Recipe no. 52 from Jean-Baptiste Reboul's La Cuisinière provençale (1909), page 35.
Ingredients
- aioli (recipe 45)
- boiled salt cod
- snails
- salt
- onions studded with cloves
- fennel
- boiled carrots
- potatoes boiled in their jackets
- artichokes cooked in water
- green beans
- hard-boiled eggs
- small octopuses boiled in salted water with aromatics
Preparation
- Preparing the aioliMake the aioli according to the recipe of recipe 45.
- Cooking the snailsCook the snails in water with salt, onions studded with cloves, and fennel.
- Cooking the vegetables and octopusBoil carrots, potatoes in their jackets, artichokes, green beans, hard-boiled eggs and, often, small octopuses in salted water with aromatics.
- ServingServe all these items around the aioli, according to taste and the means available, none of them being strictly required.
Reboul's text
We have already given the recipe for making aioli. We shall now indicate what is served with it. It generally requires boiled salt cod, snails (which are cooked in water, with salt, onions studded with cloves and fennel), boiled carrots, potatoes boiled in their jackets, artichokes cooked in water, green beans, hard-boiled eggs, and often small octopuses boiled in salted water with aromatics.
As can be seen, the preparation of this dish calls for quite an elaborate staging. However, not all the items we have just listed are strictly required. There is no fixed rule about this. It is done according to taste and to the means available.
We would certainly have refrained from placing in any other cookery book a dish such as this one; but as it is Provencal cooking that we are treating in particular, the omission would not have been forgivable.
Small Provençal glossary for this recipe
Reboul writes in French: no Provençal word appears in this recipe, apart from the dish's name itself. The table below gives the Provençal equivalents of the words used, in mistralian spelling, translated by Lingua Nostra. Each form is attested in our Provençal-English dictionary; click to open the entry.
| Provençal | English |
|---|---|
| merlusso | salt cod |
| cacalaus | snail |
| clavèu | clove |
| pastenargo | carrot |
| poumo | potato boiled in its jacket |
| cachofle | artichoke |
| baneto | green bean |
| iòu | hard-boiled egg |
| póupre | octopus |
Source: Jean-Baptiste Reboul, La Cuisinière provençale, Marseille, 1909, recipe no. 52, page 35. Public domain. Transcription, formatting and Provençal glossary by Lingua Nostra.