TARTE TATIN, POUR LE REGIME
CARAMELIZED APPLE TART (LOW-FAT)
MAKES 8 SERVINGS
Many French women—and men—are obsessed with le régime, or their diet. Although you don’t see as many heavy people in France as you do elsewhere, that’s changing. Le Figaro newspaper reported that in the past thirty years, the average Frenchman gained 11.8 pounds. (Fortunately there were no published statistics about the weight gain of American men who’ve moved to France.) And even though French people don’t obsess as much as we do about what they eat, there are plenty of Parisians who will readily admit that they’d like to lose a few kilos.
This is my “diet” version of the classic tarte Tatin, an open-faced tart of caramelized apples on a very thin sheet of flaky pastry. Since I use apples that have lots of flavor, all that’s needed is a pat of butter to add a bit of richness.
I may be hopelessly American when I say this, but a good accompaniment to tarte Tatin is a steaming cup of espresso, and I’ll enjoy them together at home. But if you come to Paris, sit in a café, and order both at the same time, and you get a funny look, don’t say I didn’t warn you.
For the dough
¾ cup (110 g) flour
¼ teaspoon coarse salt
1½ teaspoons granulated sugar
2 tablespoons (30 g) unsalted butter, cut into ½-Inch (2-cm) cubes and chilled
3 tablespoons (45 ml) ice-cold water
For the apples
8 firm, tart baking apples
Juice of ½ lemon
1 tablespoon (15 g) unsalted or salted butter
½ cup (120 g) packed dark brown sugar
To make the dough, combine the flour, salt, and sugar in a food processor, standing mixer, or pastry blender. Add the butter and mix until the butter is in pea-sized chunks. Stir in the water and mix just until the dough holds together. Shape into a disk and wrap in plastic wrap. (Dough can be made up to 3 days before using.)
To make the tart, quarter, peel, and core the apples. Toss the pieces with the lemon juice in a big bowl and set aside.
Melt the butter in a 10-inch (25-cm) cast-iron skillet. Stir in the brown sugar and remove from heat.
Arrange the apple quarters in the pan rounded side down, with their cored sides facing upwards. Tightly pack the apples in overlapping concentric circles. Really cram them in. It may seem like a lot, but they’ll cook down, so don’t worry.
Cook over medium heat for 20 to 25 minutes. Do not stir or move the apples while cooking, but gently press them down slightly with a spatula as they soften.
While the apples are cooking, preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C). Position a rack in the upper third of the oven.
Roll the dough on a lightly floured surface into a 12-inch (30-cm) circle. (It will be thin, but don’t worry.) Drape the dough over the apples, tucking in the edges, and bake the tart on an upper rack of the oven for 35 to 40 minutes, until the dough is golden brown.
Remove from the oven and invert a baking sheet over the tart. Hold the skillet in place wearing an oven mitt and flip both the skillet and the baking sheet simultaneously, being careful of any hot pan juices. Lift off the skillet, loosen any apples that may have stuck, and reunite them with the tart.
SERVING: Serve tarte Tatin warm, with a scoop of vanilla ice cream or crème fraîche (page 193). At Berthillon in Paris, the famed ice cream shop, they serve a picture-perfect version in their tea salon with a scoop of caramel ice cream, which is over-the-top good.
WELCOME TO FRANPRIX!
On recent trips back to the States, I noticed something interesting had happened during my absence: supermarkets had become inviting places to shop. Seemingly overnight, grocery stores in America have gone to great lengths to make shopping there more pleasant, transforming giant steel and concrete bunkers into lush, welcoming spaces. Some now feature spas, massage therapists, and soothing music; as well as well-stocked salad and coffee bars; mood lighting; clean restrooms; florists; and fresh fruits and vegetables heaped in wicker baskets with a gentle mist falling on them, with photos of happy, dirt-free farmers smiling down from above.
Last time I went to an American supermarket, I felt so welcome and got such a warm, cozy feeling inside that I didn’t want to leave. The ultra-plush seating area set amid a jungle of exotic plants and aromatherapy sprays was more comfy than home. After I did my shopping, I almost hated to interrupt the staff, luxuriating in their hot tub, to ring up my groceries.
