Les Poissonchats

It’s Lent. This is the forty days between Carnival and Easter, when, in an attempt to purify one’s soul and body, one is to abstain from all earthly delights and eat cabbage soup. Forty days of cabbage soup. And water. And stale bread. Or in other words, purgatory. Though I believe, at least concerning the area where I live, it had more to do with the mere fact of draining pantries and barren gardens at this time of the year than Christian Virtue: asparagus still is two months away, so are potatoes and strawberries, and grains, well those aren’t due until late summer. And of course there are no eggs as chicken take an annual winter holiday (well earned, I shall say). Which in terms, means cabbage. And leek maybe, golly, and stale bread.

Now I generally don’t agree with purgatory-like lifestyles, I even am firmly opposed to such for I think it makes for vile and bad tempered people and any a poor devil’s temper tantrums and bickering will safely turn life for everybody around into a veritable purgatory, which clearly can’t be what He had intended, right? Anyhow, a world full of well fed people is definitely a nice place to live in, sin therefore has the benefit of the doubt.

Or in short, don’t you chastise yourself but elevate simplicity to the realms of heaven: here’s the how to to an absolutely delicious cabbage stew with Bishop’s Wine and smoked trout. Also it contains butter.

As in other chateau news, the perce-neiges, the snowdrops, are out, and the daffs are almost blooming in a little pink vase in my kitchen. The cats still live indoors mostly, and so do I, wearing silly dresses and waiting for spring to come.

What you’ll need

• A good sized cabbage, serves four
• A middle sized onion, chopped
• A dash of virgin rapeseed oil
• Two good sized potatoes
• A pinch of aniseed
• 1dl of Bishop’s wine, “Cuvée des Archevêques“, which is a wine that’s made locally here where I live. Ordinary vin jaune will work as well but if ever you got hold on the Bishop’s wine, well it’s difficult to go back to anything else
• 30g of butter
• Sea salt and ground black pepper
• Some crème fraîche
• Two slices of smoked trout per person

How to cook it

Half the cabbage and cut out the stem, then cut into thin slices. In a wide pan, heat a dash of virgin rapeseed oil and glaze the chopped onion, then add a handful of cabbage and stir fry. Slowly add the rest of the cabbage in small portions, stir and reduce the heat. The cabbage will fall in and get glassy, that’s perfect, add aniseed and salt and pepper. Deglaze with the wine and add the butter. Cover with a lid that’s smaller than the pan and press firmly. Let simmer on low temperature for an hour, you may have to add water from time to time but never make the cabbage swim in a soupy mess. Peel the potatoes and cut into cubes, add to the stew and make sure it cooks covered in the cabbage. Cook for half an hour, test the potatoes with a kitchen knife: if it slides in like butter, they’re done.

Arrange in plates and have two slices of smoked trout per person and a dollop of crème fraîche on top of the cabbage stew.

How to eat it

Steaming hot, also a well buttered slice of bread won’t do no harm. Indulge in those rich and savoury late winter flavours that give you strength and endurance. Pair with a glass of aged chardonnay, you know the one with that buttery full-bodied hint of summer days ahead.