Les legumes de Villefranche

Dear Friends,

As you know by now there are many wonderful things about Villefranche.  One that you may have picked up on is the fresh produce.  It all seems to come from various places around the Mediterranean. I will say that the clementines from Israel are considerably more expensive than those from Spain but all are very good and mostly seedless.

There are many great places to get fresh produce even in this small village but our favorite, as I have written before, is a man who puts his produce out on a square between the butcher and the traiteur (the closest translation is a delicatessen).  He is very nice, speaks French to us and compliments our French.  We even joke with him from time to time.  He also seems to want to be sure that we are pleased with the produce that we buy.  A prime example was our purchase of an avocado.  Jane picked one out that looked good, but he asked us whether we were planning on eating it that night or the next.  When we said that night he selected another one that was absolutely perfect.  It was I suppose a win, win situation.  He wanted to sell that one because it would have been a little over ripe the next day (not that we would have noticed), and we wanted an avocado that was perfect for that night.

For the last two nights we have been particularly focused on local veggies.  On Sunday night we had artichokes with tomatoes, zucchini, leek and onions along with our pasta and tonight we had long Italian green beans also called romano beans and romanesco broccoli along with our chicken cordon bleu and mashed potatoes from the traiteur.  Here is the uncooked romanesco broccoli with the artichokes.

The cooking of the artichokes, tomatoes, zucchini and leek.

And tonight's meal as served on my plate.  We are walking a lot so we need to eat to keep body and soul together.

For purposes of comparison, here is Jane's plate.

We also had dessert from the patisserie.  I had a religious chocolat seen below with some éclairs, but I did not have éclairs with mine.  

Jane had a citron tart with meringue.

Bon appétit.

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal