On Rue Tatin

by Susan Herrmann Loomis

  3. Melt 1 tablespoon (15g) of butter in a heavy-bottomed skillet over medium heat and add the apples. Cook them, shaking the pan and tossing them frequently, until they are golden and turning tender, about 15 minutes. Transfer the apples to the buttered baking dish.

  4. To make the béchamel, scald the milk with the bay leaves over medium heat. Remove from the heat and infuse for 10 minutes. Melt 2 tablespoons/30g of the butter in a small, heavy- bottomed saucepan over medium heat. Whisk in the flour and cook the mixture until the butter has bubbled and formed a pale yellow foam, at least 2 minutes. Pour in the hot milk, straining out the bay leaf, whisking as you add it to the butter and flour. Cook, stirring constantly, until the béchamel has thickened to the consistency of very heavy cream. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

  5. Whisk the béchamel into the squash purée and taste it for seasoning. The mixture should be quite highly seasoned.

  6. Pour the squash béchamel over the apples, dot it with the remaining tablespoon (15g) of butter, and season it with freshly ground nutmeg. Bake in the center of the oven until the béchamel is slightly golden at the edges and the apples are tender, about 25 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool for about 10 minutes before serving.

  6 TO 8 SERVINGS

  THREE

  Brushes with the Law

  ABOUT SIX MONTHS after we’d arrived, a friend of Bernard’s who was a reporter for the local paper, Paris-Normandie, called. “Suzanne, I want to interview you,” he said rather breathlessly. Bernard had warned me he was going to call, that he considered our story something of a scoop. We made a date and I invited him up to my office for the interview. He tiptoed over the building materials, hammers, nails, and rubble in the entryway and gingerly walked up the stairs carefully avoiding the bits of plaster that had fallen on it. My office, by contrast, was a haven of calm and tidiness, though still very basic. He interviewed me all about my book project and the house and wrote a very nice story from it all, which appeared the following week. About a month afterward we received a summons from the gendarmerie, or local police station, by mail. The letter stated simply that we were to appear at the police station at a certain time, for questioning. We asked Bernard about it and he had no idea what to say, except that we should show up on time.

  We walked to the police station, five minutes from the house, carrying our passports and our cartes de séjour, which showed us as legal residents, and any other legal documents we thought might be necessary, including the deed to the house. We were ushered to a drab upstairs office that held a metal desk, where we waited for a good fifteen minutes. Then a gentleman in a suit arrived, and two other men stationed themselves in an adjacent office. The gentleman began to question us, asking us virtually all the questions that had been on the form we’d filled out to obtain our visas. He seemed primarily concerned with where our money came from, and what we were actually doing in Louviers. I explained how I was paid in U.S. dollars, showed him contracts and tax forms, then showed him copies of my previous books. Meantime, the two men in the adjacent office maintained a silent but obvious presence there, sometimes pacing back and forth. I felt like we were in a spy movie, and though I knew we were perfectly legal I started to feel a bit uncomfortable, like I’d done something wrong.

  Questions continued. “How many children do you have?” “Where does he go to school?” “Do you know anyone here?” “How long will you stay?” “Why did you choose Louviers?” “What do you drive?”

  About an hour and a half after the interrogation had begun it ended; the man shook our hands and told us we could go. We were shaken. We realized that someone in the police department must have read the newspaper article about us and not believed it—cookbook writing is not, after all, a typical French profession. Someone must have obtained our visa application as well, for they followed the questions almost verbatim, except for the few about Joe and school.

  We never heard any more from the police. Louviers is a pretty clean little town but it has its dark elements—mostly minor drug dealing. We live near Rouen and Le Havre, however, both major spots for the drug trade, so perhaps they thought we might be involved. Or maybe our foreignness aroused suspicion. Whatever the reason, being called in for questioning was an unpleasant experience, one we hadn’t been prepared for, and one that surprised even our French friends. It was one of the moments that made us acutely aware that we were outsiders.

  Added to this experience was the behavior of our landlady, Florence. Instead of her usual friendly greetings we were met with cold bonjours, and she kept her distance. I was concerned we’d done something that displeased her, but when I asked her she assured me all was well. She is a good friend of Edith’s so I asked Edith, who said that Florence hadn’t told her anything. We decided perhaps we’d outstayed our welcome, though Florence had continued to insist we stay as long as we like. In any case, the Messy House was nearly ready for us, so Michael speeded up his work and in September, just about a year from the day we moved into the cottage, we moved out. I bought a huge bouquet of flowers and left it for Florence, who was gone when we actually moved, and resolved to stop by at a later date to say good-bye personally. We hadn’t figured out what the cause of her behavior change was and had decided we would just ignore it.

  Our first dinner guests at the Messy House were Bernard and Edith. We set up a table in our chilly little dining room, right in front of the window that looked out at the church. A few well-placed candelabra, a white linen tablecloth, and the view made for a very dramatic setting.

