Paula Wolfert - The Cooking of Southwest France: Recipes from Frances Magnificient Rustic Cuisine

A hardcover edition of this book was originally published in 1983 by The Dial Press.

Parts of this book appeared originally in slightly different form in Food and Wine magazine, Paula Wolferts World of Food, International Review of Food and Wine, Bon Appetit, Cuisine, Travel & Leisure, Pleasures of Cooking, House & Garden, and Cooking.

The Cooking of Southwest France, Revised Edition. Copyright 2005 by Paula Wolfert. All rights reserved.

All photographs by Christopher Hirsheimer

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, address HarperCollins Publishers, 195 Broadway, New York, NY 10007.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Wolfert, Paula.

The cooking of southwest France : recipes from Frances magnificent rustic cuisine / by Paula Wolfert.2nd ed. p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-7645-7602-7

1. Cookery, French. I. Title.

TX719.W64 2005

641.59447dc22 2005009747

eISBN 978-0-544-18601-9
v2.0721

For My Mother and Father and for Bill

A WOMAN CHEF I KNOW, WHO TAKES HERSELF VERY SERIOUSLY AS A FEMINIST, made the point to me that since the cooking of Southwest France is really womens cooking, it was odd that I was collecting and publishing so many recipes obtained from men. My response was that I wanted to write a living cookbook, a book that encompassed the traditional recipes of the region as well as the new ones adapted from the old. Any recipe that appealed to me was worth considering for inclusion. And then I said that as far as I was concerned, one could no longer draw the line of gender in the kitchen; it must be the result, the food, that is the point, and not the man or woman who produced it.

Still, of course, recipes generally have a source, and we food writers must be scrupulous about assigning credit. Ive developed my own way of acknowledging sources, a system that is used throughout this book. If a recipe bears no attribution at all, then it is my version of a new or traditional dish belonging to no one, a dish in the common domain. I dont invent recipes, at least not for a regional book like this. When I develop a recipe, I base it on my various tastings of the dish, the literature and oral lore that surrounds it, and my own amalgam of methods and techniques, most taught to me by various cooks through the years. If a recipe bears this line at the end: Inspired by a recipe from... , then, in fact, that is just what happenedIve taken a recipe taught or imparted by a specific individual and made definite changes to it. These changes include not just substituting ingredients more available in the United States but also making simplifications or improvements that would better serve my readers. Finally, if a recipe bears the name of a specific individual in its name or is fully attributed in its introduction, then that is the recipe as it was given to me, and I am imparting it with some changes, having tested it in this country and adjusted it for a good result.

THERE ARE NUMEROUS WAYS TO ENTER SOUTHWEST FRANCE . You can fly into Bordeaux or Toulouse, train in from Paris, drive in from Provence to the east or through the Pyrenees from the west. Ive done all the above. But recently, after deciding to revise this book, I entered in a completely different wayby sea, via a British ship that turned into the Gironde to reach the outskirts of Bordeaux.

It was a remarkable journey, moving slowly, effortlessly up the river, past the beautiful Kings Lighthouse, then into the estuary, which may be the least polluted in Europe. Here sturgeon, eel, shad, shrimp, oysters, and numerous types of river fish flourish. The banks are lined with some of the finest wine producing vineyards in the world.

Commentators disagree about just which areas are encompassed by the term Southwest France. Ive seen texts that ignore the Ariege portion of the Pyrenees, that omit every part of the Languedoc, and that delineate Gascony as a special and separate culinary zone. Certainly each province has its own specialties, but there is a land the French call Sud-Ouest, which can be gastronomically defined. As shown on the , it is the land of preserved meats, or confit, a preparation that unifies such diverse regions as the Basque country, the Barn, the Quercy, the Gers, and the western portions of the Languedoc.

You will be reading often of these regions in this book, and also of the Landes, the Rouergue, the Tarn, and the Prigord, so I suggest we take a brief tour of the whole area to catch a glimpse of each subdivision, to meet the people, and to gain a notion of what they eat.

As often as I heard that one eats well in the Southwest, I was also told about how kind the people were, how warm and generous-spirited. Indeed, both assertions turned out to be true; the people are as wonderful as their food. From the proud Basques and the zany Catalans to the earthy Prigourdines and Quercynois, from the gentle Landais and Tarnais to the sophisticates of Bordeaux, the gallants of Gascony, and the sunny-tempered people of Toulouse, I never failed to find help and encouragement, a special kindness, or a smile. These are not the sort of provincial French who eye you with suspicion, nor do they behave falsely, only pretending to be your friend. Their friendship, when given, is serious; their hospitality, despite their relative poverty, generous to a fault. They have not been corrupted by le grand tourisme, nor are they xenophobic, as many provincial Europeans tend to be. There is more than a touch of Spanish honor in them, tempered by French intelligence, decency, forbearance, sympathy, and an ability to share humor. There is also the spirit of the Mediterranean, an attitude of live and let others live as they desire.

For the Bordelais, Bordeaux wine is blood; without it they would be poor and, worse, have not much to talk or argue about. Their city is elegant, their lifestyle serious, their tempers sturdy but never mean. They grill their steaks over vine cuttings, honor the shallot, the crayfish, and the caviar of the Gironde. They cook lamprey in red wine and then thicken the sauce with its blood; they eat their beloved silver-tinged oysters with spicy sausages and wash them down with chilled white Graves.

The Prigord, also called the Dordogne, is the land of old castles perched on hills, lazy rivers, forests, rocky precipices with towns clinging to them, caves hiding the artwork of prehistoric man, and the earth filled with the black diamond of gastronomy, the black truffle of Prigord. The men here are spiritual descendants of Cyrano de Bergerac, at least concerning romance. Their women stuff goose necks and make the best hare la royale in France. They press the oil out of walnuts and use it to dress their salads.

The Corrze reminds me of Great Britain: rolling hills and soft green valleys, touched sometimes by mystery and mists. The houses are topped with the same black tiles as those in the Prigord.

In the town of Brive-la-Gaillarde, at the marketplace on place de la Guierle, I stood among boxes of chanterelles, cpes, tarragon, live rabbits, red plums, and fresh white beans, listening to the quacking of the poultry and the cackling of the women. I thought I was in some paradise of producewith a bounty such as this, I knew, the food could never fail. Back in 1980 I visited the walnut liqueur factory of a certain Monsieur Denol who reminisced about serving with the Americans during the First World War, and then sang Yankee Doodle Dandy for me while he spontaneously danced a jig.