their own.
Anyway you try it, a cornuelle is another fun French bite. You can learn more about French cookies here.
In France, a happy mistake in the kitchen often paves the road to culinary success. And at any rate a good story can keep us interested in a food long enough to give it a try.
These lovely little sticks, called Les Sarments du Medoc, are a good example. A sarment is a young shoot emerging from the grape vine. (The French have a vast vocabulary to describe grape vines – kind of like the Eskimos and snow.)
The story goes that sarments were created when a machine back-fired at the Mademoiselle de Margaux factory in Medoc, an area near Bordeaux, renowned for its rich red wines and of course, swimming in grape vines.
Mademoiselle’s machine was supposed to spit out straight bars of chocolate used to fill pains au chocolat, a popular French pastry. But back in the early 1980’s something went awry and instead of straight lines, the machine made squiggles. The squiggles reminded the chocolate makers of the sarments growing all around them and that was a definite light bulb moment for someone.
We recently tried some mint sarments, and they are indeed delicious. Not a huge mouthful — rather a lacy, delicate chocolate moment. One to be savored with a small charming story.
Alas, a more careful look at the box, tells me that my Sarments du Médoc were made in Rennes! That’s quite a bit further north, and although certainly a culinary adventure ground in its own right, not a land rich in grapevines. So it’s a small charming story with a grumble.
Silicone molds have caught on in a big way in France. I noticed the other day while shopping in Cultura, that alongside several aisles devoted to scrap booking, they now have a special section called scrap cooking. Dozens of pretty molds beckoned to me, each promising a beautiful cake with little effort.
You can easily find molds for traditional French cakes such as madeleines, canneles, and
charlottes. But the possiblities have grown well beyond traditional boundaries.
I have tested silicone molds both for madeleines and canneles and was very pleased with the results. The common wisdom is that although they may claim to be non-stick, a little greasing may be necessary, particularly for recipes with lower fat content. Since they frequently have complicated crevices and cracks (that’s what gives the beautiful end results), using a pastry brush dipped in oil or melted butter to carefully paint the mold’s interior is a good idea. However, you don’t want to over-grease because this may leave a sticky residue.
One problem with silicone molds is that they are floppy. Once you fill them with batter, moving them from counter to oven can be problematic. I recommend you place a grill underneath the mold before filling it, and then use the grill to move the mold in and out of the oven. Of course silicone bakeware manufacturers have come up with their own grills, which they cutely name sleds.
The silicone mold is amazingly heat resistance. It doesn’t seem possible, but they can be used in a very hot oven and they are also dishwasher safe. You can also use these molds to make molded cold desserts. Even (gasp!) Jello – but that’s a bit beyond the range of a French food website.
Look to see more and more silicone molds in the near future. Here are a few of the molds already available through Amazon.com that will help you to make a variety of French treats.
French blue cheese isn’t just Roquefort you know.
That’s what I had to tell my son the other day. He’s been so fixated on Roquefort for a while that he doesn’t enjoy any of the other great cheeses we have available.
So I decided to fight him on his on turf. A sort of war of the French blue cheeses.
In France, blue cheese is included as one of the eight families of cheese. It’s category is called les fromages à pâte persillées, which includes 6 cheeses that have an AOC (appelation d’origine controlée).
AOC Cheeses
In case you’re not familiar with it, the AOC is a system the French have developed to preserve a certain notion of terroir. When a cheese, or wine, or other food is marked with an AOC, you are guaranteed that the product was made only in a certain area and under strictly controlled circumstances. In general, products marked with an AOC are of a very high quality.
Having an AOC is a big deal for a French cheese, because out of the 500 (some say 1000) or so cheese varieties only 45 have an AOC. Since life is short and cheese is a vast subject in France, concentrating on the AOC cheeses is a good way to start a cheese education.
The French blue cheeses with an AOC are:
- Bleu d’Auvergne (from the Auvergne region)
- Bleu de Gex (Franche-Comté )
- Bleu des Causses (Midi-Pyrénées)
- Bleu du Vercors (Provence-Alpes-Côte, Rhône-Alpes)
- Fourme d’Ambert (Auvergne )
- Roquefort (Midi-Pyrénées)
Roquefort is a bit different because it is made from ewe’s milk, whereas the rest of these are cow’s milk cheeses. However, I have hope that I can expand my son’s horizons, because he also loves the Italian blue cheese, gorgonzola, which is typically made from cow’s milk.