  We began our meal with champagne and a savory baked apple I’d dreamed up after a visit to the market that was filled with peppered fresh goat cheese and sautéed leeks. None of us are big meat eaters and we all love seafood, so I’d decided to simply sauté three different kinds of fish in butter and lemon, and serve them with a salad of baby greens grown in the garden. I had found baby sole, rascasse (scorpion fish), and daurade (sea bream), each of which has its own distinctive flavor and texture. Following that was a selection of three different qualities of Roquefort cheese because Edith has a particular fondness for this cheese. Dessert was a tart of paper-thin pastry filled with apples and a sprinkling of fresh thyme.

  We were eating and marveling at the view when suddenly Bernard said, “I spoke to Florence about you, and she told me what was bothering her.” We were all ears. “Apparently she had her family over for a meal and they wanted to know who you were. When she explained that you wrote cookbooks, her brother told her she’d better watch out, that you probably worked for the CIA, since the job of cookbook writer is a famous CIA cover.” He was speaking so seriously and with such earnestness that we listened to him, believing every word. When he finished, we both just stared. Then, we burst out laughing. He did, too.

  “You’re kidding,” I said. “I’m not,” he said, this time not laughing. “She now thinks you are CIA agents and that you’ve been spying on them.”

  Michael and I were flabbergasted. “This can’t be true. If we were CIA agents why would we have been crammed into that tiny little cottage for a year, while Michael worked on this ruin?” I said. “If we were CIA agents wouldn’t we be wealthy?”

  Bernard shrugged. “I tried to point out to her how ridiculous that was and how we’ve all known you for so long we would surely know if you worked for the CIA, but she wouldn’t hear it,” he said. Bernard assured us that her husband didn’t share her fear and that, within a few years, she’d forget all about it. Despite this disturbing bit of paranoia, we went on to enjoy our evening in the Messy House, with our friends who had helped make our new life in France possible.

  The Subaru station wagon we had shipped from the States arrived safely in Le Havre amidst a temps de cochon, or “pig weather,” when it was raining so hard you couldn’t see the lines on the road. The company who shipped the car had warned us to make sure it was completely empty, for they assured us that anything left in it would be stolen. As I looked at the mounds of things we wanted to send
to France, mostly children’s toys and books, I thought that a terrible waste of space, but wasn’t about to risk packing the car full.

  We worried a bit that the radio might be gone but when we picked up the car it was intact. We signed the appropriate papers and got in the car to drive off into the downpour. When Michael, who was driving, turned on the windshield wipers we realized they were gone. We told the director of the office, who looked at us as if he could not understand what we were saying. “Monsieur, ’dame,” he said slowly, enunciating. “Many of these cars arrive with headlights broken and radios ripped out. Your problem is nothing, nothing at all.”

  How were we to see as we drove out of the terminal which fed right onto the autoroute and its traffic that whizzed by at more than 100 miles per hour? “This is not our problem,” the director said. “You will simply have to buy new windshield wipers. Any garage will have them.” What he failed to explain is that there were no garages within a reasonable distance.

  We had no choice but to proceed, gingerly. Michael drove with his head craned outside so he could see, sort of. It was hair raising but we managed to get to the first exit where there was a garage. The windshield wipers they had didn’t fit the car but they worked well enough so that Michael could see the road and we were soon on our way.

  What had been a good car in the ice and snow of Maine proved to be just as good on the slick roads of Normandy, and the U.S. license plates—adorned with a red lobster—kept the local police at bay. They weren’t about to meddle with drivers who might not speak French.

  The customs police in their imposing skin-tight black pants, knee-high black boots, square-shouldered and silver-buttoned short jackets, and white cross-the-chest holsters were a different story. I always had the feeling their mouths watered when they saw us coming, for they often stopped us. I suppose they were looking for drugs, and cars with foreign license plates must be highly suspect.

  I remember getting stopped one day in particular. We had been in France just a few months, so our American driver’s licenses were still legal, as was everything about the car, although this would change after a year when we would have to get French driver’s licenses and bring the car up (or down) to French standards. We dreaded both of those, since getting a driver’s license in France costs a fortune and takes forever, and because bringing the car within French standards involves changing just about everything about it except the steering wheel. As it was I had nothing to fear.

  On that particular day I was driving to the supermarket with Joe, whom I had just gotten up from his nap. He was safely strapped into his car seat in the back and we were singing when I turned onto the main road, a bit too quickly I admit. I was flagged over by the police. I swore inwardly thinking it was my speed until I recognized the uniforms of the customs police. The local police remind me of Dupont and Dupond in the Tintin stories, rather fumbling, dim, and harmless. The customs guys are something else. They look down on everyone with hauteur, they don’t smile, and with their stark uniforms they look mean. They make me nervous.

  I pulled over and stayed in the car as the two officers examined my papers, pulling out my Maine driver’s license and checking it on both sides, then examining my carte de séjour, which proved I was a legal resident of France. They kept looking over at me and discussing something in a low voice.

  I busied myself by looking around at the interior of our car. It was a mess. There were magazines on the front seat, books stacked in the back, and a varied collection of small child detritus like pieces of cracker and ends of baguettes and books and toys. I was embarrassed. Normally our car is relatively tidy, but since moving to France it had become something of a third home as we shuttled between our little house on the river and the Messy House in Louviers.