When I think of a French supermarket, the feeling that comes to mind is “Romanian prison.” My local Franprix supermarché is a place I step into only with great reluctance: I buy what I need and check out as soon as possible. I look forward to going there as much as having oral surgery, without anesthesia.
From the moment you cross the threshold, instead of a friendly greeting, a grim, dour security guard in an ill-fitting Dacron suit will scan you up and down, mentally frisking you. If you have any bags, you’ll need to either check them on the way in or they’ll certainly be rifled through, with more thoroughness than airport security, on the way out. I make sure to arrive empty-handed, since I figure it’s only a matter of time before I’m pulled out of the checkout line for a full-on cavity search.
From the horrendous fluorescent lighting that makes even Frenchmen look bad, to the floor that always feels unnervingly tacky, my Franprix is grimy and poorly maintained. If something needs to be unloaded, the staff invariably stacks the crates right in the center of the aisle, blocking everything and making it impossible to get around. And if you think anyone would ever dream of moving out of the way so you can get by, you need to go back and reread “Les Bousculeurs.”
If something gets dropped or spilled in an American supermarket, an overeager soul will breathlessly get on the loudspeaker to issue an all-points-bulletin to cordon off the area and get it cleaned up. Pronto. At my Franprix, if there’s a mess, all the employees gather in a semicircle around it to watch it spread. They just stand there, watching it, waiting for something to happen. You can see them backing away and thinking to themselves, “C’est pas ma faute … c’est pas ma faute …,” hoping for someone else to take the initiative. They’ll toss a plastic cone nearby, shrug, then head back outside to finish their cigarettes.
And if there is anything welcoming in there, aside from the rows of inexpensive wine, I’ve yet to find it. While American supermarkets have caught on to the fact that if you make the supermarket experience more pleasant people will (1) want to spend more time there and (2) want to spend more money, both of those concepts have eluded the French supermarket chains. That is, with the exception of Monoprix, which also happens to be under the same ownership as the chic Galeries Lafayette department store. The only reason I can think of for the lack of improvements is that French people have been so used to going to the outdoor markets and small shops for their needs that no one gives any thought to the supermarket “experience.”
There are about seventy-five outdoor markets in Paris, which take place on various days of the week. Yet only two specialize in foods cultivated in the Ile-de-France, the central region of France, where Paris is located. The Raspail market on Sunday and one at Batignolles on Saturday mostly feature produce grown by the local producteurs themselves: organic breads, earthy greens like puntarella and brocollini, tight clusters of white-tipped radishes; you can even find les brownies américains at the Raspail market. (People keep asking me if I’ve tried them, but why on earth would I, of all people, need to buy an American brownie in Paris?)
But to find the best options for locally sourced produce in Paris, you really need to get out of the city. I have a few favorite markets, such as the one in Coulommiers—an unexciting town, but the epicenter for Brie, which is quite a treat for cheese lovers like me. But my favorite is in Provins, a small town about an hour outside of Paris. Once a week, the town center comes alive with tables and carts heaped with beautiful, locally grown fare. The farmers don’t even bother pulling the weighty pumpkins
off the truck since they’d surely crush their rickety tables. They just hack off a slice as you order it. I’ve tasted strawberries so sweet—deep red throughout—that they burst like Japanese candy in your mouth. And I bag up handfuls of itty-bitty leafy greens, all tangled together (the vendors let you help yourself—“Comme vous voulez!” “As you wish!”), which I was thrilled to do, being used to bossy Parisian vendors. “C’est plus facile pour tous, monsieur,” one told me with a smile: “It’s easier for everyone.”
The first time I went, I was bewildered. As I piled everything into my basket, racing from one table to the next, I asked one of the men, who had soil caked under his fingernails and whose hands were as deeply wrinkled as his leafy Savoy cabbages, “Why don’t you bring this gorgeous produce into Paris?”
“Je déteste les Parisiens,” he said.
