Boudin Noir

Every so often, on my trudge to work in the half light, I remember to look up. The looming panorama of Pyrenees never fails to give a little surge of pleasure which sits giddily with my early morning grumpiness. Sometimes I remember that I mustn’t miss the view of the Pic du Midi just around the corner only to forget by the time I get there – perhaps put off by a cunningly-placed poodle poo. Bof! Never mind. It’s Boudin Noir day today!

Making black pudding is brilliant. A gruesome, stinky celebration of the art, perfected over generations, of turning something unpleasant into pure gold. There are myriad variations of the blood sausage, and the version from the Béarn is a different beast to neat horseshoes of Bury breakfast pudding. Ours is bulging with meat and ugly as a badger’s bottom.

I’ve eaten lungs several times, a mistake, generally - with the obvious exception of the heroic haggis - but they go in our black pudding, along with hearts and some blubbery necks. No doubt, the splendid application which has been devoted over the years to finding good use for every last scrap of pig is scant consolation to the individual involved for a pneumatic bullet in the brain. However, I am heartened by such miserly wastelessness. The meat is perfumed and padded out with hearty proportions of stock veg and generous seasoning, and the lot is hubbled and bubbled for hours before being chopped and mixed with a gallon or three of blood.

“Delightful,” you might be thinking. And you’d be right. It’s beautiful. Even raw. I haven’t mentioned the stinky bit yet. A pig’s colon is about as unpromising as it gets. It smells really bad. It has a double skin, the interior of which has had a lifetime of odour-eating and so is beyond the pale, even for the French. This fatty, fetid stocking must be painstakingly separated from the useful and tasty outer layer, before the sausage making can begin. Frankly, even the cleaned boyaus have some odour issues, and they are often full of annoying holes, but for me they are indispensible to the glorious end product that is Boudin Noir Béarnais.

Even cleaning up is fun. Think of the waves of blood in The Shining and you’re not far off the mark. Not everyone’s cup of tea, perhaps – but I love it.

Se faire plaisir

On this day in the past I've followed Fergus Henderson's suggestion and had devilled kidneys for breakfast - a spectacular treat for me, especially here in France, where lamb's kidneys are not cheap. Dredged in flour, flash fried, supercharged with mustard, cayenne and Lee & Perrin's, a splash of chicken stock to give a little sauce. Blob of butter and a bit of a bubble, and onto hot toast! Yum diddley-yum yum! It's actually a fantastic way to discover the not-straightforward joys of kidneys - I didn't like them either...

This year I'll be breakfasting alone, so I've decided to push the boat out: in my shopping bag I have two whole pig's brains. You can actually buy this stuff in France. It'd be rude not to.

I've only cooked brains two or three times before, and eaten them maybe twice more. They're a bit strange. The first time I encountered them I was defeated. On a youthful holiday in Brittany I ordered the lamb – “No, it’s ‘ead” said the man, aware that I’d not understood cervelle d’agneau. Gulp. “No, no. It’s quite alright. I’ll give it a go...” The sauce was delicious. The brain was, well, a bit strange. And it looked a lot like a brain. I managed half of it.

I’ve grown up a bit since then – not in the sense where I’d no longer eat something potentially unpleasant out of sheer embarrassment. I’m stuck with that. But fewer things are potentially unpleasant. Well, fewer nice things...

I’ve painstakingly split rabbit heads in order to try the stuff back home. You don’t get much*, but it’s pretty good. I’ve merrily cracked open a guinea fowl’s skull at the end of a Christmas feast, and scooped out the surprisingly copious and tasty contents. This is a particularly fond memory. If you have the choice, leave the head on and roast strapped under the wing – it’s worth it!

Today I have some good bread, some bitter winter leaves, lardons and an apple. The brain needs gently rinsing under a trickling cold tap to remove the membrane and any blood clots, then poaching in a vinegary court bouillon for five or six minutes.  It’s removed, left to cool, then coated lightly in seasoned flour before being sizzled in butter until golden and slightly crunchy on the outside. I’ll have a glass or two of something delightful**, as recommended by the nice caviste man, and happy birthday me!

*Rabbits not being the thinkers sheep are.

