The Ritual Master Hello friends ! I hope you’re all doing well, whether you’re still waiting for Spring, enjoying the blossoming trees, living under permanent sunshine or slowly going into Autumn right now. There’s beauty in every season, and never ending wisdom in enjoying what we have right now.
My current state of mind, no doubt influenced by the colours popping out all around me, is to celebrate this coming back to life that Spring offers each year. I do that in many ways, but the one that never fails goes through my taste buds. Starting with a joyful table set for any kind of a feast, and of course, a good book.
You’ve already seen some of my food memoir favourites, that is a genre I regularly return to for relaxing and inspiring reads. But every once in a while, a work of fiction manages to awaken inside me that same fascination with the art of gastronomy, and one of the most recent ones was Muriel Barbery’s debut novel, Une gourmandise translated as Gourmet Rhapsody.
You probably know of Muriel Barbery thanks to her bestselling novel L’élégance du hérisson, The elegance of the hedgehog, an ode to old school Parisian lifestyle. What few people know is that the story actually started in her debut novel, when she draw the first sketches of the elegant building on rue de Grenelle and a few of its tenants.
Gourmet Rhapsody is a succession of memories, like the frames on a museum wall, each one presented from another point of view, but with a central one being more present and imposing. It’s the story of the greatest food critic in the world, the Pope of gastronomy, the indisputable head of the table. On his death bed, he’s searching for a special flavour, a taste of childhood or adolescence, that gustatory memory that is greater than any gourmet meal. His search brings back memories, unforgettable feasts of family gatherings, of exquisite restaurants, picture frames of sublimated aromas. These alternate with other people’s views on his life, slightly less exuberant and certainly less flattering for him, a kind of dark side of the moon to confirm that no life is made only of pleasure.
This is an elegant read, profoundly Parisian and mouthwatering not only for the food but also for the phrases. The original text is one of my favourite contemporary expressions of the French language, so I can only hope the translations live up to the challenge. Here’s a little taste :
Le vrai sashimi ne se croque pas plus qu’il ne fond sur la langue. Il invite à une mastication lente et souple, qui n’a pas pour fin de faire changer l’aliment de nature mais seulement d’en savourer l’aérienne moellesse… le sashimi, poussière de velours aux confins de la soie, emporte un peu des deux et, dans l’alchimie extraordinaire de son essence vaporeuse, conserve une densité laiteuse que les nuages n’ont pas.
― Muriel Barbery, Une gourmandise
True sashimi is not so much bitten into as allowed to melt on the tongue. It calls for slow, supple chewing, not to bring about a change in the nature of the food but merely to allow one to savor its airy, satiny texture… sashimi is velvet dust, verging on silk, or a bit of both, and the extraordinary alchemy of its gossamer essence allows it to preserve a milky density unknown even by clouds.
― Muriel Barbery, Gourmet Rhapsody
To accompany such a fascinating read, I’m making myself one of the quintessential French cocktails served as an apéritif : a Kir. Don’t be fooled by the name, this Crème de cassis is not a syrup, but a blackcurrant liqueur, that does a marvellous job at uplifting a delicate white wine, like my Pinot Gris. The origins of the Kir go back to 1904 Dijon, where an anonymous bartender found a way of masking some poor quality white wine by adding the blackcurrant liqueur that had been invented and patented 50 years earlier. Like anything in France, this cocktail has its history and its terroir, a bond with the land it came from, the fascinating Bourgogne.
Gourmet Rhapsody is such an extraordinary apéritif in its most elementary meaning of opening up one’s appetite. And that goes further than good food, this novel will make you want to travel and taste the sardines of Brittany or the exquisite Moroccan pastries, drink the most complex glass of red wine or simply go back to basics, in a vegetable garden bathed in glorious sunshine :
The raw tomato, devoured in the garden when freshly picked, is a horn of abundance of simple sensations, a radiating rush in one’s mouth that brings with it every pleasure. . . . a tomato, an adventure.
― Muriel Barbery, Gourmet Rhapsody
Yet there is another quote that inspired a special detour going home from work one evening :
“In the simple word ‘sorbet,’ there is already an entire world… you have already opted for lightness, already chosen refinement, you are offering airy vistas while refusing a heavy land-bound trek with closed horizons. Airy, indeed: a sorbet is airy, almost immaterial, it froths ever so slightly as it makes contact with your warmth…
[…] Thus I set upon the orange sorbet, tasted it as a man in the know, certain of what I was about to discover but attentive all the same to what were ever-changing sensations. And then something stopped me. I had tasted the other iced waters with the peace of mind of one who knows his stuff. But this sorbet, this orange one, was a cut above all the others.”
― Muriel Barbery, Gourmet Rhapsody
The orange sorbet becomes a bit of an obsession for our main character, and so I found myself intrigued by something that never seemed that special to me before. But one thing was for sure : the place to discover such a delicate delight could be none other that Berthillon. One of the best kept secrets of Paris resides on the miniature island of Saint-Louis, nestled right next to the greater, more famous Île de la Cité, home of the Notre Dame cathedral. L’île Saint-Louis is a place out of time, something that tourists imagine all of Paris must look like, and even though every other café on the island has a Berthillon ice cream sign up front, this is still a niche subject, with many Parisians having never tasted a scoop of the magic.
A family business that started in 1954, Berthillon prides itself with no added flavours, just the pure essence and taste of the ingredients. After years of pistachio ice cream that tasted more of almond extract than anything else, theirs was a revelation. The salted butter caramel is out of this world and the blackcurrant sorbet is a dream. So when I got to their ice cream parlour, I was convinced that my orange curiosity will be satisfied. But never in a million years would I have guessed that the latest flavour added to their collection would be an orange, carrot and saffron sorbet. This was meant to be ! I paired it with a scoop of mandarine sorbet and a gianduja ice cream with orange zest, and dedicated the half hour spent there to the purest most simple pleasure of my taste buds.
When I go to places like this alone, I enjoy being completely present and observant. The sounds, the people, and of course the orders I hear around me : roasted pineapple and basil, rose water raspberry, black chocolate mint, lemon thyme, lavender, wild strawberry and rhubarb, marron glacé with a touch of rhum or black cherries. Just hearing the combinations people make is fascinating. A place to come whenever you need to marvel at something !
I’m curious to know if you’ve read any of Muriel Barbery’s novels and this one in particular. It was one of my most relaxing reads this last few months and a permanent recommendation for anyone that’s curious about French contemporary literature.
Until next time, enjoy your reading and your gourmet adventures !
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