A lot of French people aren’t fond of Parisians. But since that’s where I live, and since I do like Parisians (well, most of them), I thought driving a few hours back and forth to do my shopping wouldn’t help me réduire mon empreinte CO2. So I’m stuck doing my shopping closer to home.
When I bemoan the state of French supermarkets, comparing them to those back in the States, people tell me, “David, that’s San Francisco, which is really different from other places. You don’t know what it’s like outside of San Francisco.”
True. Except Paris is a world capital, often called the Capital of Cuisine, and I think it’s reasonable to compare it to San Francisco, and other cities, and hold it to the same standard. It’s not like I’m comparing Paris to Po-dunk. It’s Paris, for God’s sake. Yes, Paris! You should walk into any food market and be knocked flat by the qualité exceptionnelle of everything. Not knocked flat by slipping on a broken bottle of frying oil that no one could be bothered to clean up.
If you think the quality of the produce is bad, the service scores even lower. My local supermarket closes at 9 p.m. But if you’re not in the door by 8:45, you can forget it. I’ve tried to go at 8:46 p.m., and the staff has already barricaded the door and started turning out the lights.
So you need to be constantly thinking ahead. Which means that if you haven’t bought everything you need by Friday afternoon, you’re sunk until the following Tuesday. Yes, Tuesday. Since most of the supermarkets are closed on Sunday, everyone with a day job has to do all their shopping on Saturday, when the stores are pandemonium and the lines are epic. It’s a day that I avoid Franprix even more than usual.
But you’re probably wondering why you have to wait until Tuesday. Aren’t they open Monday? I don’t even bother showing up on Monday, since it takes at least until Tuesday afternoon for them to restock the shelves from the hordes that descended over the weekend. So if I realize I’m out of Tropicana Pure Premium Réveil Gourmand on Saturday morning, I shouldn’t expect another gourmet wake-up call until at least Wednesday.
The final insult is the checkout, where the cashiers barely look up from what they’re doing to grunt an acknowledgment in your direction. It’s not that they’re rude; it’s that they’re under strict orders not to chat with customers so they can give their full attention to the money. There’s barely any interaction, and if I merit a mumbled “Bonjour”, it’s a momentous occasion.
If something’s on promotion, I don’t even bother to toss it in my basket, since I’ve had too many showdowns with cashiers when the sale price doesn’t ring up at the register. And no one wants to distract the manager from his nose-picking duties to do a price check. Most manufacturers have gotten wise to this tactic and just reformulate their packaging to offer 15 percent more orange juice or tuna fish rather than hope the stores honor a price reduction.
It’s also not common to get help with bagging your groceries in France. (Someone left a comment on my Web site that bagging groceries in the States was “the last remainder of slavery.”) But the self-service model doesn’t work. Once the clerk passes your groceries over the scanner, she flings them down to the end of the counter in a careless heap. Meanwhile, the person in front of you hasn’t had time to pay and pack up his groceries, which are scattered all over the place. So when your groceries head down the chute, off they go, mingling with the purchases of the customer ahead of you.
Soon you’re simultaneously engrossed in a discussion over whose milk is whose—did you or I buy that can of le tripe in sauce tomate? (I insist it’s his)—and didn’t I buy the Gamay and you bought the Chinon? And I’m sure those oursons guimauve, the chocolate-covered marshmallows shaped like bears, are mine. But the pistachio macaron-flavored yogurt isn’t, (though I kind of wonder what it tastes like.)
And while you’re both sorting through the jumble of goods and you’re praying you won’t suffer permanent kidney damage from the person behind you, who’s jamming you forward with her basket, more groceries start heading down the pipeline, inciting another wave of panic.
Once I actually got help from a cashier who must have been basking in her freedom after the shackles of slavery had been removed, and instead of just sitting there watching, pitched in to help me. Or maybe she was just new. When I thanked her profusely—“Ça va, monsieur, c’est plus vite” (“That’s okay, it’s faster”)—I wondered if she might inform her coworkers that there was a more expedient way. But I’m not holding my breath.