** Touraine 2009 Le Rocher Des Violets Cabernet Franc.

Woke up this mornin...

Emptiness has come into my life. I saw it coming. Maybe for the rest of the world it’s been over for years, but I kept my head in the clouds – I’m pleased I managed to... But what do I do now?

We’ve just watched the final episode of The Sopranos on DVD.  A bittersweet moment... the end of an era. Tony Soprano will be forever linked to the South West of France. Perhaps we should give French telly another go*... But, then again, this year Father Christmas brought me the first series of The Wire. How did he know?

The Marché Victor Hugo in Toulouse is reckoned to be among the best in Europe. This was our second visit, on a rare Saturday off. On the back of last year’s experience**, we got a room for the night: on a trip like this, lunch should flow into dinner via little more than a digestif, a snooze and an aperitif...

The market is worth celebrating. It heaves with people and produce. Under one giant, unbeautiful roof, traders group according to speciality: cheese; poultry; piggy stuff – mountains of rillettes, anaconda coils of Toulouse sausage, teams of suspended hams; piles of lamb; great slabs of cow; a whole section of bibbly-bobbly offally bits; and a collection of the most abundant and varied fish counters I’ve ever seen. Abundance is the key word – a hangar-sized cornucopia of fresh, good stuff. Sensibly, there are a number of small bars scattered around the edge of the hall for those who encounter bewilderment in the face of so much shopping, and need a moment to restore equilibrium. We bimbled about, gazed at the buxom displays, intimidated by the opulence, and by the business. Trying not to dribble.

All photos are click-on-able, if you want to get a better look.

A bee-line for the fish. It way surpasses anything we can get in our local market (which, in turn, way surpasses most English fish stalls). We joined a vaguely orderly queue and struggled to decide what to buy: 

Rascasse (Scorpionfish), Lemon Sole, Red Bream

un comme ça... 










un comme ça,











deux comme ça...




Merci. Brilliant! Now bring on the most expensive ham we’ve ever tasted!

100g cost 22 quid! But by crikey it was worth it. Jamon Ibérico Pata Negra de Bellota, 36 months maturation. The guy carved it by hand in front of us and advised us to serve it on a slightly warm plate. We had a bit of a chat, agreed to perform a small personal errand, and he spoilt us with 20g lobbo for our troubles! Glad to be of service! We’ll be back...

All this bustle is thirsty work and the bars were calling, but it was lunchtime already and we were holding out for something more substantial.

The entrance; the b&w photo at
the top of my blog was
taken inside here.

Lunch is served in a corridor of buzzing, interconnected joints which runs the length of the first floor of the market hall. You reach it via a grotty stairway in one corner – perhaps a ploy to keep the tourists out. It’s jam-packed with locals, and it rocks your socks off! There are four or five places, each specialising in a particular market product. Last time we had beef; this time we went for fish. We ate a simple, fresh lunch of grilled bream. Razor clams to start and a chocolate mousse at the end, with a fruity white to relax us into the noisy atmosphere. A proper French lunch.

Next, we planned to revisit a bar that we’d liked last time – but post-lunch sleepiness paired with a flair for getting lost had us on a tour of town. Toulouse is a mixed bag of scruffiness and grandeur; they seem to be doing the place up, but perhaps they’re too skint (or can’t be arsed) to finish. It was a pleasant change from small-town life, though: self-confident, friendly, multicultural and busy. We had a nice time. Eventually, I admitted defeat and we asked for directions. The couple we spoke to had never heard of the place but found it for us on a much posher phone than ours and our feet were saved.  (This was one of a number of examples of friendliness we encountered. Earlier, a lady led us right across town so we could find the market. Then she pottered off back the way we’d come: she wasn’t in a rush, she said!)

The place we had been prepared to struggle to find is called Au Père Louis – brought to our attention by Rick Stein in his FrenchOdyssey series†.  It’s a tiny wine bar with an on-the-face-of-it grumpy old barman, who was actually rather jolly. Perhaps he became jolly as we stayed in his bar grazing on a plate of delicate ham and drinking an enthusiastic quantity of Côtes du Rhône and Quinquina†† before we decided we needed a kebab.

