from
Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman
behindthefrenchmenu@gmail.com
Cherries
www.flickr.com/photos/tracyelaine/4606773000/
Cerises - Cherries
The cherries on French Menus will be under the names
Cerises, Bigarreaux, and Griottes.
While the word cerise does cover all
types of cherries, bigarreaux usually indicates sweet cherries while griottes always
represent the mûre, slightly sour, morello type cherries.
La Cerise sur le Gateau.
This French expression translates as the cherry on the top of the
cake and has the same meaning as “The Icing on the Cake” in English.
After strawberries,
cherries are the second most popular fruit in France, and to prove it
France is the 15th largest cherry producing country in the world. In season,
from May through early August different cherry varieties fill the markets and
restaurant menus will be filled with dishes made from fresh cherries.
Cherry Blossom
Cherry dishes on French menus:
Aumônière de Poire et Mousse de Griotte
au Grand Marnier – Pears
stuffed with a mousse made from the griotte sour cherry and flavored
with Grand Marnier liqueur.
Cerise au Marasquin - Maraschino cherries were
originally a native Croatian cherry used for making maraschino liqueur. Today
the maraschino cherries on top of your whipped cream or cakes are produced
primarily by adding a red pigment to regular cherries while flavoring them with
all sorts of substances and lots of sugar. I suggest you think twice before
eating the red stuff in these cherries!
Cerises au Porto sur Glace à la Vanille – Cherries;
here they are probably griottes, the morello type cherries, flavored with port and served with vanilla ice cream
Cerises Burlat - Burlat cherries are native French
cherries that taste and look like a medium-sized California Bing cherry, and I
love Bing cherries. From that similarity, I was not surprised that the Burlat
is the most popular sweet cherry in France. The Burlat cherry developed from
cuttings from a wild cherry tree, and the finder was a French soldier, named
Léonard Burlat. Léonard had been called
up for service in the French army during WWI, and in 1915, he discovered a
remarkably different wild cherry tree near the city of Lyon. When Léonard went
home on leave, he took the cuttings from that tree back to his family’s farm,
near his home village that is now the small town of Loire-sur-Rhône in the
département of Rhône in the Rhône-Alps, and the rest is history. France had
fallen in love with Burlat cherries.
Burlat cherries
www.flickr.com/photos/johnloo/4609747322/
Léonard Burlat ended up with a
cherry and a street named after him as well as the thanks of a nation of cherry
lovers. Burlat cherries are now grown all over the world, and in France, they
account for over 50% of the cherries sold annually.
Cerises Noir - Black cherries. Usually, this indicates griottes, morello type sour
cherries.
Cerises Jubilee - Cherries Jubilee. These are morello type cherries marinated
in kirsch, a liqueur
made from cherries, accompanied by vanilla ice cream,
and flambéed in front of the diners while being served. This famous recipe was
created, and first served at the Savoy Hotel, London, by Auguste Escoffier in
honor of Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee, her 60 years on the British throne;
that was on the 22nd June 1897.
Cherries Jubilee
www.flickr.com/photos/kirt_edblom/14505460017/
You may wonder how a dish created in
England in honor of a British queen remains on so many French menus? Well,
to begin with, Escoffier was, of course, an extremely famous French
chef, and Queen Victoria loved France and was also much loved by the French.
Queen Victoria and her family were close friends of the Emperor Napoléon III
and the Empress Eugénie. When Napoléon III lost his job as Emperor at the end
of the Franco-Prussian war (1870-1871), he found refuge in England.
When Napoléon III died in exile in England in
1873, Queen Victoria paid for the crypt
built in the Benedictine Abbey of St Michael’s in Farnborough, Hampshire,
England, where he is buried. The abbey itself was built for Napoleon III by the
Empress Eugénie, and when she died in 1922, she was buried next to him. The
only son of Napoleon III and the Empress Eugénie was Eugène Louis, the Prince Imperial, and
Napoleon IV; he died fighting for the British Army in the South African British
Zulu wars, in 1879 and is buried in the same English church alongside his
parents. Many French tourists, visiting the UK, make a point of visiting the
last resting place of Napoleon III and Napoleon IV.
More about Napoleon
and cherries.
The bigarreau Napoleon is a sweet cherry,
and it is a yellow to pink to red sweet cherry.
For more about Napoleon III see the post:
and for more Napoleon I's descendants see the post:
Clafoutis aux
Cerises Burlat - Clafoutis
made with sweet burlat cherries.
Clafoutis, pronounced clafooty, (the S is silent), is a traditional tart
from the
old region of Limousin. The original
clafoutis was only made with cherries mixed and cooked together in a crêpe-like
batter. Now clafoutis are popular all over France and just as popular when made
with other fruits, vegetables, cheeses, and fish. The old region of Limousin
included the departments of Corrèz,
Creuse, and Haute-Vienne that are now part of the new super
region of Nouvelle Aquitaine.
