Recipe no. 420 from Jean-Baptiste Reboul's La Cuisinière provençale (1909), page 196.
Ingredients
- sauerkraut
- salt
- pepper
- nutmeg
- bacon fat
- onions
- carrots
- bouquet garni
- garlic
- juniper berries
- salt pork
- ham
- sausages
- white wine
- water
- lard
- goose fat
- paper
- potatoes
- Frankfurt sausages
Preparation
- Preparing the garnishWash and spread the sauerkraut on a cloth, season with salt, pepper and nutmeg. Build a layer with bacon fat, onions, carrots, bouquet garni, garlic and juniper berries, then place salt pork, ham and sausages on top.
- CookingMoisten with white wine and water, add lard or goose fat, cover with a greased sheet of paper, then set over low heat. Put in the oven to cook for at least 3 to 4 hours.
- Checking and platingCheck regularly that the salt pork and sausages do not fall apart. When everything is cooked, drain in a colander, plate on a dish surrounded by the sliced sausages and salt pork, with the carrots in a ring.
Reboul's text
The sauerkraut well washed and squeezed out, blanched even and refreshed if needed, spread it on a cloth to season it with salt, pepper and nutmeg. Spread a good layer of it in a saucepan in which you will have put thin strips of bacon fat, onions and a few whole large carrots, a large bouquet garni and two cloves of garlic; a few pinches of juniper berries enclosed in a muslin bag may also be added; arrange on top a piece of salt pork, a ham hock if you can get one, and 2 or 3 household sausages; put the rest of the sauerkraut over that; moisten with half a litre of white wine and just enough water for it to be barely covered.
Add a few spoonfuls of good lard or goose fat; put a greased sheet of paper on top and, with the saucepan covered, set it over low heat so it does not catch. Once it is boiling well, put the saucepan in the oven to cook for at least 3 to 4 hours.
Check on it from time to time to avoid letting the salt pork and the sausages fall apart, and take them out as soon as they are cooked.
When the sauerkraut is cooked, there should be no liquid left in the saucepan, it should have absorbed it all. Drain it then in a colander so that it releases its excess fat and arrange it on a dish surrounded by the sausages and the salt pork, sliced. The large carrots, also sliced, may also be arranged around it in a ring. Cooked potatoes, Frankfurt sausages, a piece of ham, and so on, may also be added as an accessory garnish when plating.
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 |
|---|---|
| blanqueja | to blanch |
| assaboura | to season |
| amaneu | bouquet garni |
| muia | to moisten |
| sahin | lard |
| agouta | to drain |
| vira | to turn |
| foundre | to fall apart |
| couire | to cook |
| graisso | fat |
Source: Jean-Baptiste Reboul, La Cuisinière provençale, Marseille, 1909, recipe no. 420, page 196. Public domain. Transcription, formatting and Provençal glossary by Lingua Nostra.