Promenade around Maussane les Alpilles

We are now in the home of the olive oil of Les Baux de Provence, an AOP, appellation d'origine protégée, which replaces the former AOC, or appellation d'origine controlée.  My two favorite olive oil producers are here. Le Moulin Jean Marie Cornille produces three sorts of olive oil, all from a combination of different olive varieties. I prefer the Fruité Noir,  produced from black olives, which has a delightfully fruity taste of chocolate, preserved black olives and artichokes.

Next door to le Moulin Cornille is the attractive boutique of Jean Martin, which makes delicious tapenades, soups, sauces and other Provencal products, all without any preservatives.

Nearby is the Mas des Barres, also an AOP Les Baux, which produces a slightly peppery oil, much like the olive oil of Tuscany.

Not far away is the ancient village of Les Baux, ancestral home of the Grimaldi family (now of Monaco). Les Baux is a beautiful hillside town, whose main street climbs up to the now mostly destroyed chateau. On a clear day you can see all the way to the Mediterranean Sea.

And also close by Maussane is another favorite restaurant of mine, Le Bistro du Paradou, in the village of Le Paradou.. There is only one menu, although rarely there might be a choice of the main course, composed of an entrée, a main course with its accompaniments, an extraordinary assortment of cheese, and a dessert, plus all the good Côtes du Rhone red wine you want, all included in the fixed price menu.  Friday is always aioli, that provençal dish of morue, vegetables, and freshly gathered snails, accompanied by a garlicky mayonnaise-like sauce.

The top photo is of a bottle of the Moulin Cornille olive oil. And the bottom photo is of the Mas de Barre olive oil mill.

My Favorite Restaurant in Avignon

My favorite restaurant in Avignon is La Fourchette on the Rue Racine. I have been eating here for almost forty years. The restaurant is owned by the third generation of the Hiely family and Mr. Hiely is the chef. The food is traditional Provençal, often with an imaginative twist. The prix fixe menu includes an entrée, a main course with accompaniments, and dessert. Everything is "homemade"; nothing is frozen. Order the assorted tapenades with your aperitifs. A consistent and very good place to eat.

Yummy Innards

La Triperie Provençale in Les Halles of Avignon is a bastion of authenticity. Owned by Denis and Monique Decoster, Monique makes her own pieds and paquets, lamb's feet and little parcels of lamb's tripe, stuffed with chopped parsley, minced garlic, freshly ground black pepper and bits of salt pork. This dish is one of the glories of the Marseille cuisine repertoire. You can watch her rolling up the paquets behind the counter. You can make your own but doing so takes a lot of time and Monique's are delicious. But you need to make the sauce.

Sauté 200 grams of salt pork in some olive oil. Then add 450 grams of peeled, chopped onions. Cook slowly until the onions are soft. Add a thick coulis of tomatoes to cover, then put in 1 kilo of paquets and 6 prepared lamb's feet, sliced carrots, 4 whole cloves, 2  bay leaves, lots of chopped garlic and parsley - I prefer flat leaf - a handful of each and some freshly ground black pepper. Do NOT salt. Cover half way with dry white wine and cook covered very slowly for 6 hours. Add more wine if necessary. Serve with boiled potatoes. Serves 6.

If you look at the photograph you will see a lovely calf's head sitting next to the pieds and paquets. You can eat calf's head hot or cold. Monique sells the cooked calf's head in portions and then you can either buy her sauce gribiche, usually served with cold tête de veau, or make your own. There are several ways to make this sauce. Take the yolk of a hard boiled egg and mash it well, then add either minced garlic or shallots, minced parsley, capers (those from Italy preserved in salt are the best - just rinse them and dry them well before you use them), and chopped French cornichons. Add mayonnaise, vinaigrette or olive oil to taste, whisking well.

Olives - a most precious gift

The story says that there was a dispute as to what the name of the new city in Attica should be called. It was decided that Poseidon, God of the Sea, and Athena, Goddess of Peace and Wisdom, would compete to decide on the name and that the city would be named after whoever gave the gift most precious to humanity. Poseidon struck his trident into a rock and salt water rushed forth. Athena put her spear into the ground and an olive tree sprang up. And so the new city was called Athens. The olive tree represents Peace, Wisdom and Triumph.

