Ingredients & Fine Foods

[Monkfish Liver on Toast]

I had purchased a can of foie de lotte at the Salon Saveurs last spring, and it had been quietly sitting in our kitchen cabinet ever since, waiting for its turn to get a little attention. We finally opened it for a quick and easy lunch recently, spreading the chunks of liver on freshly toasted bread — just like we used to when I was a child and foie de morue (cod liver) on toasts was an occasional Saturday lunch treat.

Monkfish liver is sometimes referred to as le foie gras de la mer (foie gras from the sea), and quite rightly so if you ask me. The similarity between those two distant cousins is pretty striking : same pale orangey pink color, same soft texture, same peculiar earthy flavor, same sweetness at the back of your mouth.

Monkfish liver turns out to taste very much like cod liver, just a tad more subtly flavored, and is extremely enjoyable on the warm and crispy slice of bread, topped with just a squeeze of lemon and a grind of pepper.

One important thing I cannot stress enough : do not dump the leftover fish oil in the sink, under penalty of having to live with that smell for a week at least. And as much as I adore fish liver for lunch, breakfast is an entirely different matter.

Cécile’s Little Horrors. What a fantastic movie or book title this would make.

So far though, it is merely a sign in the window of a cheese store in Bergerac (Périgord), where we bought our tray of Cabécous. Handwritten on a thin circle of wood taken from the bottom of a cheese box, it is here to introduce a selection of extra extra dry — and I do mean extra extra dry — goat cheese (“séchons de chèvre”) of various origins.

A little freak show in its own right, a hodgepodge of brittle cheese flints, in camouflage tints of grey, blue, orange and white. Oh-so-touching in their utter lack of vanity, and the humourous way in which they are presented.

Humor. I like that in a cheese store. I also like that they have enough respect for their products not to throw out perfectly good pieces of goat cheese, just because they’re ugly and extra-dry. Ugly and extra-dry? Sharp and brittle? Some people will love them all the same, and welcome them wholeheartedly into their homes and mouths!

Sure, it’s also a very clever marketing scheme. But I like that in a cheese store too!

Continue reading »

The great thing about bringing food souvenirs back from your vacation — besides choosing them, buying them, fitting them somewhere in your already overbulging suitcase, hoping and praying and crossing your fingers that they don’t break/shatter/squish/smoosh/leak — is that it prolongs the magic indefinitely as you savor your goodies, little by little, over the next days, weeks and months.

I have a definite weakness for all things sweet and spreadable (as some people who share cabinet space with me are painfully aware) and I always seem to lug back herds of jars from my peregrinations.

This invariably leads to private moments of breakfast happiness, as I sit on my bar stool, pop the jar open, discover the color and texture which I had so far only guessed at through the glass, spread it on toast, take a bite, and mmmh… relish the taste, congratulate myself on the purchase, and munch contentedly away.

What we have here is a jar of walnut jam from the Périgord. Walnuts there are taken as seriously as ducks and ceps, so much so that La Noix du Périgord is protected by her own personal AOC (Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée, a certification of origin). This jam is made of sugar (55%) and walnuts (45%), nothing else. And this is all it takes to get you this fabulous, grainy, dark and intensely flavorful spread, so fragrant it almost smells like liquor.

A sweet mouthful of Périgord to last me through fall, making up for the increasing darkness at breakfast time.

Continue reading »

Try spending eight hours in a car on a sunny day, with a tray of twenty cabécous in the backseat. It’s an interesting exercise in willpower and determination to bring home the magic. Not the most orthodox way to age fresh cheese for consumption at their optimal stage of ripeness, but it certainly works!

Ah, what one woudn’t do, for the love of cabécous!