How is pumpkin prepared in the French cuisine? (recipe included)

HOW IS PUMPKIN PREPARED IN THE FRENCH CUISINE?

Halloween and Thanksgiving may not be French holidays, but pumpkins are in every French kitchen!

Of course, the Jack-O-Lanterns are the mandatory staple of any American household, and they’re selling like pumpkin pies!

Speaking of which, check out the article below for an amazing recipe of the French cuisine and watch the video for some French that sells!

(This week: the verb VENDRE – to sell)

This is a blog post shared from Cécile Delarue’s frenchandparfait.com.

Be sweet ! Make a savoury pumpkin pie !

My dear, poor, non-French people,

The more I live in the US, the more I’m amazed by how different and at the same time similar our cultures and minds are.

Take pumpkins for example. Simple, round, orange vegetables.

You guys turn them into horror masks…

While we (among which French and perfect author Charles Perrault) imagined they could turn into a wonderful carosse that could also turn a poor damzel in distress into a glamourous princess…

But we have this thing (among lots of others) in common:

The citrouille love.
L’amour du pumpkin…

I thank Christopher Columbus everyday for bringing it back to Europe !

My grand-father, who took every occasion he could to be negative and scornful as any good French man should, always said it was a « fit for lazy » vegetable : the kind you didn’t have to sweat and suffer to see it bloom in your garden…

But my grand-mother, who took every occasion to smile at him and do what she wanted anyway, as any good French woman should, loved to cook it…

And strangely enough, here again, our ways of seing pumpkin in a plate are totally different ;

My grand-mother’s pumpkin soup was sweet, when the American version is savoury.

And as much as I understand, Pumpkin pie here is a dessert … Whereas when I bake one, it’s a (salty) entree…

So here it is.

My Tarte au potiron
(savoury pumpkin pie)

1 pumpkin (a regular one, you need at least one pound of pumpkin)
7 oz lardons, or sliced bacon
1 onion
1 cup chicken broth
1 tbsp ground nutmeg
1 egg
1 pâte brisée

I know my family will laugh when they see this recipe, cause they will surely remember that the « tarte au potiron » joke was one of my favorite as a teenager.

I promise I’ll tell it to you in its entirety when we meet “for real”, although it might be the longest, lamest, stupidest joke you’ll ever hear (and it’s in French, aussi).

But the thing is, “potiron” and “citrouille” (who both mean pumpkin), are for me one of the funniest words in the culinary world. Just love the sound of it.

And look at it ! All round and orange and funny !

I discovered savory pumpkin pie in a cooking book my brother bought me years ago.

The recipe was part of a great book of recipes inspired by Colette, the French and perfect author (famous for writing Gigi, but also for her great freedom of thinking and love of good food!). I’ve lost it when I moved out to LA, which is a sad thing, but also pushed me into trying to invent my own…

So here is how I make mine.

Slice the onions, brown them in a pan with some olive oil

Add the lardons, or the bacon cut into small fingers.

Let them dance together, while you peel the pumpkin (and take the seeds out)

Cut it into squares

Add the pumpkin squares in the pan, and let them brown

Salt, pepper, and Nutmeg

Add a cup of broth, stir

Put to a boil, and then let it simmer slowly for 30 minutes : the broth disappears, the pumpkin melts into the bacon

Preheat the oven at 350°F

Put the crust into the pie dish

Mix the egg quickly with the pumpkin

Pour into the crust

Bake for 40 minutes

Et voilà !

This pie is as good hot or cold…

Now, if you really want to be French and perfect, have a bite, close your eyes, and think that the citrouille might turn you into a princess or a prince…

Who knows!

Here is a song by French, perfect, and very crazy Brigitte Fontaine, who pretends this song makes pumpkins turning into princess carriages…

Bon appétit les amis!

NOW IT IS YOUR TURN!
Tell us in the comments below: what is your favourite pumpkin pie recipe

Let me guess.

Do you constantly have the feeling that you can’t hear what the French say and you don’t know how to read all the French words because they are written so much differently than they sound?

Learn 3 secrets that will help you be self sufficient in the way you pronounce French words – even if you don’t know what they mean – so that you can read that sophisticated menu in your favorite French restaurant.