Showing posts with label stockfish. Show all posts
Showing posts with label stockfish. Show all posts

Aïoli – Aioli. France's Much Loved Garlicky Mayonnaise Version was the Original Aïoli. Aioli on French Menus. Enjoying Le Grand Aioli in France.

from
Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman

behindthefrenchmenu@gmail.com

 

  
Aïoli – Aioli
Photograph courtesy of Tim Pierce
www.flickr.com/photos/qwrrty/3090907319


Aioli  - France's Garlic Mayonnaise

Aioli was the name originally given to France’s garlicky mayonnaise and is often associated with Provence. For such a famous sauce, aioli’s recipe is simple: egg yolks, crushed garlic, oil, and lemon juice. The chef may add mustard or other flavors. Le Grand Aioli which is connected to aioli but is sometimes confused with aioli itself is a traditional Provencal family meal. More about Le Grand Aioli in the latter part of this post.

The British and the North Americans discover Aïoli in France.

Aioli was discovered by the first English tourists who arrived on France’s Mediterranean coast in the latter part of the 19th century. In the early 20th century, North Americans would reach France on ocean liners like the Mauretania with a capacity of 2,300 passengers in 1907. Awaiting them was Provencal cuisine, including aioli, and the city of Nice. As a reminder of the first welcomed English invasion, the promenade built along the city of Nice’s sand-covered beaches is still called the La Promenade des Anglais, the English promenade.


A view of Nice from the Promenade Anglais.
Photograph courtesy of Richard Whitaker.
www.flickr.com/photos/richardwhitaker/18794583782/
 
Garlic in the French kitchen

With Provencal cuisine, the tourists were exposed to seasonings, aromas, and flavors mostly unknown at home. While Provencal cuisine uses garlic in less than half of its most famous dishes the use of garlic, sometimes in robust quantities was a surprise. Garlic was rarely used, at that time, in British or North American kitchens. When garlic is added to a dish with intensity and passion it can remain on the diner’s breath for a day or two. Aioli became famous as apart from accenting Provencal cuisine it promised to keep vampires away

Aioli’s fame has spread.

Aioli is now an internationally famous sauce and on menus with tens of different accents from Japan to Thailand to Australia, North America, and all of Europe. It is usually prepared and offered in a side dish like mayonnaise. The amount of garlic in the recipe depends on the chef. In Northern France, a single clove of garlic may be added for every diner; along the Mediterranean coast, that number can rise to four cloves per diner


Crab cakes and mustard aioli.
Photograph courtesy of stu_spivack.
www.flickr.com/photos/stuart_spivack/2250085312/

   Aioli on French menus:

  

Les Escargots de Mer et Sauce Aïoli – Escargot de Mer means sea snails and so this dish will star France’s much-loved Bulots, also called Bourgets or Buccins, whelks in English. Here the whelks are served with aioli. When you order whelks in a small seaside restaurant, it will serve them with mayonnaise or aioli accompanies Frites, French fries, chips, on the side. If the French fries are not included, then order them separately. Whelks, aioli, and French fries is one of the tastiest ways to eat whelks. As the Belgians have mussels and French fries so France has whelks and aioli. In France another popular, but much smaller, sea snail is the bigorneau, the periwinkle or winkle in English. The periwinkle may be part of the dish.     

 

Swordfish Carpaccio, Poached Ocean Trout with Aioli

Photograph courtesy of Alpha

www.flickr.com/photos/avlxyz/2865423734/

 

Assiette de Crevettes, Aïoli Maison – A plate of shrimps accompanied by the restaurant’s take on aioli. 

     

Petite Friture Aioli

A tasty entrée of deep-fried little fish served here with aioli.

Photograph courtesy of Mike Czyzewski

www.flickr.com/photos/21687588@N07/3712937213/

 

Tartare de Boeuf, Poivre Vert, Lardons, Aïoli au Parmesan et Citron A Beef Tartar prepared with green pepper, bacon pieces, aioli, Parmesan and lemon. The traditional beef tartar is flavored with mayonnaise and Worcester sauce and topped with copeaux, shavings, of Parmesan cheese. For this Beef Tatar, the mayonnaise is replaced with aioli. The other additions to the original version are green peppercorns bacon pieces and a piece of lemon on the side.

