It’s worth shelling out on this French bliss
Anna gives this sumptuous cuisine a perfect 10 for taste
It’s been several decades since I had a food parcel from my mum. In the years before she died, the roles were reversed and I took her home baking, her favourite herring from the fish shop or salad leaves from my garden.
But when I was a student, Mum was the queen of the Red Cross delivery. There would be a giant jar of instant coffee, a block of cheddar the size of a brick, homemade jam, chutney and marmalade. Plus a tin of her extra crunchy shortbread or a barnbrack made from the recipe that I still use.
For a few days, the desolate cupboards of my shared flat would feel like home.
I was reminded of these edible expressions of love by a dinner in a box from L’Escargot Bleu. This Edinburgh institution, under the talented hands of Fred Berkmiller, serves what the French call “cuisine grandmere”. Snails, rabbit, boudin noir, chicory salads, all the solid, unfussy classics of French home cooking are there, with a few bistro flourishes thrown in.
If I had a French granny who did emergency dinners, this is what she would send.
I liked everything about the way L’Escargot Bleu organised their takeaway. The menu, which changes every week, has a few cold starters and one soup. Then five or six casseroles, which serve two and include potatoes. These are straightforward to reheat on the top of the stove or the oven.
Sides include vegetables in garlic butter for the full restaurant experience and a gratin for the really decadent Sunday-lunch-atGranny’s experience. To my great joy, nothing involved pouches of puree or mysterious tubs of crumbs. Berkmiller grows the veg, salads and herbs in a walled garden on the outskirts of the capital. It shows.
An asparagus salad – a handful of fat spears on top of a tangle of leaves, tomatoes and herbs – was like eating spring. There was a lush crème fraîche dressing – actually more of a dip – to swipe
the asparagus. The other starter, a rabbit terrine studded with pistachios, was a slice of France. Charcuterie, cornichons, sweet little pickled carrots – all that was missing was the sun, the glass of rosé and the view of a field of sunflowers. It was also very rich. At first I complained about the lack of baguette. Then I needed a rest before my main course.
The hideous cruelty of traditional veal production means it rarely appears on menus. I can’t recall the last time I ate it. But rose veal comes from the male calves born in the dairy industry. No crates, no special diet to keep their flesh white.
Here, it came in the historic stew veal marengo. The legend is that, after Napoleon defeated the Austrian army at the Battle of Marengo, his chef had run out of provisions. He requisitioned what he could find from the town of Marengo, south of Turin, and improvised. This is the result.
More than 300 years on, the Berkmiller version contains melting hunks of meat and a scattering of mushrooms in an intense but not thick gravy. A few plain, peeled potatoes are not a traditional ingredient but they made the preparation delightfully straightforward. I mashed mine into the gravy and I’m not ashamed to admit it. It was so good, with the depth of flavour that only comes from hours of loving cooking and many bones in the stock pot.
In true French style, we had the side salad afterwards. The leaves – unfussy varieties of lettuce and fronds of tarragon and chervil – were so fresh they bounced. With a proper French vinaigrette, emulsified with Dijon mustard, they were an utter delight.
The lemon pot, in its foil tray, was not the most elegant dessert. But when faced with solid lemon curd and a spoon, I don’t care. And there was a cute element – three dainty biscuits that survived the trip home and being dropped on the road as the bag disintegrated. Speculos, langue de chat and shortbread covered most of the Auld Alliance in one bag of baking.
A chocolate and pear brioche pudding was a French take on the homely bread and butter puds my mum used to make with a stale loaf. Berkmiller’s crème Anglaise – basically posh custard – took it to the next level.
This was one of the best box dinners I’ve had. Minimum fuss in preparation, maximum delight in consumption. Everything was robust enough to survive transport and plating by an amateur. Each mouthful an edible hug. And we all need a bit of that.