Roast goose was a traditional Christmas dish in France for many years, probably for centuries, but it is rather rare on holiday tables these days, having ceded its place to turkey, capon or duck. Nonetheless, roast goose is delicious. This year I decided to roast a goose well before Christmas in order to post it here in time for you to think about it, and perhaps make it. But getting the goose proved harder than anticipated. In fact it was a bit of a feat.
Oie rôtie de Noël / Roast Christmas goose
It all began in early December when I invited a few friends over for dinner the following Saturday, promising them roast goose. I set out to the local farmer’s market on a Sunday morning, six days ahead of time, hoping if not to find a goose at least to order one. My favorite poultry merchant, Monsieur Breton, had no geese on display. When I asked if he could get me one when the market reconvened on Thursday, he gave me a Gallic shrug.
The problem was not just that geese are raised in France to be ready for the market only in the week ahead of Christmas. There was also the matter of the gilets jaunes, the protesters demanding a living wage who have blocked roads and, joined by hooligans on Saturdays, wreaked havoc in France for the last few weeks. Monsieur Breton said that even if he could find a goose that was ready for the market, he couldn’t be sure he could get it. For the protesters have not only blocked roads, they have blockaded fuel depots, and gasoline supplies are uncertain throughout the country. Trucks aren’t delivering the goods.
‘Call me Wednesday,’ said Monsieur Breton, handing me his card. On Wednesday I called. ‘Call me Thursday,’ he said. I tried, but he didn’t answer. By this time I had called off the dinner party. In any event, a couple of guests had begged off, saying they were afraid to cross Paris on a Saturday night, what with angry people setting cars on fire and smashing windows throughout the city, and the police riposting with tear gas. But I still wanted to make the recipe for the site. So I texted him on Friday morning. Again, no reply.
Early Friday evening, I was minding my own business at home when my phone signaled that I had received a text. It was Monsieur Breton. ‘You can count on a goose on Sunday morning,’ he wrote. Well! I quickly rescheduled the dinner for the following Tuesday. Four people could make it, and a fifth wasn’t sure.
On Sunday morning, I took my time about getting to the market. It was raining hard, but eventually off I went. Arriving at Monsieur Breton’s stand, I peered at the poultry display. There I saw … half a goose. As Monsieur Breton was nowhere to be seen, I hailed his wife. ‘Excuse me,’ said I in dismay, ‘but where is the other half?’ Again, the Gallic shrug. ‘We sold it,’ she said. ‘But I ordered a whole goose,’ I protested. ‘Would you possibly have another?’ She looked around for her husband. He might have one, she said.
As she picked her phone to call him, I noticed the price of the partial goose, written in blue grease pencil on the pink wax paper beneath it. 54 euros! ‘Hold on a second,’ I said. ‘Is this the price of half a goose?’ She gave me a cool nod. Mais oui, madame. I made a quick calculation. ‘Does that mean a whole goose costs more than a hundred euros?’ (108 euros = $122). Mais oui. ‘Never mind,’ I said. ‘Half a goose will be fine.’
At that point, Monsieur Breton arrived on the scene. Along with the half a goose, he gave me half a liver, half a gizzard and half a neck. He also proposed half a heart, but I passed. The 9-pound bird would feed four or five, he said, and should roast for 2-1/4 hours.
I had my doubts about the cooking time, but had no doubt that I wanted my guests to have enough to eat. Not wishing to add another bird, I decided to make several side dishes — pear slices sautéed in butter, sautéed baby artichokes, stuffing and watercress salad — with braised fennel soup to start, and cheese and clémentines to finish. One of the guests brought a poppyseed Christmas cake she’d acquired in Berlin. No one went hungry.
I roasted the goose on the Tuesday morning — I couldn’t wait until dinnertime because my recipe photos need natural light. Early preparation turned out to be a great idea. I was able to carve the goose at my leisure and reheat it just before serving. In the end, the roasting time was 1-1/2 hours, perhaps because it was only half a goose.
If you’ve never roasted a goose before, there are tips on the recipe page for ensuring that it stays tender and moist. In the next few days, I will update the Holiday Menus page with this recipe and others you may wish to consult for creating a festive occasion.
Happy cooking, and merry Christmas!
This is a versatile salad featuring two types of greens that come into their own in late autumn and winter: mâche (aka lamb’s lettuce) and Belgian endive. Mustardy vinaigrette sauce and plenty of garlic turn the leaves into a zesty salad that may be served as is or enhanced with walnuts, Alpine cheese and/or country ham. This adaptability will allow you to enjoy it whatever your culinary proclivity — omnivore, vegetarian or vegan.
While either mâche and Belgian endive may be served on its own as salad, they pair nicely and can form the basis for a quickly prepared and tasty salad at lunchtime, with or without extra ingredients, or a salad course to precede or follow a main dish. The garlic adds zing, as does the homemade mustard vinaigrette, a French classic that also harks back to days of yore.
This dish gives an interesting twist to pumpkin that may be of interest as the holidays approach. Yes, I’m thinking Thanksgiving. The combination of pasta and pumpkin is popular in both France and Italy, and the walnuts add depth. This version also has a touch of Meg thanks to the spicing — not nutmeg, as my childhood friends delighted in calling me, but cumin which, combined with a spritz of lemon juice, adds a welcome zest.
