Classic Dish Quotes
“Bouillabaisse, this golden soup, this incomparable golden soup which embodies and concentrates all the aromas of our shores and which permeates, like an ecstasy, the stomachs of astonished gastronomes. Bouillabaisse is one of those classic dishes whose glory has encircled the world, and the miracle consists of this: there are as many bouillabaisses as there are good chefs or cordon bleus. Each brings to his own version his special touch.”
Curnonsky (1872-1956)
"The lips could sense already the velvety smoothness of the thick slices of beef, nestling on a large slice of sausage, in which coarsely chopped pork was combined with the finest veal, herbs, and chopped thyme and chervil. But this delicate pork confection, cooked in the same broth as the beef, was itself resting on an ample bed of white chicken meat, including the breasts and the wings, boiled in its own liquor with a veal knuckle that had been rubbed with mint and wild thyme. And to support this magical triple edifice, there had been cleverly inserted under the white flesh of the chicken (which had been fed only on milk-soaked bread) a rich and robust foundation of a generous slice of fresh foie gras, simply poached in Chambertin."
Rouff (Marcel) French writer (1887-1936)
Describing Dodin-Bouffant's pot-au-feu.
“....an ignorant and pretentious bunch try to improve on what is already the finest..... The improviser sets himself up at the stove just as he does anywhere else. With his eyes turned to heaven instead of on his saucepans, he drops in a pinch of curry powder here, a spoonful of brandy there, and somewhere else, something even worse - a few drops of custard! He uses any old stuffing, he dribbles in some frightful additive. . .. Old words, classic terms, and traditions are all flouted by these priests of improvisation - it seems that we are a long way removed from the discreet combinations of flavors, thought out at length, that were once the basis of French gourmandise. . . .”
Colette (Sidonie Gabrielle) (1873-1954)
French novelist
|