Maybe I should give them a bit of a break. After all, I have to spend only a few minutes there each week, while they have to be in there all day. Sure, I’d like it better if the aisles were cleaner, the fruits and vegetables were fresher, they had more than one grocery divider per store (they must be terribly expensive in France), and the cashiers were a little friendlier. Featuring local products would be nice, too. All that would probably help lift the spirits of those who work there, plus make it a more enjoyable place to shop.
But I’ll continue to shop there unless they raise the price of wine. As long as they have that going for them, it makes it a little bit easier to put up with the other indignities. After all, I do have my priorities.
OIGNONS AIGRES-DOUX
SWEET-AND-SOUR ONIONS
MAKES 6 TO 8 SERVINGS
It’s so challenging to find good fruits and vegetables in supermarkets that many Parisians head straight to Picard, a chain of frozen-food stores. The stores are immaculately clean and brightly lit, each a beacon of hope in the bleak landscape of supermarket produce. Although I’m not the addict that many others are, I’m amazed at what you can find there: shelled fava beans, lobes of foie gras, individually frozen macarons, ready-to-bake soufflés a la framboise, precut bags of leeks, and big sacks of pitted sour cherries, of which—as someone who’s pitted a heckuva lot of cherries in his lifetime—I am a great fan. They also have small peeled onions that I like to cook in a sweet-and-sour mixture of sugar and vinegar and serve alongside roast meats.
In general, though, I prefer to use regional products as much as possible, and on a trip to rural Brittany, I passed a sign for a producteur-récoltant with a colorful drawing of some appealing-looking apples. Slamming on the brakes, I made an unauthorized U-turn, ignoring the ire of drivers in both directions. They were undoubtedly left cursing the Citroën, whose license plate read “département 75” (the mark of the despised Parisian driver), that was running amok in their idyllic countryside. I followed the dirt road that led to the apple orchard of Paul Loïc, where he and his family press the most wonderful apple juice and make a fruity apple cider vinegar, which smells just like fall apples, too. It adds a lovely fruit note to these sweet-sour onions.
If you have fresh boiling onions, you can peel them by dropping them in boiling water and letting them simmer for five minutes. Drain them, and let them cool. Then slice the ends from each one and slip off the skins. You can also use small shallots. These are terrific served alongside a meaty pâté or added to a braised meat or poultry dish, like the Braised Turkey in Beaujolais Nouveau (page 160). If you like them spicy, use harissa or Asian chile paste instead of tomato paste.
This recipe was inspired by
Judy Witts Francini, who teaches Italian cooking in Florence, but who has French roots.
1 pound (450 g) small boiling onions, peeled
2 tablespoons light brown sugar
¼ cup (60 ml) apple cider vinegar
½ cup (125 ml) apple juice or cider or water
1 tablespoon tomato paste or ½ teaspoon harissa or chile paste
½ teaspoon coarse salt
Put all the ingredients in a deep, nonreactive skillet, cover, and cook over moderate heat for 10 minutes.
Remove the cover and continue to cook the onions. During the first few minutes, you don’t need to stir them, but as the liquid slowly reduces and the onions begin to caramelize, you should start stirring.
Keep stirring during the final minutes so they don’t burn, cooking until the liquid is thick and syrupy; they’re done when a thin layer of liquid remains on the bottom of the pan. Remove from heat and transfer the onions to a bowl, scraping the flavorful juices clinging to the pan as well.
STORAGE: These onions are even better the next day, and will keep in the refrigerator for up to one week.
FANCYING LE FROMAGE
Aside from the so-so supermarket fare, there are a lot of exceptional things to eat in France. Although I have a well-known weak spot for the chocolates, what’s truly special are the French cheeses, which no other country or culture could ever hope to match. From Abondance to Vacherin, every round, square, or bouton of cheese is an expression of terroir, climate, and other geographical elements specific to the region where it’s produced.
Each cheese is distinct and appealing in its own particular way, whether aged and earthy or ripe and runny. Although I have my favorites, I haven’t tasted a cheese that didn’t make me swoon. I want them all. How can one decide between a wedge of Coulommiers and a chunk of Comté? The happy tradition of the cheese course, which still concludes meals in France, gives one an opportunity to try several of them.
The Sweet Life in Paris Page 17