Another fine mess
This week, keeping the streets clean and a recipe for apples baked with boudin noir.
The day before I went to Paris for the first time when I was 12, one of our neighbours told me “You have to watch your feet!” She was far too refined to mention the reason, but the reason – as I would soon find out in the most lived-experience way possible – was dog shit. (I once mentioned “dog poo” in The Daily Telegraph and a gentleman went full on whisky-for-breakfast in the comments because I didn’t say “excrement”, like every day is Sunday lunch at granny’s.) The streets of Paris are much cleaner than they once were, and not just because of the Olympic glow up.
Like the English, the French often lose their traditional reserve when faced with four paws and a wet nose.
Our visitors often comment on how many people have dogs in the village, and just as when I lived in London, I have dog walking friends. How can you not befriend someone who greets your petite louloute with an enthusiastic “Mais, t’es belle comme tout!” (you’re so beautiful!)?
Like the English, the French often lose their traditional reserve when faced with four paws and a wet nose. Dogs are welcome in the village’s bars, cafés and restaurants, on the terraces and often inside too, and in most of the shops. Gracie even has her favourite table at the Marine Bar, though every table is a favourite table on market day when the terrace is paw-deep in crumbs from people’s breakfast croissants. She works the place with the efficiency of a robot vacuum cleaner.
The pavements here are clean, mostly. I cannot imagine the wrath of one of the grandes dames of the village if you were caught abandoning your dog’s mess in the street. You’d probably have to move. The commune takes a carrot and stick approach. On the one hand, there are dispensers all over the village where you can help yourself to free poo bags. On the other, if you’re caught failing to pick up after your pet, you’ll face a fine of 135€.
I can honestly say I’ve never seen anyone failing to clean up after their dog. The sense of community and public civility is very strong in rural France. But there is certainly dog mess about the place (I am running out of ways to say shit at this point, so do bear with me), despite the carrot, despite the stick. I think this is because though there are very concerted efforts to keep the pavements clean, these attempts are hampered somewhat by an old-fashioned attitude to dogs which persists in some quarters.
When I was a child growing up in a village, it wasn’t uncommon for people to let their dogs out of the house in the morning and simply cross their fingers that they would come back in time for dinner. The attitude to children was much the same.
Every now and again, there’ll be a message on the local Facebook group from a kind-hearted citizen saying they’ve seen a dog running loose on the road by Carrefour, on the way to Mèze, or up in the vines. The message is often from a British person, or otherwise new resident, and it will be followed by reassuring messages from locals saying: “Oh, that’s just Rocky…Lola…Max, they’ll make their way home soon”. A Belgian Malinois called Scooby Doo seems to be a repeat offender. They’re just out there living their best lives, doing their own thing, pooing free.
Scooby Doo, or rather Scooby Doo’s owner, would be in a lot of trouble if he were 30km to the East, in Béziers. Since the Autumn of 2023, the owners of dogs within the heart of the city must carry a genetic identification card for their pets, created from a DNA swab taken at the owner’s expense by a certified vet. You can be fined for not carrying the card when you’re out and about with your dog, and if dog poo left on the pavements is tested and found to belong to your pooch, there is a street cleaning fee of 122€. They’re not messing about when it comes to mess. The city website states: “Excrement on public roads is intolerable in the city. This reflects a lack of education of the animal and a lack of hygiene and civic mindedness of the owner.”
So until we can send Scooby Doo and his pals to finishing school, it’s down to us and our civic mindedness to pick up the slack, or the… oh god I just can’t.
Baked apples with boudin noir
I love this combination of sweet apples and boudin noir, the French version of black pudding. It’s very rich, so serve it simply with a green salad. I like frisée, because its robust edge of bitterness works so well with the other ingredients – I just dress it with a slick of walnut oil, a few drops of cider vinegar and some flaky sea salt.
If you swap four large apples for eight smaller ones, this makes a great starter as part of an elegant autumn or winter dinner.
Serves 4
20g butter
200g lardons, diced, or bacon cut into small strips
2 medium onions, about 200g, diced
1 small leek, white and pale green part only, about 100g, thinly sliced
3 bay leaves, plus 4 more for finishing
2-3 sprigs of thyme
2-3 tbsp crème fraîche, about 50g
4 x medium-large apples, about 250g each
400g boudin noir
A little cointreau, armagnac, cognac or even whisky, optional
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
In a large frying pan, melt the butter over a medium-high heat and sauté the lardons and bacon for a few minutes until just beginning to become golden. Turn down the heat a bit and add the onions, leek, 3 bay leaves and thyme sprigs and sauté gently, stirring from time to time, until soft, about 15-20 minutes.
While the vegetables are cooking, prepare the apples. Cut a small slice from the bottom so they will stand flat in the tin. Cut off the top to make a lid. Using a small, sharp knife and a spoon, carefully hollow out the apples leaving a border around the edges and the bottom to create a “cup” for the boudin noir. Discard the core but keep the flesh and chop it roughly.
Heat the oven to 190C/170C Fan/Gas 5.
Add the chopped apple to the lardons, onions and leek and sauté for a couple of minutes. Stir in the crème fraîche and a few grinds of black pepper. Taste and add some salt if you think it needs it – it may not, depending on how salty your lardons or bacon is.
Tip the lardons, onions and leek mixture into an ovenproof dish or roasting tin and spread it out into an even layer. I use one that’s 25x15cm – you want one that’s not too large, one which allows everything to fit in quite neatly.
Place the apples on top of the lardons, onions and leek mixture. Slit the boudin noir with a sharp knife and remove the skins. Spoon the boudin into the apples, filling them generously so it rises above the top of the fruit a little.
If you’re using the alcohol – it’s not essential but I think it’s a nice addition – pour a few drops over the top of the boudin noir in each apple, honestly you only need about ¼ tsp in each.
Put the “lids” back on top of the apples. If you want to, add a small bay leaf by the stem.
Bake for 30 minutes, until the boudin noir is cooked through and the apples are tender.
Eat very hot, with a green salad.
Printable Recipe
Market haul, January 28, 2025
This week’s market haul comprises: lardons, frisée lettuce, cèpe sausage, a beef cheek and shin for making a casserole (buying a thick piece of shin with the bone means that the bone marrow enriches the sauce), coriander, cucumber, leeks, celery, eggs, boudin noir, apples, parsley, shallots, garlic, onions, sweet potato, red peppers, blood oranges, carrots, a croissant and a chocolatine, ham.
What I’m reading
This year’s Le Fooding guide to restaurants, bars, wine shops and food businesses in France, plus some great essays on French food culture now. If you live in France or are planning a trip, this is a great resource. It’s in French, but each entry has a summary paragraph in English.
I like the DNA tested poo idea. Would do away with the poo bags hung in hedges that plague Bedfordshire.
Oh god, that recipe! Sounds like utter heaven and I've never seen anything like it and am the biggest fan of black pudding.