from
Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman
behindthefrenchmenu@gmail.com
The Coco de Paimpol.
www.flickr.com/photos/marckjerland/4044122852/
The Haricot de Cocos de Paimpol AOP is the most famous bean in Brittany. The French love
beans and this bean is the gourmand’s bean. The Cocos de Paimpol took the slow
boat from the New World to the Old World and only began to be recognized for
their distinctive taste and texture in the 1930s
When did the Coco de Paimpol
arrives in Brittany?
Within one-hundred and fifty years of Christopher
Columbus and the Conquistadors discovering South America in 1492 beans and
maize was being grown all over France along with French-produced hybrids.
However, no one is entirely sure when the original bean that would become the
Cocos de Paimpol arrived in Brittany, but it did not reach via Spain with other
beans. Cultivation began in the 1930s, and by the end of the 1940s, the Cocos
de Paimpol was famous.
Saucisses de Toulouse aux Cocos de Paimpol
Toulouse Sausages with Cocos de Paimpol.
The bean itself
This white bean has an oval shape with a pale yellow
pod that has slight violet markings; it is sold as a haricot demi-sec, a semi-dry
bean. Semi-dry means the bean will be sold without the pod but not dried like
many of France’s traditional beans, which require prolonged soaking to
rehydrate them before use. The Haricot de Cocos de Paimpol will be in recipes
from soups to salads, accompanying roasts, and many other dishes and, of
course, will be in stews and cassoulets.
The Cocos de Paimpol on your menu in France:
Filet
de Sole Cuit Meunière, Cocos de Paimpol aux Truffes, Beurre de Persil
Plat- A filet of sole prepared with
a Sauce Meunièr beans with truffles and flat parsley butter. Sauce Meunier is a tasty but straightforward
butter sauce made with added lemon juice and parsley. Accompanying the sole, the
fish, are the Cocos de Paimpol beans flavored with truffles and a parsley
butter made with the slightly stronger flavored flat parsley. A wedge of the parsley
butter is placed on the fish just as it is served to allow the butter and
parsley to flavor the fish as it melts. (For decoration, curly parsley is
preferred, but the flat parsley is used when more parsley flavor is required).
The
truffles offered in this dish will not be France's famous Black
Perigord truffles or the nearly as
famous Burgundy
truffles; otherwise, they would have starred on the menu. Nevertheless,
France has a number of truffles that do add their own flavor to a dish and are
relatively inexpensive. The truffles offered here may be the Truffle d'Été, The
Summer truffle; it is a lightly scented truffle or the Truffe d'Hiver or Truffe
Brumale, the Winter Truffle. Ask.
Dos de Haddock.Cocos de
Paimpol.
A thick cut of smoked haddock accompanied
by the Cocos de Paimpol.
Pavé
de Thon Mi-cuit, Compotée de
Coco de Paimpol Frais – A thick cut of very, very, lightly cooked tuna served
with a compote made from fresh Coco de Paimpol beans. Fresh beans will only be
on menus from the end of June through October.
RIs
d'Agneau aux Cocos de Paimpol, Jus de Veau Réduit - Lamb sweetbreads served with Cocos de Paimpol beans and a
reduced sauce made from a veal base.
Soupe aux Haricots Coco de
Paimpol - Coco de Paimpol bean soup. A soup made with
the Coco de Paimpol will be creamy and velvety.
Crème de Cocos de Paimpol à
la Poitrine Fumée
Cream of Coco de Paimpol soup
flavored with smoked streaky
bacon; in the USA, smoked slab bacon.
Photograph courtesy of Cuisine Actuelle.
Souris d'Agneau Confite et Caramélisée,
Haricots Cocos de Paimpol – Souris d’Agneau is the
foreshank and knuckle of lamb served as a caramelized confit accompanied
by the Coco de Paimpol beans. In this menu listing, the lamb confit has been
caramelized, probably with honey and wine vinegar. To
a confit, caramelization
adds additional texture and taste.
A
Souris d’Agneau is nearly always prepared as part of a stew or, as here, as a
confit. Confits were, and are still, made by slowly cooking the meat on a low
heat in its own fat and juices. A slow, low, heat breaks down the muscle and other
tissues so that the meat will, practically, melt in your mouth. Historically, duck
and pork confits would be preserved under a layer of the same fat in which it
was cooked, allowing the flavors to
mingle. Just as a soup or stew tastes better the day after it is cooked, so
these confits which were kept for the winter months in airtight containers
while their taste improved with time. Today,
a lamb confit will not have been stored under fat, rather very very slowly simmered.
Translating the Souris on your menu listing.
N.B.:
When translating menus with a traveler’s English-French dictionary or Google
Translate, you will find the word souris in French also means a mouse or a rat.
However, worry not; this is a cut of lamb, and no mice or rats are included. In
the days when French cuisine was in its infancy, culinary names were either
traditional names or allocated with kitchen humor without any need to be
politically correct. The uncooked cut was said to resemble a mouse, and despite
its unfortunate connotations, the name stuck.
Choosing your aperitif and
digestif in Paimpol.
Choose a glass of ice-cold Chouchen, the
alcoholic mead that the Celtic Druids who came from Britain to France brought
with them. You may also choose a Kir Royal in the
manner of Brittany as your aperitif. That is a Kir made with Brittany’s
sparkling cider replacing the
original champagne. or Brittany’s Pommeau de Bretagne AOP. With your meal you might choose Brittany’s
Cidre Cornouaille AOP.