The Cheese Tasting
So we begin testing. We started with a side by side comparison of fourme d’Ambert vs. Roquefort.
The Roquefort was as usual: sharp, tangy, crumbly and extremely flavorful. A real mouthful of cheese eating bliss.
The fourme was much milder, with a creamy, even sticky, texture. We were both surprised that a blue cheese could be so mild.
So what’s the verdict? Well, he prefers to stick with the Roquefort. However, he gave the fourme a better note for spreadability. The fact that the cheese sticks to the bread is apparently an important criteria to the 12 year old connoisseur.
We’ll be working our way through the rest of the French blue cheeses in the weeks to come.
Just a Taste is All it Takes
And just a thought to parents of picky eaters. Taste tests are lots of fun. It takes the pressure off of having to eat a whole plate of something, yet gives your kid a chance to try new flavors and textures. I truly believe that it is the exposure to new tastes and experiences that eventually leads to healthy eating habits.
Recently when a reader wrote to me with a question about les cuisses de nymphe aurore, I immediately suspected a joke from my husband’s corner. He occasionally sends me emails under various pseudonyms and nymph thighs at dawn would certainly be up his alley.
A little research though reveals that these thighs are not from the early morning imaginings of mon cheri, but an actual dish prepared over 100 years ago by the French culinary giant, Auguste Escoffier. Following in the footsteps of Antoine Carême, Escoffier was instrumental in the modernization of French cooking, and his influence continues to this day, although of course, reinterpreted by a century of creative chefs and avid eaters.
Not only was he a cooking genius, Escoffier had quite a knack for naming his dishes. He was the creator of the classic Pêche Melba and innumerable other recipes. Many times there is a fascinating bit of history behind these names, and I could imagine Escoffier’s encounter with some voluptuous beauty inspiring him to write of nymph thighs. Alas, the real story involves the supposed reticence of the Englishman to wander from tried and trued grub. Escoffier concocted a dish of frog legs served in champagne jelly, tinged with paprika, and decorated with herbs. He crowned it with the name Les cuisses de nymphes aurores, before serving it to the Prince of Wales. Legend has it that the Prince thoroughly enjoyed his dinner, but was dismayed to read in the newspaper the next day that he had dined on amphibian.
I would not qualify this dish as a French classic, for it is not oft-repeated, but it does have its place in culinary history. Supposedly after Escoffier prepared them, a new wave of frog leg eating took over France, and as we all know, the Frenchman’s reputation for eating frog legs persists to this day. Although entire days might be devoted to eating frogs legs such as during the Foire aux grenouilles in Vittel, frogs and other amphibians are apparently protected by laws limiting their capture for resale in France. Most all of the frog legs eaten in France these days are imported from Asia. The frozen frog legs in my local grocery store (10 euros a kilo) come from Indonesia.
Sad to say, but our world has become too small to support wide scale hunting. Places like Indonesia are rapidly being over frogged. and when one considers how they are processed, all sorts of ethical and health concerns crop up. For my part, I’m not sure I really want to see the spry fellows garnering my dinner plate. Indeed, with their evocative name, I think I will leave les cuisses de nymphes aurores simmering someplace in the fanciful world of dawn imaginings.
Ribbit.
How about you? Ever tried frogs legs?
Most of my cakes taste a darn sight better than they look. This one is exceptional.
I thought the recipe up all by lonesome, which explains a lot. I know what I did wrong. I’m going to fix it. But in the meantime I just had to show you how pretty it looked.
I made the cake with my regular crepe batter. After refrigeration, the crepes were rather tough. I think the cake needs a much more eggy crepe to be successful.
I layered the crepe cake with orange marmalade. Well here in France it was labeled confiture d’orange, but Bonne Maman is not fooling me again. That’s marmalade. It has those bitter peels included, and if you’re not a fan of bitter, you’re not going to like this cake.
I also used chocolate ganache. Very successful. But it’s hard to mess up gananche you know.
Hopefully by the time I have the crepe cake thing figured out, I’ll have this blog design thing worked out too.
Yikes!
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