We’d stumbled across O’Saj earlier and I’d had half a mind on it since. It’s a kebab shop with cookers shaped like big bin lids. Who wouldn’t be intrigued? It turns out the bin lid itself is the saj, a Lebanese flatbread griddle – like an inside-out tandoor. Bread dough rolled thin is slapped onto the surface, a filling spread on top like a pizza, and it all cooks from just one side. It was folded up, wrapped in a hankie and presented to us. Our lamb farce, scented with coriander and friends‡, was delicately cooked by the heat coming through the bread. Crunchy, chewy, fresh and spicy, a very sophisticated kebab.  We tried another, this time the simplest filling – just zataar. Now, I actually knew what this was thanks to the Moro books – a paste of olive oil, thyme, sesame and sumac‡‡ – but I’d never tried it. The first bite was weird; the second had me hooked – sour, scenty, dry and sweet. In that order. Complicated and good. Grown-up food for people who like eating.

The cushion is used to thwack the bread onto the saj. Great stuff!

We’d intended to eat on a park bench, but the staff were so friendly we ended up munching at the counter, chatting to the boys about food and music. And then we ordered the second one! Haha! Good times...

* No.

** Yup, very rare.

† In fact, old Rick’s researchers did us proud – the market and the restaurant upstairs are also mentioned. Splendid work Rick! He makes great programmes.

†† A sweet, bitter wine with quinine

‡ Erm... cumin? Sumac‡‡? Maybe a bit of fenugreek? We’d been drinking...

‡‡ This is a berry that is dried and crushed into a reddish-black powder. It has a lemony, sour taste and is used in middle eastern cooking. Apparently it used to stand in for lemons when they were out of season. It’s worth looking for. It’s lovely.

Dinner!

Makin' his list

We are gearing up. Did you know that black truffles from Perigord are wholesaling at €1,000 a kilo? I burnt through at least a ton*on my own yesterday. For this year’s fêtes, like every year, we will shift somewhere in the region of 100 kilos of foie gras. A poularde **from Bresse can easily cost 60 quid at this time of year; it comes with its fluffy white neck and head protruding from a cloth bag, neatly sewn up in a tight parcel which conserves its modesty and hides its rather splendid blue feet. We also have capons and turkeys, langoustes and salmon. White and black puddings, patés en croûte, terrines and suckling piggies. C’est la fête, quoi!

We’re getting ready for the big day at home too. I made pate en croûte yesterday at work, but in our house I made a pork pie. Of course, it is a very similar beast, but it’s not quite the same. It’s better.  No foie gras†: the british version is more boldly seasoned, with herbs and spices and a more open texture; slightly wobbly, tasty jelly; lard replaces butter – and the pastry kicks ass! A home-made pork pie is a revelation.

I can heartily recommend the version in Hugh Fearnly-Whittingstall’s Meat book. Not only does it have a well-thought-through set of picture instructions, but the pastry is a winner and the filling works a treat. I pretty much just do what he says, although I’ve taken to adding the meat from my trotter stock to the pie because it adds a nice richness. Also, Hugh doesn’t discuss how to judge the seasoning properly. You can either follow his quantities blindly, or guess, or, as I do, fry a small pattie of your mix, and eat it, so as to be able to judge for yourself. It takes a bit of effort to make, after all, so you want to make sure it’s worth it...

It’s an impressive beast – a festival for the season of generosity. Just the thing to have waiting in the wings for when guests descend. Or the post-pub posse. A jar of chutney and a pickled onion and Bob’s your barman! Happy Christmas everyone!

 

* Money, not weight.

** Girl chicken.

† Well, not none. We’re having foie gras as well! We do live in the South West of France...

a bum

There is the odd perk to my job. This does not include having hands that do dishes feel as soft as my face (with 24hrs of stubble). No, I get to eat what the boss throws away!

Honestly, this is a good thing...

Mind you, my boss doesn't throw much away. There seems to be a stinginess that, for the most part, I admire amongst the small family-run businesses that I have come across here. This is how money is made, I guess. The same determinned (or mean?) streak that has made France so famous for its tradition of wonderful paupers' cooking makes sure that nothing is wasted. Nothing that is worth selling at least. Needless to say, with these kinds of kitchen scraps, I often have my work cut out.

