Bonjour French Market Friends,
In France this week political parties are taking stock of the results of the Municipal elections where centrist 
parties, through alignment with several smaller parties, managed to stave off extremists on the Right and Left. This was an encouraging result for the Centrists as France moves towards the Presidential election next year. In other news, one of Napoleon’s black bicorne beaver hats, that was with him when he was held captive on the island of St Helena, was recently found and identified as genuine. Napoleon wore his hats sideways to give a distinctive outline so that his soldiers could recognise him in battle. The hat will be on display at the Chateau de Chantilly later this year (Image courtesy By Jacques-Louis David – Google Art Project, Public Domain- Wikipedia).
With the Easter weekend fast approaching, we are bringing in lots of new cheese stock from F
rance, so that you can create your French cheese platter to accompany your Easter celebrations. The AF plane is landing in the morning direct from Paris with a couple of hundred kilos of cheese on board. We should have all your favourite cheeses in stock. Do message me (Whatsapp/email) if you would like to place an Easter order so that we can get it ready for you and you don’t have to wait. I’m happy to guide you – you can reach me on the Whatsapp 0833006725 to pre-order.
Favourite
s in the soft cheeses are Brie layered with truffle cream, triple cream delice, Vacherousse and the hand-crafted Brie Donge. In medium firm textures most popular are Morbier, Emmental and Tomme des croquants, in the aged cheese the Comte and Gruyere are at the top of the list. In the blues the Roquefort leads the blue mob, with its strong salty taste. We now have to pre-order a minimum quantity of Roquefort if we want to get stock, so we have many kilos of this stunning cheese.
We have plenty of French meat terrines and pates that you can share with your friends, especially the rich duck liver mousse that is a perfect starter course for a celebration meal. If you are off hiking next weekend, then take some of the 78gr tins of terrines and mousses as they are the perfect size to pop in your backpack and make a delicious snack on a cracker.
The fresh produce is changing as the seasons slowly change. We have received some fresh porcinis, indicating the beginning of the autumn weather as the Persian fig season is coming to an end. These porcinis are large, about the size of a hand and in great condition. Combine these cooked in butter with some of our super jumbo farm eggs and you will have a meal made in heaven. In Europe as winter changes to Spring, we enter the Bianchetto white Spring truffle season.
In Cape Town we have lots of fresh berries in season right now, so today’s recipe is an easy dessert of fresh berries, meringue base and yoghurt. We stock amazing fresh meringues, sometimes these crumble. In this easy recipe I used broken meringue pieces topped with yoghurt and decorated with blueberries and raspberries. This is such an easy and quick recipe (if you have a meringue available) and is most attractive, with the blue and red of the berries nestled in the whiteness of the yoghurt. It takes less than 5 minutes to assemble. For wine pairing I would recommend a fresh, delicate, bubbly wine such as the Crémant from Alsace, which we stock in our shop.
I hope you have a relaxing weekend; forecast is sunny but with moderate temperatures as we start to gently move into Autumn.
Regards
Suzanne and The French Market Team