    

 

Ronin Burger - Angus beef, caramelized onions,

Japanese cole slaw, miso goma dressing, fried egg, Katsu BBQ, Yuzu citrus aioli

Photograph courtesy of City Foodsters

www.flickr.com/photos/cityfoodsters/10065094283/

   

Blancs d'Encornet Grillés, Persillade et Aïoli -  Encornets are a favorite small squid in France, a calamari; here it will be opened and flattened on the grill. The persillade is a seasoning of parsley, garlicvinegar and oil and it will have flavored the calamari while it was grilling;  the aioli will be served on the side to add as you choose.

Aioli and mayonnaise.

Aioli developed from mayonnaise. According to the accepted tradition mayonnaise, was a sauce created in 1756 by the chef of the Duc de Richelieu. The Duke had ordered a banquet to celebrate the French capture of the Mediterranean Balearic island of Menorca from the English. The chef’s unique creation for the evening was the Sauce Mayonnaise.  

I imagine that as soon as the French sailors came home, they brought the new creation called mayonnaise. Then the addition of garlic, crushed till it became oil, would have been a very short step.

The name aioli.

In Provence, many people still speak or understand the Provencal dialect of Occitan alongside modern French. Until one hundred and fifty years ago Occitan and Catalan were the main languages spoken in Mediterranean France.  In Occitan, garlic is “alh”  and “oli” is oil. Together those two words are “alholi”; and  that became aioli. Aioli is just as important in the cuisine of Languedoc-Roussillon where Catalan is still spoken alongside modern French. Just as the city of Nice is a center for Provencal cuisine so the large fishing port of Sète is a center for Languedoc-Roussillon cuisine. If you are traveling in the region will find many Sète seafood restaurants with aioli on the menu or in the recipe of the dishes you order.

In Sete your menu may offer:

  

Moules Farcies à la Sétoise – Mussels, from the Étang de Thau, the Thau Basin, stuffed in the manner of Sète. The mussels are stuffed with sausage meat and cooked in white wine and tomato puree.  The mussels will be served with aioli on the side or on top.

  

The main canal in Sète.

Photograph courtesy of Mike McBey

www.flickr.com/photos/158652122@N02/42295334951/

    

Bourride de Lotte à la Sètois -  Bourride de Lotte is a traditional Provencal monkfish stew, and monkfish are one of the tastiest sea fish with a very firm texture. Sète’s version of Bourride is a creamy stew of monkfish and vegetables all flavored with white wine and aioli. The stew will be served with more aioli on the side.

Le Grand Aioli may have begun in Provence.
Now, it is a family favorite all along France’s Mediterranean coast

In both Provence and Languedoc-Roussillon, aioli will be the dish prepared for family get-togethers. Le Grand Aïoli will be held for most large celebrations and is a delight for the eyes


Le Grand Aioli.
Photograph courtesy of The Wednesday Chef, Luisa Weiss.

Le Grand Aioli and its ingredients change with the season. However, the centerpiece will always be the traditional desalted cod. Then come the vegetables in season; crunchy fresh vegetables like carrots, radishes, and fresh cauliflower are important as they may be dipped in the aioli.  The layout of the vegetables with attractive colors is also important and so fresh tomatoes and cucumbers will be included. To this will be added hard-boiled eggs and cooked vegetables that may include France’s favorite fresh green beans, haricot vert, boiled potatoes, courgettes, zucchini, and asparagus in season. Depending on the home or restaurant seafood where Le Grand Aioli is served seafood and or snails may also be part of the mouthwatering display.

-------------------------------- 

  

Searching for the meaning of words, names or phrases
on
a French menu?

 
Just add the word, words, or phrase that you are searching for to the words "Behind the French Menu" (best when including the inverted commas), and search with Google.  Behind the French Menu’s links, include hundreds of words, names, and phrases that are seen on French menus. There are over 450 articles that include over 4,000 French dishes with English translations and explanations.
 
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Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman

 

behindthefrenchmenu@gmail.com

 

Copyright 2010, 2015, 2021
 
--------------------
   
Connected posts:
 
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Lotte or Baudroie - The Monkfish –.Searching for the Most Popular Fish in French Restaurants; Monkfish is Number Two in the Top Ten.
 
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Dreaming of the French Caribbean While Traveling in Mainland France?

from
Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman

behindthefrenchmenu@gmail.com

 

   
The town of Saint Pierre in Martinique.
www.flickr.com/photos/jries/1793239573/
    
Cuisine Antillaise is the French - Créole cuisine of the French Caribbean island regions of Martinique and Guadeloupe, and the French-administered islands of St. Barts and Saint Martin.  French regions are somewhat similar to USA states or UK counties and, despite the distance, over 6,000 km (4,000 miles) from the French mainland; think of Hawaii and mainland USA. These islands are as much part of France as Paris; gendarmes direct the traffic there are croissants for breakfast and you have to pay in Euros.  