This is the Bretagne, Brittany’s delicately sparkling semi-dry AOP cider. Its
apples come from the area called Cornouaille in the département of Finistère.
If you are visiting this area, take their Route du Cidre AOC Cornouaille, their
cider road.
Your digestif in Brittany will be their famous Lambig
apple brandy, over that, there will be no discussion.
A
Brittany Lambig Apple Brandy.
Horse
d’ Âge – Over six years old.
Around Paimpol and within
Côtes-d'Armor
Around Paimpol and within the department of
Côtes-d'Armor, you will see the names Goëllo, Penthièvre, and Trégor again and
again. These are the names of the old Brittany Provinces that today make up the
department of Côtes-d'Armor. The names came from the
hereditary Counts who held these areas as their personal fifes. The department
of Côtes-d'Armor was created during the French revolution, but many businesses
and place names still have the old names linked to them.
In Brittany
celebrations always include oysters.
They will
often be accompanied by Cidre Bouché, not champagne.
Visiting Paimpol
Paimpol is not only famous for its beans. Long before
the beans arrived, it was an important fishing port and a vacation center.
Paimpol and the area around have excellent beaches, and today there is a lot of
activities, restaurants, fetes, and celebrations in town. However, in July and
August, you will have problems finding even one hotel room if you did not book
the year before. During the French holiday season in July and August, the
area’s population increases by more than 300%. Nearly all of that population
growth comes from French citizens who know a good thing when they see one.
In Paimpol
If you are in the area during the first weekend in
August, make sure that you are ready for the Fête du Coco de Paimpol, the bean
from Paimpol celebrations. Apart from opportunities to taste the bean and to
pick up some recipes, you may join in traditional competitions such as the
ramassage, bean picking, and the all-important d'écossage, bean podding. Who
knows what fabulous prizes you might win?
Apart from the celebration and fete connected to
Paimpol’s famous beans, there are other celebrations, concerts, and fetes every
month. An example is the bi-annual "Fête des Chants de Marin." This
is a sea shanty festival with groups bringing shanties from all over the world.
It attracts thousands of visitors for three days in August.
A
Breton procession in Paimpol.
www.flickr.com/photos/mwf2005/14665004689/
In the summer, there are often two events in
the same week. That is in addition to a Tuesday morning street market, night
markets, and the "Mardi du Port" - where locals and visitors enjoy
music beside the port every Tuesday. There is also a weekly farmer’s market
where everything from beans to ciders, local cheeses, seafood, sausages, poultry, and
more are on sale.
Paimpol
Port.
Paimpol,
apart from being an active fishing port, has a large harbor for the growing
number of visitors who arrive in their own yachts.
www.flickr.com/photos/12195219@N02/1242829387/
Paimpol’s English language Tourist Information
website:
To see the calendar of events for the whole year in
Paimpol, click on the box on the lower left on the home page. It is entitled
“Events: Diary of the Paimpol Country.”
Tasting local products close to
Paimpol
Within a short distance from Paimpol, you may
visit oyster and mussel farms and
cider mills. From the Tourist Information Office, get addresses for those who
accept visitors and make a morning visit to the seafood farms and taste their
products for lunch.
Langoustines -
Dublin Bay Prawns and Huitres – Oysters
For
lunch.
In the afternoon, visit producers of Brittany’s famed cider, Chouchen,
Pommeau, and Lambig, but with a designated driver!
Paimpol is also home to the first Label Rouge,
red label, sea-farmed turbot, the
fish. The Label Rouge level of excellence requires adherence to humane farming
methods apart from the quality of the product.
Wild Turbot on sale.
www.flickr.com/photos/cvalette/20707640115/
The coast around Paimpol
Along the excellent beaches close to Paimpol are a
wide range of fish and seafood restaurants. When you have had too much fish,
and seafood you will find other restaurants a few miles inland where the
local Label Rouge free-range chickens, turkeys, pork
products, veal, and the pre-sale lamb will
be on the menu.
Pêche à Pied.
This part of the coast of Brittany has many places to
join in one of the more popular Breton seaside sports, La Pêche à Pied. La
Pêche à Pied is fishing while on land, literally, it translates as fishing on
foot. Whenever there is a high tide, buy a net, a hand rake, a bucket, and
gloves and join the locals and other visitors at low tide, which is in the
afternoon. There among the rocks and sand pools look for and collect crabes, crabs: crevettes, shimps; amande de mer, dog
cockles; langoustines, Dublin Bay
Prawns; coques, cockles;
and more. If you are lucky, you may find a langouste, the rock
lobster, and the owner of the lobster tail. All may be collected for dinner.
Pêche
à pied, fishing on foot.
www.flickr.com/photos/rhian/36291882871/
Paris to Paimpol
Paris to Paimpol is 450 km (281 miles) by car or
three hours by TGV train to St Bruec, followed by a forty-minute drive by bus
or train for the 46.0 km (30 miles) to Paimpol.
--------------------------------
Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman
behindthefrenchmenu@gmail.com
Copyright 2010, 2012, 2015, 2017.
--------------------------------
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Bryan G. Newman
Behind the French Menu
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