Véronique’s Feast

Despite living in one of French gastronomy’s celebrated enclaves, one thing we hardly mention in this blog is food. We converse at great length about terracotta tiles, plasterboard, fiberglass, oak versus chestnut beams, yet neglect all about pâté de campagne, foie gras, omelette aux cèpes or confit de canard. Since our renovation work drags on, why not take a pause to discuss good food? Especially because the subject involves, I fear, the quintessence of a slowly declining culinary culture in France.

The world has changed since Françoise, the impervious cook in Marcel Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past, held sway in his parents’ kitchen. She was entirely devoted to the preparation of meals, which involved daily trips to the market and calls on trustworthy suppliers. One cannot imagine a better connoisseur to judge the quality of a piece of beef or the freshness of asparagus. Advance planning and precise attention were required for all dishes, mundane and special. Françoise and her ilk were proud professionals who knew full well that their standards would be measured against other cooks and even fancy restaurants.

A perfect inspiration came to me via a dinner party that Dan & I arranged for friends when autumn began blushing in yellow and orange the chestnuts and oaks of the valley of the Dordogne. When I called Véronique Pardoux, mistress of the château de Régagnac, for the special favor of booking a dinner for eight, she was out collecting cèpes – porcini mushrooms – in her woods, taking advantage of their emergence after the first cloudburst of the season.

Véronique was our introduction to the rugged beauty of Périgord more than ten years ago when Dan and I alighted at the gate of her chambres d’hôte following a perilous drive across the dense forests between the villages of Montferrand and Cadouin. In a land of geese and ducks, looking for Véronique’s château almost turned into a wild goose chase. There, a most exotic duo – a lady with jet-black hair wearing a Vietnamese hat and her housemaid Arlette – showed us to our room for the night. 

On that first visit to Régagnac, having arrived late, we gave her table d’hôte a miss. We caught up years later – by then full residents of Périgord – for a meal that ranks among my most indelible eating experiences. That’s when I came to understand that the prestige of Régagnac cuisine reposes – with few exceptions – upon whatever the garden and the property supply.

The menu for this new affair was agreed weeks before. Véronique had just been given a leg of wild boar by the hunters whom she gracefully admits to her land. Nervous calls ensued and each time I had to reassure her that my guests would be delighted to taste her sanglier and that they would no doubt appreciate her home-made pâté. Devotees of today’s Roman cuisine, rich in the strong flavor of offal, would have to be similarly persuaded that someone else in the world could possibly enjoy such delicacies.

The night of the dinner, as the final touches were underway in the kitchen – the French coup de feu, that is – we guests nibbled on delicious miniature vegetables dipped in a thick mayonnaise and drank champagne in the relaxed atmosphere of the family room. Then curiosity prevailed and some of us sneaked into the dining room to snap pictures of the long table set with a maroon tablecloth, simple and beautifully faded Limoges china, battered silver, and old crystal ware. Véronique’s late husband had banned electricity from that room: only tall candelabras and the glow of the fire in the huge inglenook provided light for the looming feast.

Véronique came from the kitchen and sat at the head of the table, an anxious look still on her face. A monogrammed plate out of kilter caught her attention and caused a hissed rebuke. Arlette, a lopsided white lacy cap on her head and an apron to match over an incongruously masculine outfit, began to serve mushroom soup from a massive silver tureen. Seven kilos of cèpes had ended up in that dense and fragrant potage. Sounds like a cliché, but tasting, as for any work of art, ought to reach for the brain and translate into a story embedded in our conscience. The first spoonful of the soup thus transported me into the dripping woods of my Italian childhood home, la Cervara, the sounds of footsteps muffled by layers of musty-smelling leaves, the air saturated by the decay of sodden tree branches.

I overheard Arlette whispering to Véronique that the sanglier ‘was thirsty’. Whether good or bad news, she excused herself and went to the kitchen to attend to the poor animal. Back to the table she explained that the gigot (the leg) had been marinating in a broth of garden vegetables for nearly a week, a preparation that required a daily change of the liquid.

Then came a platter of pâté de foie gras studded with caramelized figs and looking crumply like slices of Christmas pudding, accompanied by chilled Monbazillac, a sort of local Sauternes. Its entry provided an opportunity for Véronique to launch into a comparative account of nearby markets and suppliers of fine foie gras before disclosing her source with the same pride as an Edwardian lady would drop the name of her Bond Street milliner.

Porcini mushrooms reappeared, their large russet caps spread on a silver platter. Sautéed and slow-steamed without butter or garlic, said Véronique. Just a hint of shallots. Butter and garlic made everything heavier and spoiled the flavor, she added. Yet this was what most restaurants did, she said, although she went out to eat once in a blue moon. Gault & Millau, she recounted, came to Régagnac once under cover and included her cuisine in their guide, the only private person to be so honored in all of France. Her husband insisted later that she be removed.

Véronique retreated to the kitchen. The gigot de sanglier needed her supervision once again before Arlette could bring it to the room for people to marvel at it. She carried the whole leg on a platter and stood briefly grinning in front of the fireplace like an actor in a curtain call. The wild boar was expertly sliced and served tucked under the silky cover of its light brown gravy. Arlette was sent for the wine, a rare Bordeaux from 2003, the year of the canicule. The heat wave killed 13,000 that summer in France. Yet the year proved exceptional for winemaking.

To finish came the chestnut cake, sumptuous as a Sicilian cassata. Véronique turned to me. I made it for you, she said. I can no longer do that. My chestnuts are small, thus infinitely tastier but a pain to shell. Une galere! This is the last time, she swore. We savored the rich natural texture – almost no sugar, just a dollop of fresh cream – thinking with a pang of nostalgia we might no longer taste such a miracle.  Beauty is a fragile thing. Time, neglect, and ignorance threaten it everywhere, at all moments. In comparison ugliness seems invulnerable; still to have good days ahead.

Véronique is now a frail lady in her eighties striving to keep up with a demanding and isolated property. One of our American friends asked Véronique if she would allow her to come and watch in the kitchen for a week. A week!, exclaimed Véronique. You must stay with me a year, starting in the spring when I plant my garden.

In a nutshell, isn’t that the secret of good cooking?