The green arrows indicate the French Caribbean islands.

Still Dreaming?
Look for One of the Many Mainland Restaurants 

Serving French-Créole Antillaise Cuisine.

By the number of restaurants offering Cuisine Antillaise in mainland France, it is undoubtedly the most popular of France’s islands’ cuisine and the one that I have enjoyed the most.

Your Créole Antillaise menu may offer:
   
 Accras de Morue Deep-fried cod fritters made from rehydrated cod. The cod used for this dish is hydrated salt cod.  Dried cod was a staple food that could be stored and transported before there were refrigerators, and the French Caribbean settlers imported it as a cheap protein to feed their slaves.   Salt cod has remained very popular in France and in her overseas departments and regions.  Accras de Morue will be on many mainland menus without any reference to their Caribbean origins.
        
Accra de Morue, Sauce Chien
The word Chien does translate as a dog; however, this sauce has nothing whatsoever to do with dogs and the origin of the name is lost. The sauce is a mildly spicy 100% vegetable dip.

Morue, dehydrated salt cod, also called in mainland France, Merluche and Stockfish, and is still, after hundreds of years, behind many French comfort foods,  Salt cod dishes will be on the menus of the best restaurants and bistros in mainland France with the most famous dishes called  Brandade de Morue and Brandade Nîmoise.

If you want fresh cod, then look on the menu for cabillaud or morue fraiche:
  
Colombo de Porc -  A pork stew made with a blend of spices associated with Tamil Indian and Sri Lankan cuisine.  The Colombo spice group includes coriander, turmeric, cumin, mustard, cloves, fenugreek, and pepper.
   
Fricassé de Lambis - Fried conch; the popular and tasty large sea snail, often incorrectly called a clam, that is on menus all over the Caribbean.  The first fricassées were French stews made with chicken; however, that was originally.  Today fricassées are also made with veal, vegetables, other poultry, and shellfish, and that includes the conch of which there are many different types. The most popular conch seen on Caribbean menus is the Queen Conch,
         
     
Ragout de Cabri Antillaise An Antillaise goat stew, usually served with rice.  Tasty Antillaise ragouts, stews, use fewer vegetables and different herbs and spices than mainland ragouts.  In modern French, a goat is a chèvre, and the word Cabri comes from Occitan, the French language of d’Oc brought to the islands by settlers. The early settlers were mostly from the region of Occitanie and Provence.  Apart from bringing their language, the Provencal settlers would also have also brought goats.  The southeastern part of France did not bring cow’s milk into their diet until the 20th century and are still famous for their many excellent goat's milk cheeses. Occitan or d’Oc is the language that lost out in the search for a single language to unite France; however, despite losing to out to modern French there are, still today, millions of French citizens who speak or understand some Occitan or one of its dialects alongside modern French.  Provencal and Nicoise have Occitan origins.
  
(The new French super-region of Occitanie was created on 1-1-2018 from the old regions of Languedoc-Roussillon and Mid-Pyrénées).
   
Vivaneau Frit, Riz et Rondelles de Bananes Plantains -  Fried snapper served with rice and round slices of fried plantain cooking bananas.  The plantain cooking bananas used in this recipe are an essential part of many French-Créole dishes.  The vivaneau on the menu is most probably the silk snapper; also called the yellow-eyed (red) snapper.
    
 
        
Gratin Chouchou à la Morue – A dish of chayote, also called custard marrow, and rehydrated cod, usually served as an entrée, the French first course.  For this dish, the recipe calls for the pale green to whitish vegetables to be baked like potatoes, and then after the skin is removed, mashed.  The mashed chayote will be mixed with the rehydrated cod, and baked until it browns, just before serving grated Gruyere Cheese may sometimes be sprinkled on top for a golden-brown gratiné finish.
         
Chayote originated in Mexico but is now a Caribbean staple, and fresh chayote is also served as a salad or as part of a mixed salad.  One of Chayote’s other French names is Christophine, in honor of Christopher Columbus who brought the vegetable to Europe from Mexico.

