It doesn’t take much truffle to make a difference to all sorts of foods: charcuterie; garnish; timbales; soufflés. Escoffier even cooked them in Champagne for some of his more select diners. For the 2010 festive season, when Isigny Sainte-Mère launched its Camembert with Truffles, regional paper Ouest-France interviewed director general Daniel Delahaye. He remembers truffles [...]

At the end of every year, it is common to see oyster sellers outside the entrances to French supermarket entrances. Everywhere you look, there will be tables piled high with France’s favourite seasonal seafood: marquees filled with boxes of oysters of all sizes destined for new year celebrations. Depending on the region, the sellers will [...]

The snow currently falling across Europe is a timely reminder that butter was once a cold weather product. Before the days of universal refrigeration, it was harder to keep butter from going rancid or melting. Not impossible, but a sufficient challenge to ensure it remained the prerogative of rich households. Where available, a buttery or [...]

The older a cheese gets, the more water it loses. However, a totally dehydrated cheese would not taste of anything. One of the challenges when maturing longlived cheeses like Mimolette is to ensure that it retains enough water to be edible, since the process is irreversible. The cheese grader’s skill is to be able to [...]

From the Normandy coast to the heart of England is a well-trodden path for Isigny Sainte-Mère’s cheesemakers. This time, though, the occasion was shared with cheesemakers from all around the globe at the World Cheese Awards. Birmingham has been an export destination for Normandy dairy products since the days when steam power first started supplying [...]

For any English shoppers who can still reach a local Waitrose supermarket despite the snow, the Isigny Sainte-Mère Crème Fraîche with Calvados that featured in the previous post is available from the shelf. It may just be quicker than waiting for a  home delivery van in the present snowy weather….

Christmas comes but once a year, so the saying goes, but the memory of a real English Christmas pudding is enough to last a lifetime. This dark, dense and fruity dessert deserves a better fate than to be drowned under a dribbling custard jug. For the adventurous, it should arrive at table swathed in the [...]

Andy Sheppard was playing live tonight with guitarist John Parricelli on the BBC’s classical music channel Radio 3. He also spoke to presenter Petroc Trelawny about his forthcoming appearances at the London Jazz Festival. On Saturday afternoon, he is appearing alongside Isigny Sainte-Mère chef Ivan Vautier in a re-run of their cooking treble act with [...]

So what can festivalgoers look forward to when Isigny Sainte-Mère chef Ivan Vautier appears at the London Jazz Festival this Saturday afternoon? The menu starts with a capuccino of woodland mushrooms and Isigny camembert cheese, whizzed up in a blender and foamed through a siphon. Horn of plenty fungi start life on the woodland floor [...]

Isigny Sainte-Mère chef Ivan Vautier will be appearing in the London Jazz Festival on November 13 to repeat the set he did with Andy Sheppard at Coutances last year. Accompanied by percussionist Michel Rabbia, and saxophonist Andy Sheppard at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, Ivan will be cooking live again in Jazz et Cuisine. TV cameras [...]