How can you try every culinary speciality in a country that has several thousand? The answer is simple: make discovering local recipes a challenge (as much as a game!). Following La Scandibérique from north to south, stop in each area to taste the regional cuisine. Off we go, follow the guide!
Carbonade, ficelle and fricadelle in northern France
In northern France, as everyone knows, people eat mussels and chips! But not only that: there are also some delicious specialities such as the Flemish carbonade (pieces of meat braised and slow-cooked in beer) or the fricadelle (or fricandelle, a sausage). For a starter, try the ficelle picarde, a pancake filled with ham, mushrooms, onions, crème fraîche and grated Gruyère. And before thinking about dessert, in particular the sugar tart, do not neglect the maroilles cheese! And of course, to go with it all, try one of the many beers of the North, often produced in craft breweries; to be enjoyed, of course, in moderation!
The département of the Oise is famous for having given birth to Chantilly cream.
The region around Melun produces the Brie of the same name. As for the niflette of Seine-et-Marne, it is a pastry in the form of a mini puff-pastry tartlet filled with custard. Careful: not tasting it would be a sin!
A coffee and croissants, please!
In Paris, play the tourist! For tourists, the specialities of the French capital are, in order, the baguette, croissants, the croque-monsieur (preferably enjoyed on a brasserie terrace) and macarons! Curiously, Paris has also become renowned for its honey, produced in hives set up on the city’s rooftops. The ones on the Opéra Garnier are famous today.
A stone’s throw from the capital, the surrounding area offers visitors some lovely gourmet discoveries: for example the Essonne has the Pithiviers, a cake made of puff pastry filled with almond cream. As for the banks of the Marne, they still host the guinguettes and their speciality: fried gudgeon.
The “fillettes” of the Loire
Heading further south, you reach the Loire Valley, Touraine, Anjou, Sologne and the Gâtinais, territories renowned for their honeys, their poultry – which benefit from a PGI – and their asparagus. In Touraine, order rillons (small pieces of pork belly browned in their own fat) and rillettes, but also the andouillette of Vouvray; to be washed down carefully with one of the wines produced by the vineyards of the Loire Valley, served in a “fillette”, that is, a small 35 cl bottle. In Tours, melt for the Nougat, a cake made of almond macaroon paste and apricot jam.
Between land and sea: the two Charentes
Once across the Vienne, you arrive in Charente and Charente-Maritime, very close to the Gironde, where traditional cuisine readily draws its inspiration from seafood. This is where you can taste oysters and bouchot mussels, cooked “à l’éclade” under a blanket of pine needles. In Charente, you will also discover the cagouille (a snail), a tourteau fromager (a cheese-cake, but sweet) and a galette flavoured with angelica that goes wonderfully with the two signature spirits of the area, pineau and cognac (to be enjoyed in moderation).
If you follow the oyster trail, it will lead you a few dozen kilometres further on to the Arcachon basin and to the Gironde, where the Bordeaux cep also reigns supreme. And since you are in the city of Bordeaux, stay there long enough to savour the city’s speciality, the cannelé.
©Aurelie Staff porteurdesonge.com
Warm and flavourful: the cuisine of the south-west
Your gastronomic trip ends in the south-west of France, between the Landes and the Pyrénées-Atlantiques, two territories renowned for the excellence of their cuisine. Here, between duck confit, foie gras, Bayonne and Tonneins hams, Marmande tomatoes, Gers chickens and capons or Chalosse beef, the hardest thing is clearly to choose! Must-tries: Agen prunes, especially macerated in the local spirit, Armagnac. Do not forget to taste piperade, made with tomatoes, peppers and chilli… from Espelette, of course, and above all do not skip the cheese stop (mainly sheep’s milk): you are in the land of Ossau-Iraty, Etorki and Manec-Iholdy. Before leaving, treat yourself to the Landes pastis, Dax madeleines and the Basque cake, filled with black cherry jam. Nothing but joy in prospect!
All in all, what a great adventure to live by following the route of La Scandibérique; or how to discover a precious heritage, that of the cuisine and signature products of the French regions.