A cherry clafouti.
www.flickr.com/photos/noellegillies/19584503876/
Confiture de Cerises
Noires - Black cherry jam
Filet de Canette Montmorency – Slices of duckling breast prepared with Montmorency morello type cherries. Cherries are no longer
grown in the village of Montmorency outside Paris, but any dish with Montmorency
in its name will contain cherries, and Montmorency cherries are grown all over
the world. The village of Montmorency is now a bedroom community of over 20,000
people, but apart from being famous for its cherries, the French philosopher
and writer Jean-Jacques Rousseau lived and worked there, and the painter
Camille Pissarro loved to paint there.
Sliced duck
breast with sour cherries.
www.flickr.com/photos/experiencela/77236358/
Entrecôte de
Daim
aux Bigarreaux - An entrecote, a rib-eye steak, from a fallow
deer served with a sauce made from sweet cherries. This will be farmed deer, as in the hunting
season when wild game may be on the menu, then either the
full menu will be marked as a Carte de la Chasse, a menu from the hunt or wild
game listed on the main menu will carry the suffix sauvage, wild. Many of the
animals traditionally associated with hunting are farm-raised in France. On
your menu without any other indication, the rabbits, hares,
fallow
and other deer, pheasants, quail, and even wild boar are all farm-raised and will be on menus all
year round.
Griottes à l'Eau-de-vie – A dessert
of griotte, morello, cherries made with an eau de vie, a fruit brandy, usually
this will be kirsch, itself a cherry liqueur. A dish like this
will usually be served with a soft white cheese or ice cream.
Kirsch or Kirschwasser - A 40-45% clear, cherry brandy that may be in your
cheese fondue, in desserts, cakes or served ice cold on its
own. Kirsch from the Fougerolles, the small town in the department of
Haute-Saône in the region of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté is one of the most
respected sources for French Kirsch.
Apart from Fougerolles so famous for its
Kirsch liquor, there are other famous cherry towns in France; a
particularly compelling one is the town of Céret in Occitanie.
Céret has a cherry festival in the
last week of May or the first week in June. For all French fetes and
celebrations check, ahead of time, with one of the French Government Tourist
Office in your country.
The cherry festival in the town of Céret in Occitanie.
The Céret cherry season begins in May,
and there will be sales of all products made with cherries at stalls and
restaurants in and around the town along with bands, traditional Catalan
dancing and more.
Cherries in Céret.
Céret menus will also offer a wide range
of French and Catalan-influenced dishes. At almost any time of the year,
Céret is a delightful place to visit as there is much more to the town and area
than just cherries, Catalan cuisine, and Catalan connections.
The town also strong connection to modern
art that began when Georges Braque and Pablo Picasso came here in 1911 and
spent a year or two in Céret during Picasso’s cubist period; today Céret considers
itself the home of cubism and over the years, many other artists, not just the
cubists have also spent time there. Céret’s small but unique Museum of Modern
Art was founded in 1948 by some of the artists who visited and loved the town;
it holds works, mainly donated by artists who spent time in Céret, and that
includes Picasso, Braque, Chagall, Matisse, Miró, Soutine, and others.
Still Life With Banderillas
Georges Braque. Ceret, summer 1911
www.flickr.com/photos/rverc/4297148574/
For the opening times of the museum and
days when it is closed see the museum’s French language website that is easily
accessed with Bing and Google translate apps.
Getting to Céret.
Céret is in the department of the
Pyrénées-Orientales in Occitanie and is just 15 km (9 miles) from some beautiful
Mediterranean beaches; it is also just 15 km (9 miles) from Perpignan and
18 km (12 miles) from Spain.
The only time when I cannot recommend
Céret is in mid-July when, unfortunately, Céret, has real bullfights, corridas,
the bloody ones. You may schedule your visit for before or after the corridas.
Since Catalonia in Spain has banned bullfighting, I am hoping that Céret with
its Catalonian history will soon follow suit.
Portrait of the artist Chaim Soutine painted
by Modigliani in Céret.
Bigarreau - Sweet cherries in the languages of France’s neighbors:
(Catalan - Cirera or
guinda), (Dutch - kers), (German - kirsche), (Italian - ciliegi, cerasa)
(Spanish- cereza, guinda).
Griotes - Morello sour cherries
in the languages of France’s neighbors:
(Catalan - guinder, cirerer amarg), (Dutch -
zure kers), (German
–sauerkirsche, weichselkirsche, weichsel), (Italian - amareno, visciolo, amarasco), (Spanish -
guindo, cerezo ácido, cerezo de morello).
------------------------------------------
Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman
behindthefrenchmenu@gmail.com
Copyright 2010, 2013, 2017, 2019
------------------------------
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