Bastides

Having done a Bastides for lunch today, the first since that noticed at reference 1, I thought to check what a bastide was - my theory being that it was a fortified town on a cliff overlooking the Dordogne valley, built during the troubled times of the Hundred Years War to keep marauding Brits in check.

Not quite the story according to Wikipedia at reference 3, which describes them as medieval new towns in south west France, seemingly more a device for colonising unused land, presumably not very good land, than anything else. Getting on for 700 of them altogether and one of them was a place called Aigues-Mortes, pre-existing but re-developed to give Louis IX of France crusading access to the Mediterranean, not dependant on the good will of either the Count of Toulouse or the King of Aragon.

The old town is about where it says 'Aigue-Mortes' in the snap above. With the name meaning - perhaps in the Langue d'oc - dead water, for all the shallow lakes and ponds of salt water which then surrounded the town. Access to the sea seemingly provided by some kind of dyke or canal. A small portion of the town walls is also snapped above, suggesting that the King of France was a very rich man.

Back with sausage, the reason for a Bastides today was that I declined the other half of the sauce in a bottle from Tesco, noticed at reference 2, with the result that I was invited to put the apron on. As it happens, the last Bastides, noticed at reference 1, also involved sauce in a bottle, Sainsbury's rather than Tesco's and rather more successful. Note that I failed to find an image of a cut Bastides saucisson sec, so I had to do with this image of a sausage made in the USA, lifted from reference 5. But it looks about right. Down to the rather sticky coating of flour on the outside, on top of the casing.

One large and one small of garlic, gently fried in a little butter. Add four mid-sized onions, finely chopped. Cook for a bit. Add an orange pepper, coarsely chopped. Cook for a bit more. Add five mid-sized tomatoes, finely chopped. Cook gently for getting on for an hour. I added a couple of tablespoons of water at some point.

Add three or four sticks of celery, cross sliced, about twenty minutes before the off. Add 200g of Bastides (plain, no truffles or any of that sort of nonsense), coarsely sliced and quartered. Add some left over boiled whites, chopped into chunks of about one cubic inch. Simmer for the last ten minutes.

Serve with boiled brown rice and green salad. Round off proceedings with a couple of baked apples from next door.

Enough stew left for a snack at some point tomorrow.

Note absence of salt and pepper. Quite enough of that in the sausage.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2023/07/bottle-cooking.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2023/09/sausage-sans-pork.html.

Reference 3: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bastide.

Reference 4: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aigues-Mortes.

Reference 5: https://frenchalacarteblog.com/2016/09/23/saucisson-made-in-usa/.