To help you celebrate Bastille Day, we’ve sourced six French themed recipes from some of our favourite chefs and bloggers to add a bit of culinary joie de vivre to your kitchen.
July 14th is Bastille Day, the national day of France. It celebrates the anniversary of Storming of the Bastille on 14 July 1789, a turning point of the French Revolution which led to the end of the monarchy.
It’s the day where the French celebrate everything great and good about their country; from delicious wines to delectable recipes. And, for the keen home cook, it’s the perfect excuse to insert some liberté, égalité, and fraternité into your kitchen.
To help you celebrate, we’ve sourced six French themed recipes from some of our favourite chefs and bloggers. You may not be able to storm the Bastille, but hopefully these should add a bit of culinary joie de vivre to your celebrations.
Les sucrés ("The Sweet")
Canelés are a small sweet pastry flavoured with rum and vanilla. The outside is dark, caramelised and crunchy, while the inside has a gloriously soft custard-like texture. Originating from Bordeaux, they don’t look like your standard flaky pastry. Instead, as Cluck Muck & Cook says in his recipe notes for them, they have a shape like “little burnt sandcastles.” He also says that they’re sensational when accompanied with a big cup of coffee, so we know which treat we’ll be whipping up during our next baking session.
Madeleines are simple, elegant and utterly moreish. They make the perfect post dinner petit four or just a simple, sweet snack to nibble on when you’re experiencing cake cravings. Lost in Food’s recipe for Lemon Madeleines is “buttery, lemony and so very moreish!” If you don’t have a special madeleine mould, you can bake these in a muffin tray. If you don’t have lemons to hand, these work with well with any type of citrus, providing you with lots of opportunity to experiment. We bet that blood orange Madeleines would be particularly delicious.
Tarte Tatin is a quintessentially French dessert and can be adapted in a number of different ways. You can make it with tomatoes, you can make it with onions, we’ve even seen it be made with beetroot! However, we really like Fuss Free Flavours’s method of making it with Figs, Apples and Cardamom. She uses ready made puff pastry and a frying pan to ensure that it’s sticky, golden and delicious. Serve with a large dollop of creme fraiche and you’ve got a practically perfect dessert.
Les Salé ("The Savoury")
Raymond Blanc is the King of modern French cookery, so of course we turn to his recipe when we want to make the ultimate Coq au Vin. It’s a timeless classic, which - as Raymond says - represents the best of French cuisine; “the conviviality, the friends and laughter, the simple, hearty food, the rustic bread dipped into the sauce, and the heady red wine that will be drunk.” We can think of no better way to spend an evening.If you’re looking for comfort food, there are few better meals to curl up with than a big bowl of Beef Bourguignon and mashed potatoes. You can make our recipe for this French classic in a Circulon non-stick casserole dish, but it would be just as good in a slow cooker.
Looking for something lighter on the meat but heavier on the vegetables? Try French Guy Cooking’s recipe for Ratatouille. Whereas some recipes can leave it looking like overcooked veggie porridge, here all of the different ingredients remain soft, silky and delicious. Like many French things, Ratatouille only gets better with age. So make a huge batch of it to top with eggs or serve over couscous.