Serge Olives, in Les Halles of Avignon, is a wonderful place to find all sorts of different olives, tapenades and salted cod, or morue. French olive varieties available include the Tanche - the olive of Nyons -  the Picholine of the Gard, and the Lucques, as well as the cracked olives of Les Baux. All of these French olives are protected by an AOC, or a certification of their place of origin. Other olives come from other Mediterranean countries. Serge Olives, created in 1961 by the great uncle of the present owners, seasons many of the olives they sell, including the Picholine with fennel. And oh, the morue. The morue chez Serge is fished in the northeastern Atlantic Ocean. Cod used to be inexpensive and abundant; now it is neither. You can buy three cuts of morue; the filet, the best for brandade, the baron, the best for aioli, and the cheeks.
Here are two easy, delicious recipes. In both cases you must desalt the morue for 12 to 36 hours in cold water, depending on how salty the cod is, changing the water several times. Once the soaking water is no longer salty the fish has been desalted enough.

For the cheeks: take an equal quantity of soaked and then patted dry morue and wild mushrooms (cepes are the best). In separate pans sauté the fish and the mushrooms. When cooking mushrooms always start without any oil in the pan until the mushrooms have given off all their juice and the juice has evaporated. Then add the best quality olive oil and minced garlic and flat leaf parsley to taste.  Continue to cook the mushrooms for a few minutes. At the same time sauté the cod cheeks in olive oil. When both the fish and the mushrooms are done, mix them together and serve.

For the brandade: For four to six people take 700 grams of morue and soak it as above. Pat dry and remove any bones. You can remove the skin or leave it, as you wish. The skin will add more taste. Now for the easy part, if you have a robot, or the hard part,  if you have to pound the fish by hand. Cut the morue into small pieces and put them into the robot. Slowly add 23 cl of best quality olive oil and 23 cl of whole milk and 2 large cloves of fresh garlic, minced. At the very end add 1 small cooked potato, cut into small pieces, and continue to mix for a few seconds. Do NOT overpuree, for the potato can become very sticky. Remove the brandade from the robot and reheat until it is very warm to hot. Sprinkle with freshly grated nutmeg. Add salt and pepper to taste. IF you have no robot you can make this with a mortar and pestle. You can serve the brandade with toast points and black olives from Nice.

A note on garlic. Always remove the core of the garlic clove, unless the garlic is very young indeed. The core makes the garlic bitter.

500 Kinds of Cheese

The best cheese store in Avignon is La Maison du Fromage in Les Halles. The shop's owner, Nathalie Francoz, has been selling cheese for thirty years. There are more than 300 varieties of cheese on sale, among them almost 100 kinds of goat cheese from Provence and the Cevennes, some of which are exclusive in the region to Nathalie. Try the Banon, a goat cheese wrapped in a chestnut leaf, whose tannin gives a special taste to the cheese. La Maison makes its own sort of pureed cheese, a delicious spread for toast, with fresh goat cheese, roquefort, and old marc.  Another speciality is a Corsican brocciu passu, a sheep's cheese with wild herbs and garlic, available from mid November. Unusual blue cheeses include a Bleu de Gex and a Tomme de Montbrison from the Loire. One of my favorite cheeses is the creamy St. Marcellin of Renée Richard, made from cow's  milk. Nathalie's cheeses are made with raw milk, warmed milk or pasteurized milk. I like raw milk cheeses the best for they have more taste. And now for a recipe - what could be more French, and easier, than a cheese souffle!

Melt 3 soup spoons (tablespoons) of butter, stir in 3 soup spoons (tablespoons) of flour and whisk slowly over low heat. Add just under 250 cl (1 cup) of milk and whisk until the mixture thickens into a thick sauce. Add a pinch each of salt and pepper. Remove from the heat and whisk in 3 egg yolks, one at a time, then put back on a low heat and whisk well. Then add 5 soup spoons of grated Parmesan and 3 soup spoons of grated comté. Stir well. At this point you can add a soup spoon of strong Dijon mustard or a pinch of cayenne. Whisk 4 egg whites until stiff.  Stir into the milk and cheese mixture. Pour into a buttered and floured straight sided 18cm (7 inch) souffle dish (if you wish you can sprinkle some grated parmesan over the top) and bake in a preheated 180° (350°) oven for 25 to 30 minutes, until the souffle has risen and set. Do NOT open the oven door until the souffle is done.