My friend Vera, a superlative cook, served this spicy slow-cooked veal dish on the occasion of her husband’s birthday last year. It was summer, and the birthday dinner was in the garden of their country house in Provence. There were many guests and many speeches, much wine and much merriment. Cheery lanterns hung from a mulberry tree over trestle tables festooned with patterned cloths. I loved it all, but what blew me away was the food.
One of the delights of autumn is the baked apple — pomme au four in French. Served with cream or without, it’s a classic dessert that’s both healthy and easy to make. But is it so totally basic that it doesn’t belong on a French cooking blog? I thought it over, called a couple of friends and, with their hearty encouragement, decided to go for it. I’ve been wanting to add pommes au four to the desserts on this site for a very long time. Et voilà.
However, as the summer was very hot and very dry, they were smaller than usual. Although in the past I’ve tended to use large apples for this dessert, I decided to give it a try with the small ones, serving two or three per portion, as shown above and, with caramelized sauce but no cream, here.
There were a few big apples left on another tree, however, and I gave that a try also. The first one I baked exploded (i.e. its skin popped off) — see the recipe page for a photo. When I tried again, I took care to score the apple skin before baking, and it turned out perfectly, shown here with a dollop of crème fraîche.
The humble lentil comes into its own in this simple, earthy dish flavored with gently sautéd onions, ground spices and fresh herbs. Lentils prepared in this way can be served as a flavor-packed side dish with meat, poultry or fish, or as part of a vegetarian meal. I served the dish recently with grilled guinea hen with walnut sauce, with a spinach salad alongside, and my guests were very happy. The full meal, with recipes, is described below.
Fusion is hot in Paris at the moment, with Asian, African and Latin American-inspired dishes popping up on menus created by French chefs at trendy bistros. And among the popular dishes, raw fish — served as tataki, ceviche or simply tartare — might well top the list. In this version, raw tuna is marinated in a mixture of Asian flavors and set atop a bed of black rice, another new-ish addition to the Parisian culinary repertoire.
But before I got around to attempting to replicate that dish, I was treated to dinner at another, pricier restaurant, Le Comptoir du Relais, where a ceviche of mulet noir was the first course of a five-course, fixed menu (no choice). The fish, mixed with tiny bits of Granny Smith apples, avocado, celery and cucumber juice (!), was served in a shallow bowl with a smear of tapenade alongside, as shown in the photo snapped by my friends.
Fruit became a major issue this summer down in Burgundy, where a great year for fruit of all kinds — cherries, plums, apples and pears — turned my garden into a paradise for fruit-loving wildlife of the alarming variety (more on that later). Now that I’m back in Paris, where I can safely gather fruit from the market, I decide to try my hand at a salad featuring pears topped with parmesan and roasted to mouth-watering succulence.
Cheese stands as a course of its own in France — and why not, in a country with more than 400 varieties to choose from? It is usually presented between the main course and fruit or dessert, with the number of cheeses ranging from one to many depending on the occasion and the number of people at the table. But which cheeses to choose and how to present them? A reader wrote in to ask this question. The subject is vast. Here goes.
With so many cheeses to choose from, where to begin? Cheeses are seasonal, varying according to the time of year when the milk is at its best and the amount of time needed for the cheese to mature. Cheeses at their best in spring include all types of chèvre (goat cheese, seen at right) and soft cheeses like Camembert, Brie and Epoisses. Cheeses that take a bit longer to mature, like Reblochon or Saint-Nectaire, come into their prime in summer. Autumn is the time to choose cheeses that have acquired character through longer maturation, like Roquefort, Ossau-Iraty (a hard Basque cheese made from ewe’s milk), Maroilles or Livarot. Winter is when cheeses needing the longest maturation come into their own: Comté and Beaufort, Cantal and Laguiole, and the unmatchable Mont d’Or, a meltingly delicious cheese eaten out of its round wooden box with a spoon.
Harmony becomes more important when assembling a cheese plate for fewer people. As I’m partial to goat cheese, sometimes I’ll compose a plate with two or more types of chèvre, as seen at left. The plate includes Pouligny-Saint-Pierre (from south of the Loire) and two Rocamadours (from the Périgord). 
Sometimes I’ll go regional, selecting cheeses from, say, the rugged Auvergne region of south central France. The board at right includes Laguiole and Fourme d’Ambert, both made from cow’s milk. By the way, since blue cheeses, including Roquefort, are not to everyone’s taste, I usually include at least one non-blue cheese in the assortment. (An excellent site for taking a look at French cheeses is 
I first discovered tarama in France, where it has been popular as a starter for decades or possibly longer. It is traditionally made from bottarga — cured and salted roe that has been pressed and sealed in wax. But, as I learned when shopping for this blog post, it is more often made these days with fresh salted roe, which is a fraction of the cost of the cured variety. The other ingredients are oil, bread, milk and lemon juice, and preparation is easy.
I decided to experiment for this post and bought both kinds of roe — fresh and cured. The fresh roe cost 2.80 euros for 100 grams (about 1/4 pound), while the bottarga cost 14.50 euros for the same quantity. I also experimented by using sunflower oil with the fresh roe and a half-and-half mixture of sunflower and olive oil with the bottarga. You can see the results in this photo.