   
Chayote
www.flickr.com/photos/lacatholique/5194455316/
   
Blaff de Poisson –  Fish marinated in lime juice and then boiled or baked; sweet potatoes or yams traditionally accompany this dish.  With a menu listing like this ask what fish is being served.  Blaff may be made with almost any fish, white meat or shellfish and nearly all Créole Antillaise menus will include at least one dish of blaff.  All blaff dishes are marinated in lime before cooking, and the recipes come with accents of curry, and or coconut.
   
Blaff de poisson
www.flickr.com/photos/88832582@N08/8134575775/

Gateau Patate A French Créole cake based on the patate douce, sweet potatoes.  Sweet potatoes are those purple to brown, and sometimes almost white, skinned tubers that often come with pointed ends; they have a white to yellow to orange flesh inside.  It was Christopher Columbus who brought the sweet potato to Spain from South America.  From Spain, the sweet potato quickly reached all of southern Europe where it grows well but it was not accepted as part of modern French cuisine until the mid-20th century.  (The potato reached Spain 40 years after Colombus when the area now called Peru when in1532, Francisco Pizarro conquered the Inca Empire and claimed the region and potatoes for Spain).
  
 
The sweet potato in the languages of France mainland neighbors:


(Catalan – moniato. batata), (Dutch - zoete aardappel or bataat), (German - süsskartoffel, batate, weisse kartoffel), (Italian - patata dolce, batat), (Spanish- patata dulce).
   
Crêpes Flambée au Rhum - Crepes flambéed in rum.  The first crepes to be publicly flambéed in alcohol, according to tradition, were served to Great Britain’s Prince of Wales, in Monte Carlo, in 1896, by the chef Henri Charpentier.  The Prince was asked to name the dish, and chose the name the Crêpes Suzette;  that was in honor of an eight-year-old girl who accompanied her father, as the Prince’s dinner guest.

  
       
Rum, with 40% alcohol, is made from distilled sugar cane, and France’s only AOC/AOP called Rhum Agricole is produced in Martinique.  Martinique is a leading exporter of cane sugar, and so there is plenty available for making rum.
   
Rhum Agricole Martinique AOC  six-years-old.
www.flickr.com/photos/saleg-w/11619781865/
  
Martinique rum producers offer both white and dark rums with the best rums matured in oak barrels.  When buying Rhum Agricole, look on the label for the age. Some rums may be labeled Rhum Vieux, old rum; however, the real age, if written at all, is written in years, as it is in the picture above.  The age is not necessarily in the large print and from my experience only buy rum that is over three-years-old.  The usual meanings of VSOP, VSOP, Napoleon, and XO, etc. when printed on the labels do not have the same meanings as they do for Cognac, Armagnac, and Calvados; look for the written age.  All of the above is true, but at the same time, there are plenty of other rums from Guadeloupe and Martinique that do not have an AOP.  Many are excellent but try them before buying a case.
    
The differences in the Créole cuisines begin with the different herbs, spices, fish, and meats that were locally available.  To the local foods add the languages, traditions and cultural heritage brought by the French settlers, the slaves the French settlers brought from Africa, and later the indentured workers from India. 

French - Créole from Louisiana
and French – Créole from the French Antilles.
      
Travelers arriving from the USA quickly realize that the French - Créole Antillaise cuisine is distinctly different to the French - Créole cuisine of Louisiana.  That is not too surprising as Louisiana is 2,000 km (1,300 miles), from the French Caribbean.  However, that difference is nothing compared with the French Island regions of Réunion and Mayotte in the Indian Ocean; they are 13,000 km (9,000 miles) away from the French Caribbean and 9,000 km (5,000 miles) away from mainland France.  Even when a dish has the same French name the recipe can be very different as local ingredients take over.


The Créole language in the USA
    
In the USA, the largest French - Créole speaking group are the Haitian immigrants.  A Haitian Créole speaker and Louisiana Créole speaker will need a translator to talk to each other unless they speak in English or modern French.  Caribbean Haitian French - Créole cuisine is also markedly different to the Antillaise Créole cuisine due to the  


--------------------------------

Behind the French Menu
by
Bryan G. Newman

 

behindthefrenchmenu@gmail.com

 

Copyright 2010, 2013, 2018, 2019
--------------------------------

Searching for the meaning of words, names or phrases
on
French menus?
 
Just add the word, words, or phrase that you are searching for to the words "Behind the French Menu" (best when including the inverted commas), and search with Google, Bing, or another browser.  Behind the French Menu’s links, include hundreds of words, names, and phrases that are seen on French menus. There are over 450 articles that include over 4,000 French dishes with English translations and explanations.


Connected Posts:
 
 

 
 
  
 
  
  
 


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