Recipe no. 47 from Jean-Baptiste Reboul's La Cuisinière provençale (1909), page 32.
Ingredients
- 2 sliced leeks
- 2 sliced onions
- a few tablespoons of oil
- 2 sliced tomatoes
- 2 crushed cloves of garlic
- a sprig of fennel
- a bay leaf
- a piece of orange peel
- 2 litres of water
- 1 kilo of small rockfish (small spiny lobsters, crabs, rainbow wrasse, scorpionfish, roucaous, small conger eels)
- salt and pepper
- half a kilo of thick vermicelli
- a strong pinch of saffron
Preparation
- BrowningSlice the leeks and onions and brown them in the oil.
- Adding tomatoes and aromaticsAdd the sliced tomatoes, then the garlic, fennel, bay leaf and orange peel, and moisten with the water.
- Cooking the fishAdd the small rockfish, salt, pepper and let cook briskly for 15 minutes.
- Straining the brothStrain the broth into another saucepan, pressing the fish in the strainer with the wooden spoon to squeeze out its juices.
- Finishing with the vermicelliPut the broth back on the heat, pour in the vermicelli and the saffron, let cook slowly and serve.
Reboul's text
Slice 2 leeks, 2 onions and put them into a saucepan with a few tablespoons of oil; let them brown. Add 2 sliced tomatoes, leave on the heat another minute, stirring with a spoon; then add 2 crushed cloves of garlic, a sprig of fennel, a bay leaf and a piece of orange peel; moisten with 2 litres of water.
Add 1 kilo of small rockfish, such as small spiny lobsters, crabs, rainbow wrasse, scorpionfish, roucaous and small conger eels; salt and pepper accordingly and let cook briskly for 15 minutes. Then strain the broth into another saucepan, pressing the fish in the strainer to squeeze out its juices well. A wooden spoon is used for this. Put this strained broth on the heat and let it boil; at this point, pour in half a kilo of thick vermicelli and a strong pinch of saffron; let cook slowly and serve.
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 |
|---|---|
| pòrri | leek |
| peis | rockfish |
| langousto | spiny lobster |
| girello | rainbow wrasse |
| rascasso | scorpionfish |
| fielas | conger eel |
| passadouiro | strainer |
| cuié | wooden spoon |
| verlichèlli | vermicelli |
| safran | saffron |
Source: Jean-Baptiste Reboul, La Cuisinière provençale, Marseille, 1909, recipe no. 47, page 32. Public domain. Transcription, formatting and Provençal glossary by Lingua Nostra.