Now and again it's straightforward: Five chickens deboned equals ten chicken wings for my barbecue (too fiddley to be worth deboning, not enough of them to sell) plus some tasty stock for a risotto or soup the next day.

Often I have to be in the mood for a project:  Twenty chickens, chopped in half and prepared for grilling, equals, well, lots of bones and forty feet! (There might be lots of them, but they are chicken feet!) I've already made enough stock - Patte à poule façon chinoise anyone? I've got enough for a party...

patte a poule with shiitaki - not bad, but dim sum style is better!

In fact chicken's feet are delicious, if a little demanding*. We used to eat them in a great dim sum place in Liverpool. I love them. They're really chickeny. Clearly, there's not a lot of bulk to them, but they are rich and gelatinous and a sticky-lipped treat!

A pair of stuffed and rolled suckling pigs leaves a fairly considerable challenge: Bath Chaps! This is a pretty gruesome task, but I must admit I rather like that sort of thing. Sort of...

The idea is to remove the skin and flesh from the head, including the prize-asset cheeks, and roll it up around the tongue. Fergus says a spirited butcher will do this for you, but I have spirit too so the game's on...

I was quite pleased with myself! Having never seen a bath chap before in the flesh, I don't really know how accurate my efforts were but, as you can see, the process was pleasingly revolting and the uncooked product acceptably neat. After being pot roasted with some aromatics and a bit of water, much as I might a shoulder of pork, it tasted pleasingly unrevolting, and my brave dinner guests didn't feel quite so brave after all! It actually turned out to provide rather tidy, and surprisingly lean, delicate mosaic scallops of tender baby pig face. Yum!

Waste not want not. Merci Patron.

* They need to have their scaley outside skin singed off, then fried, then marinated, then braised (and then steamed, for dim sum). Then you need to get your head round the idea of sucking the skin off a still-patently claw-like claw!

Bits

Dot is starting to grow tired of me coming home with bibbly-bobbly bits. Often hairy and almost inevitably a little whiffy, she points out it's the last thing she wants to put in her mouth when feeling a little liverish*. Of course I couldn't disagree more, so now and again she has to put up with it, and grudgingly admit that it's really pretty nice...

There is a specialist abats counter in our local market where bits abound: I can treat myself with calves' feet, sweetbreads, liver, or go nuts with a full, floppy boned-out head; cows' cheeks, tail or tripe; pigs', well, everything! Good eh? Nose-to-tail stuff I used to only dream about. Some of it is a bit of a challenge, I'll admit, though some is pure luxury, such as onglet, the ribbony, king of steaks with a deep flavour that is a touch liverish** due to its position next to the liver. Why it should be sold as offal at all is a mystery to me. Other equally inoffensive-tasting morsels such as cheek or tail at least sound like they could be unpleasant; onglet is just a nice piece of steak sullied by its surroundings. Historical proximity, it seems, is enough to banish it to the ghetto with it's noisy neighbours. Not that I'm bothered, though I suspect you already know that...

I've been buying sweetbreads recently, and I'll admit I haven't quite got to grips with them yet. Braising them is easy - we do that at work with madeira and mushrooms. Roasting them is a bugger. It's difficult to tell when they're done, and they are so incredibly expensive that I struggle to justify my unsatisfactory tinkering. I know they can be excellent (all caramelised, sweet and interesting), but I think I really need someone to show me how.

Steak and kidney pudding is the plan to sneak in the bobbly bits by the back door(4/6 alliteration word-count ratio!! Yessss!***). Dot might well snipe that my simmering stew stinks of piss(4/8 - cdb). A soupcon - But... But the kidney is veal, a first for me, and it's so good that most of it ends up devilled on toast for a snazzy light dinner, Dot pulls a face but ends up saying 'Yum!' and mopping her plate. Yessss! Back in the game! The next time we have sweetbreads they're going to rock yer socks off!

* TM Fergus Henderson
** Not in the FH sense. It just tastes a bit like liver.
*** Or maybe just a sad, head-shaking 'No'.