Food & Wine

Local specialities

The local specialities are the pride of southwest France. Many derive from corn-stuffed ducks and geese: not only the rich and famous foie gras, but also magrets (boneless duck breast steaks) and confits (thighs, legs and wings preserved in their own golden fat, pâtés or meaty rillettes. Duck or goose fat is used for everything from sautéing potatoes to flavouring soups; combined with the excellent wines from Cahors and Bergerac you have, believe it or not, a delicious, cholesterol-clobbering combo.

From Cadogan gourmet guides: Lazy days out in the Dordogne and Lot, by Dana Facaros & Michael Pauls, publ. Cadogan Books, 1996.

Bars and restaurants
Local village café-bars often serve simple, excellent value fixed price lunches (typically select one of 2 or 3 hors d’oeuvres and main courses and choose between cheese and dessert; coffee and 25cl of table wine are usually included). More sophisticated restaurants will also offer “à la carte” menus, and their fixed price lunch menus may not be available in the evening. Lunchtime is between 12 noon and 2 pm and you may find it difficult to be served after about 1.30 pm in bars and smaller restaurants. Evening meals are usually served from around 7.30 pm. From 1st January 2008, smoking is banned inside all bars and restaurants (and indeed all public places), but not at tables set outside.


Tipping
In principle, don’t! With very rare exceptions, in bars and restaurants, you’ll see « service compris » (service included) on your bill and this means what it says. You may wish to leave small amounts of change or a tip if you have had some special help, but leave nowhere near the 15% typical of some countries where service is not normally included.
Similarly, taxi drivers should not expect a tip

The region is famous for its soft little cabécou cheeses. Left to mature until a thick, downy and softly tender skin forms on the outside, and the inside becomes deliciously runny, this cheese is best spread in gently creamy waves on a crusty chunk of country bread.

from: Discover Quercy, by Michèle Aué, publ. MSM, 1994, 1997

Local specialities
The Lot has always been famous as a gastronomic area, and recently has made great efforts to ensure consistent high quality through various forms of labelling, without sacrificing taste or traditional methods.
Here’s a checklist of just some of the area’s many specialities, apart of course from the duck and goose products with which this page opened -

  • Quercy melons – ask the stall holder to pick one for eating the same day (pour manger aujourd’hui) or to keep (pour garder).
  • Le Croustilot – traditionally baked bread using 100% Lot wheat.
  • Black truffles – Lalbenque, near Cahors, is famous for its cash only truffle market.
  • Quercy safran – a recently revived delicacy, now appearing on local markets.
  • Chasselas white table grapes – Moissac is the centre of this AOC area.
  • Pruneaux d’Agen – try them - dried prunes will never taste the same again!
  • Noix du Périgord – Local walnuts & traditionally produced walnut oil.
  • Rocamadour – AOC name for the 100% goat’s cheeses locally known as cabécous.

Bon appétit!

Wine

Local vineyards produce Cahors AOC (appellation d’origine contrôlée) and Coteaux du Quercy  VDQS (vin de qulaité supérieur) wines. Restaurants will also serve Lot red, rosé and (more rarely) white table wines (vin de pays du Lot).
Saint Martin le Redon, where Cubertou is located is well-placed for local Cahors AOC vineyards (click magnifying glass to enlarge map) click to enlarge


A few hundred yards from Cubertou, our neighbour's Domaine du Buis produces an excellent vin de table...

And some 10 minutes drive away, award-winning Château Lamartine has a growing reputation, and is widely exported.

In the Middle Ages, most of the wine that was shipped from Bordeaux came not from the local vineyards, but from what was called the Haut-Pays, up the Dordogne and the Garonne and their tributaries. Today there are still wines from those regions, with the best probably coming from around Bergerac on the Dordogne and Cahors on the Lot.
The basic grape of Cahors is the Malbec, here called the Auxerrois, which plays a supporting role in Bordeaux. Traditional methods of vinification used to give what was known as a "black" wine, deep in colour, full of tannin and long lasting. Modern wine-making methods and more planting in the sandy valley bottom, rather than on the limestone slopes, now give rather lighter, but by no means light, wines which mature earlier.
From: Travellers Wine Guide - France, by Christopher Fielden, publ. Philip Clark Ltd, 1989.

 

 

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