What a lovely read for anyone who loves France or French cooking!

“Part memoir, part cookbook, this classic of food literature is an immersion course in authentic, regional French home cooking from a world-renowned culinary authority.

As a young woman, Madeleine Kamman developed her passion for food by working in the kitchens of France’s most respected regional cooks. She dedicates one chapter to each of these remarkable women, who nourished her appetite for the tradition, rigor, and deeply personal nature of cooking. Her exuberant memoir—originally published over 30 years ago—tells of collecting mussels at the shore, churning butter from the milk of village cows, gathering mushrooms in nearby woods, and then transforming them into glorious meals under the tutelage of her beloved mentors. Over 250 recipes for the simple dishes Kamman learned at their sides accompany her evocative reminiscences of a bygone era in rural France. Now in paperback, this classic is required reading for anyone who wants to know more about la cuisine française and the life, times, and tastes of a woman who helped to shape American cooking.” (Random House)

Written in 1976, it’s also part Suite Francaise, I Capture The Castle and Mastering the Art of French Cooking. From the author’s remembrances of Brittany in the 1930’s and her friendship with Loetitia:

“Loetitia is a great storyteller who lived most of her active life in Paris. Now in her seventies, she has gone back to the Bigouden country of her birth at the extreme southwestern point of the French Cornouailles…Loetitia rescued me from my search for the techniques of the true Breton butter cake, the old Kouign Amann, which nowadays one finds only with difficulty in a very small number of bakeries of Cornouailles.”

Hard to imagine just 40 years ago, you couldn’t find a Kouign Amann outside Brittany and now they’re in trendy bakeries not only in Paris, but all over the world.