Le gratin appelé « Morbiflette »

La Morbiflette is a gratin de pommes de terre that greatly resembles the better-known Tartiflette, which is made not far south of Geneva (Switzerland) in the Alps in the area called la Savoie. The little town of Morbier (pop. 2,400 or so) is just 25 miles north of Geneva.

 

Both of these gratins are made of blanched (partially cooked) potatoes peeled and then sliced into rounds before being browned lightly in oil or butter on a baking sheet in the oven or in a frying pan on the stovetop. The rondelles de pomme de terre are arranged in a baking dish in layers and cooked in a hot oven with sauteed onions and smoked lardons, along with cream, white wine, and Morbier cheese.

 

The Morbier cheese's distinctive feature is a line of vegetable ash that runs through the middle of a wheel of the cheese. Morbier is mild-tasting (as is the cheese that the Tartiflette is made from, called Reblochon) and melts smoothly. The crust of both these cheeses is edible, like the crust of Brie or Camembert, as is the ash in the Morbier. (The broccoli in my photos is some that I steamed for us to have as a side dish.)

My Morbiflette as it came out of the oven...
Here's a link to a recipe in French.

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After you sautee the onions and lardons, lightly oil an oven-proof dish and put in a first layer of sliced potatoes. Then put a layer of sauteed onions and lardons over them. Put on another layer of potatoes and pour on some cream and a splash of white wine. Slice the Morbier cheese and spread the slices over the potato mixture. Cook the Morbiflette in a hot oven until the potatoes are tender and the cheese has melted and started to turn a golden brown color. The cream and wine will have mostly evaporated when the Morbiflette is done. Be careful not to burn your mouth when you eat it.

P.S. If you're in the U.S. I don't know whether you can find Morbier cheese or not. I believe the Reblochon cheese used to make a Tartiflette is not imported into the U.S. Also, my innovation here was to make the Morbiflette not with smoked-pork lardons but with diced-up smoked chicken that I happened to have in the refrigerator.

La Renaudière : couleurs locales

Yesterday's snow shower was over by about 10 a.m. It turned into rain and the rain lasted until mid-afternoon. By the time I went out for a walk with the dog, it had ended. Today marks two months that I've been suffering with this chest cold/bronchitis. It's not as bad as it way back in January and February, but the symptoms — congestion, itchy eyes, coughing, sneezing — just won't go away. Still, I need to go out and walk with Tasha the Sheltie every day. Walks are longer or shorter depending on the weather.

I spend a lot of time in the kitchen cooking these days. Yesterday I made something that I had never even heard of a few months ago. It's called une morbiflette. Have you ever heard of it? More to come... A few days ago I made chicken noodle soup. Before that, North African couscous with lots of vegetables, as well as Asian-style stir-fries with either rice or noodles. And baked beans with bacon. Today's lunch will be lasagna with spinach, ricotta, and mozzarella. There's a theme in here somewhere.

You call that snow?

After predicting it for days, the weather people finally delivered. We got a little bit of snow this morning. I took the picture of our Peugeot at about 6:30a.m. Walt just looked out and said the snowflakes are turning into raindrops already. It's cold outside (and wet) but it's slightly above freezing. The red dot on the weather map shows the approximate location of Saint-Aignan. Paris is 150 miles north and the city of Tours is 35 miles west from us.

Early spring flowers

Yesterday I went out early with the dog for our morning walk. It was cold and very wet out there. These are some photos I took in our yard and in the neighbors' yard across the road from our house. They aren't here right now, and we keep an eye on their place so we can let them know if anything seems amiss.

Above are two pictures of the plum tree that I grew from pits starting at least a decade ago. It has really grown a lot over the past couple of years because we've had so much rain. Nobody mentions drought any more so I assume it is over now. We lost half a dozen trees to drought over those five or so dry years.

Above left is a flowering branch of a forsythia bust that was already growing here when we came to live here in 2003. Walt takes good care of it, pruning and shaping it every year. On the right are some of the premula (primrose) plants that come up spontaneously in our yard and in the neighbor's yard too. The woman who sold us the house 22 years ago said when she lived here she would buy pots of primroses every spring and then throw the root balls out into the yard at the end of their growing season. They started coming back up in early spring every year, and they continue to do so.

Above left is what I think is a flowering quince tree that blooms early in the spring every year in our neighbors' yard. On the right is the flower stalk of what people here call a saxifrage plant ("elephant's ears" or Bergenia cordifolia, I think). It was growing here when we moved in as well.