  The officers strode back over and one bent down to speak to me. “Madame, je vous en prie,” he began, then Joe started to cry. He had just realized, I think, that he was no longer in his cozy bed but was strapped into the car, not his favorite place. “Madame, nous voulons examiner votre voiture.”

  They wanted to search the car. Oh geez. I looked at him, about to cry myself. I’d been carting boxes all week in between trying to work, the house we were renting was chaotic, and the Messy House was a cold, chilly wreck. I wasn’t sure my spirit could withstand a howling child and a car search at the hands of these snooty, tight-lipped officers.

  “I have nothing in here of interest,” I said, agitated. “My child, some books, and a lot of junky paper.” Joe was crying louder and beginning to wiggle with frustration. There is something about a strapped-down child crying in the back of the car, just out of reach, which causes my nerves to bunch up—I can’t stand the thought that anyone might be uncomfortable, particularly when there is nothing I can do about it.

  Despite my inner turmoil I didn’t want to defy the customs police, who do not enjoy a humanitarian reputation. I unbuckled my seatbelt and made motions to open the car door. The officers were conferring again in hushed, serious voices. The spokesman returned to me and leaned over. “Madame, nous avons decidé de vous laisser passer.”

  They were letting me go. Whew. What a relief. I had nothing to hide and I still felt like I’d been saved from purgatory. What about all the people who get stopped and do have something to hide?

  It was only later as we were on our way home after an uneventful visit to the supermarket that I thought of the contents of my glove compartment. For some reason I was keeping a collection of powdered sourdough starters in there, each in its individual white envelope. Perspiration popped out on my forehead. Oh Lord, what if they had searched the car and found those envelopes? I could just see myself trying to explain what was in them.

  “Oh yes, officer,” I would have said as I watched one or the other of them sift out the fine white powder. “It’s just dried

  levain.”

  Why, they would surely want to know, would someone travel with dried sourdough starter in the glove compartment of their car? That was a question even I couldn’t answer.

  I nearly started shaking as I thought of what a close call I’d had. Then I burst out laughing. “What’s so funny, Mama?” Joe asked from the backseat. I started to say something but I was laughing too hard to reply. I explained it to him, when I finally caught my breath, though the story was not as funny to him as seeing me nearly bent double.

  It took us about two years to get used to the tuyau system in France. This is an undocumented system that pervades every element of French society and is vaguely comparable to the notion of bypassing the authorities. In its most extreme form it is nothing less than cheating.

  We hadn’t been at all aware of it before we moved to France, but once here it kept seeping into our consciousness, baffling as well as intriguing us. One of the first places we saw it at work was with Edith and Bernard, who received shipments of wine regularly throughout the year which they bought through a tuyau, in this case a friend who knew the vintner. It simply meant they got the wine for a good price because their friend who knew the vintner grouped all his friends together to buy a large quantity of the wine. This was harmless, legal, and to everyone’s advantage. In fact, once we found out about it we asked to take advantage of this particular tuyau, too.

  Michael had parked his old truck on the church square in a paying parking spot and forgotten to move it when he and Joe flew to Italy, where I was researching a project, to meet me for a week’s vacation. When he returned his windshield was papered with parking tickets amounting to several hundred francs. Frustrated with his own carelessness he mentioned it to a friend who takes care of our vehicles. Our friend put his hand on Michael’s shoulder and said, “Don’t worry, I am going to help you.” He helped Michael write a letter to an official explaining what had happened, then went to the official to see him in person. According to Michael, he then stopped by the house and said the tickets had all been forgiven. Michael thanked our friend profusely and tried to give him a bottle of wine. “You owe me nothing,” he sai
d. “But the official is an amateur of whiskey.” Within a couple of days we’d sent him a bottle of the finest.

  Michael, in the course of talking with a bricoleur friend who does a lot of work on his own house, found out that he could buy electrical equipment at cost if he went through this friend who had a friend who worked at an electrical supply house. It involved the minor complication of knowing exactly the type and quantity of material he would need well in advance. For a savings of nearly fifty percent, it was worth it. Michael would write out his orders, our friend would order the equipment under the name of his company, and the discount would be ours.

  We have a friend who has a restaurant and when he realized the extent of my recipe testing he told me he could take me to a wholesale supply store where I would be able to buy everything from unsalted butter to stainless steel mixing bowls at just above cost. “No one but registered food professionals are supposed to go, but I’ll just take you with me and pay for your things and you can pay me, no problem,” he said. The first time I accompanied him I was nervous and hoped it didn’t show. My friend assured me there was no problem. “Everyone does this, they just don’t say anything,” he said.

  The tuyau system has developed to circumvent the killing taxes placed on every aspect of French life, but it is also an ingrained part of the French, who love to glisser, or slip through these kinds of loopholes without being noticed or caught. All of these quasi-illegal exploits are much discussed afterward, usually with pride. A friend who claimed her car was damaged in a parking lot when she was the one who caused the damage told everyone she talked with about it, laughing gleefully to think she’d gotten away with it. Another friend claims he buys televisions for people he knows because he paid his television tax when he bought his own television and he now has the right to buy as many as he wants without paying any more tax, whereas first-time purchasers must pay a hefty sum.