Rick Stein’s French Odyssey

We got this book at Christmas, browsed it enthusiastically, made a couple of recipes from it and then it got lost in the general melee of household life. We retrieved it again before our French holiday but left it at home since it is quite a large hardback. Now that we have returned from France we have read it with renewed vigor since much of it covers the area we have just been visiting.

The book accompanies a television series where Rick Stein travelled across France from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean on a series of canals, meeting food producers, visiting restaurants and cooking food along the way. One of the canals was the Canal Lateral a La Garonne which runs right through the area where we have been staying. The first part of the book is Rick’s diary of the trip, the second is a collection of recipes – some traditional from the regions and others developed by Rick as a result of the journey. The book is illustrated by the beautiful landscape photography of Craig Easton.

Rick places his usual emphasis on relatively simple recipes that rely on good quality ingredients and they are all eminently reproducible in a domestic kitchen. The ones we have made, including the Marmande tomato tart, have been delicious and we must try some of those that seem less immediately appealing (is a small pile of Puy lentils the ideal accompaniment to seared sallops?).

This book is well up to the high standard of Rick Stein’s previous books and functions both as an inspiring coffee table volume and a practical cook book in the kitchen.

On Rue Tatin by Susan Loomis

There are countless books about moving to a different country and we have read a lot of them, seduced by the idea that we might one day do the same thing or wishing to extend the atmosphere of a recent holiday. In many cases these are not very good books, the writing is not of a high standard and the content usually revolves around a series of mishaps and setbacks that arise from a lack of understanding of the host country’s language and social structure. We have both recently read On Rue Tatin by Susan Loomis and this in an honorable exception to the rather disappointing overall standard of the genre.

Ms Loomis is a professional food writer who takes advantage of a contract to write a French farmhouse cookery book to move to France with her husband and young son. They originally plan to rent a house for the period but end up buying an old house that needs much restoration. The book is an account of the restoration, integration into French life and French food and cooking. It is well-written with many perceptive observations of French life. Each chapter ends with some recipes of dishes that have been described in that section, many are from French natives living around her in Normandy. We have made the gazpatcho recipe on this holiday and it was very good, we couldn’t quite stretch to making the accompanying cucumber sorbet.

There are a number of factors that probably contribute to the Loomis’s success in their move. Susan Loomis spent a year in Paris at a cookery school when she was a student so she learnt a lot of the French language at a relatively young age and made a lot of friends a few of whom are still prominent in their life in Normandy. They went to France with a ready-made purpose – to write a book, and that book was concerned with one of the most universal interests – food. When they moved they were young and full of energy rather than looking to retire and wind down.

There is a second volume about their continuing life in France and the setting up of a cookery school which we will review later when we have both read that.

Fish by Sophie Grigson & William Black

We found this book in the bargain section of a bookshop though it was little more than a year after its publication. We can’t understand this at all as it the best fish cookery book we have come across and we have made many of the dishes which have all been wonderful.

Sophie Grigson is of course a very well-known cook and writer who is the daughter of the legendary Jane Grigson. William Black, who was at the time her husband, may be less well-known. He is also a food writer and has worked as a supplier of fish to many top UK restaurants.

In Fish Sophie Grigson contributes the recipes and William Black writes an introductory section to each chapter describing the class of fish, the particular species, their seasonality, cost and yield after filleting. All the recipes that we have made from it, at least a dozen, have been excellent and we have noticed that they have featured on the menu of some restaurants we have visited. The flambéed sea bream with herbs make a spectacular dinner party dish. The monkfish cooked in an unlikely sauce of lager and cream is a lovely warming meal with some new potatoes and brocolli. The halibut with a Welsh rarebit crust is especially good if you can find halibut steaks rather than fillets.

The French Market by Joanne Harris & Fran Warde

We brought this cookery book on holiday with us. It was toss-up between it and Rick Stein’s French Odyssey and the French Market won because it was smaller. However it has proved much the best choice since its recipes are centred around in Nerac in South West France, only 45 minutes drive from where we are staying. All the regional ingredients mentioned in it are easily available at the local markets.

The book is very well written with a great main introduction and introductory paragraphs for each recipe. Joanne Harris is a well-known author of novels such as Chocolat and her literary style carries across into this book. The book is lavishly illustrated with excellent photographs taken by Debi Treolar. There are pictures of most of the finished dishes interspersed with perceptive images from markets and small French towns.

Since we have been staying in houses with well-equipped kitchens we have been able to try out many of the recipes. Some of them are simple assemblies of the wonderful produce that can be bought at French markets whilst other require more cooking. All are unpretentious dishes that make a memorable meal without hours of preparation. The salade aux noix takes advantage of the ready availability of walnuts and their oil in the French South West. The chèvre aux figues has been wonderful with baskets of fresh figs available for only 2 Euros at the markets, we tried it with both young and aged goat’s cheese and preferred the taste of the young as the recipe specifies. The lentilles en salade is a great blend of Puy lentils, courgettes, tomatoes and herbs which still tastes summery even with the lentils, exactly as the introductory paragraph suggests, or perhaps we are just suggestible.

There is a previous volume titled the French Kitchen which we haven’t seen yet but we look forward to using. It is good to see that Joanne Harris is donating all her earnings from these two books to Médecins Sans Frontières.