It totally amazes me when I sort through my collection of old magazines and find articles on subjects I kept simply because I thought that "one day" I might check into it. To have never been to Ste. Genevieve in my adult life, I sure collected a lot of information on the town. . .almost like some part of me knew I'd end up here one day. Such is the case with this Early American Life feature. For a couple of months I have searched online for the foodways in this town, coming up with very little. While looking through old magazines last week, I ran across this one. I've copied it as originally written. The places he speaks of have changed hands, and I don't know where Lucretia's Restaurant was located on Market Street. But, the St. Gemme Beauvais is now a B & B, and the Old Brick House is still open.
From: French Heritage Recipes from Ste. Genevieve, by Roy
Bongartz, Early American Life Magazine, October 1984.
It was in 1646 that the Ursuline nuns of Quebec first began
adapting French cooking methods to Canadian produce, creating a French-Canadian
cuisine that a century later arrived in the Mississippi Valley with the French
settlers there. The plentiful game provided meat for stews or rich soups that
simmered all day in iron pots—the bouillon. Other hearty soups that originated
along the St. Lawrence were based on dry peas, cabbage, or onions.
French cooking around Ste. Genevieve took very little from
the spices and peppers of New Orleans Creole cookery that had its beginnings a
few years earlier. Here the flavors of food were brought out mildly in a
cuisine in which leeks or shallots were preferred to garlic. Pies of many kinds
also made a basic element; besides fruit and berry pies, there were meat pies
of game or pork: the cipate, or the fancier tourtiere served at
the reveillion, the Christmas Eve supper.
Today Ste. Genevieve still draws upon that French-pioneer cooking heritage, handed along over the years from those distant origins in Normandy, Brittany, and the Vendee country of France. Though much of this cuisine lives on only in the private kitchens and dining rooms of the descendants of the French settlers, there are a couple of restaurants that also honor the French style.
French crullers, or croquignoles, are another
Christmastime treat. A main dish called lapin chasseur is made of rabbit doused
with brandy and simmered in a Dutch oven. The excellence of the local quiche Lorraine
seems to stem from the freshness and richness of the Swiss cheese and cream
that goes into it. The simplicity of the Ste. Genevieve chicken bouillon dinner
belies the savory heartiness of the dish, in which the patient simmering of a
fine variety of vegetables makes a blend of good flavors that honor the cooked
hen. No doubt influenced by some traveler up from New Orleans is the local ham
jambalaya, which combines ingredients from various directions and historical
periods: the old-style bouillon, along with some curry from down south, and
some ketchup, too.
Local Indians, with whom the Ste. Genevievois were generally
on good terms, provided the populace with corn meal cakes nowadays served with
the jambalaya in place of potatoes; there are called Goli-she-was. Bake ovens
produce French strawberry pies, pear bread, and such fancy cookies as cornucupes
de Genevieve, gateaux secs au gingembre, French tea cakes, and
praline cookies.
The most pleasant setting for sampling some of these old
Ste. Genevieve specialties is the luxurious dining room of the Inn St. Gemme
Beauvais on North Main Street, where Frankye Donze and her husband Boats Donze
have refashioned the 1851 Felix Rozier mansion into a country style inn. A
two-and-a-half story brick house with stately columns rising to the full height
of the façade, this was Boats Donze’s boyhood home. A maple tree he planted as
a youth now shades the house. After they acquired it a few years ago, Mrs. Donze
furnished the rooms with antiques of the mie-19th century. The
accommodations are set up as two-room suites, with a salon adjoining each
bedroom.
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| St. Gemme Beauvais |
Another restaurant serving food out of French traditions of
both past and present is Lucretia’s on Merchant St., started by Lucretia Ann
Hadel, now run by her son and daughter-in-law, Sam and Nancy Hadel. They
continue to concentrate on French cooking, offering crepes, quiches, a home
specialty, spinach balls, and cream-based dishes.
The Old Brick House is another good restaurant, at Third and
Market, purveying simple, standard entrees such as frog legs, filet mignon, and
catfish. The 1790 structure is the oldest brick building west of the Mississippi
and has the further distinction of having figured in the first sheriff’s sale
west of the river, when it was sold off for debts of the owner early in the
last century for $1100. It has a big, handsome, carved bar, and old-timey
upright piano, and, for a note of gentility typical of Ste. Genevieve, a
brightly lighted chandelier.
French Heritage Recipes from Ste. Genevieve
Early American Life Magazine, October 1984
1 comment:
Wonderful information!! It's hard to find the old recipes here. Thanks!!
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