The real Cassoulet, cooked "on location" in Carcassonne, France.

[Music] dear food pilgrims as much as I've enjoyed the recent beats pans oyster and mussel orgy in Lochner gut and the fish soup from Kaleo is definitely time to head inland from the Mediterranean to the world famous medieval fortified town of chacas on the route takes you across the wonderful wine country known as liqueur Pierre the a Palacio in the longer dock area that turns out vast quantities of mostly red wine amounting to 75 million bottles a year so I shouldn't be going thirsty anytime soon now one of the most celebrated dishes all around these parts is the gasoline which is an ancient rich slow-cooked casserole containing various bits of pork and duck and crucially local white beans and it's named after its traditional cooking vessel the castle a deep round terribly heavy earthenware pot with these slanting sides however first I still have 100 kilometers of this splendid area to cross through vines scrub and shrub this is the Department of Lourdes in the region of oxy Danny and it's also known as guitar country after the religious dissidents active in the 12th century my route takes me through the lovely town of la classe officially recognised as one of the most beautiful villages of France [Music] for lunch duck gizzards salad followed by the confit de canard duck legs slowly cooked in their own fat both so typical around the Southwest and onwards to caucus on this 100 year old map of French gastronomy has the cassoulet written all over these parts as you'd expect cactus on dates from the 6th century was rebuilt and expanded in the 13th and has remained miraculously preserved ever since if I've ever felt like I'm walking to a fairy tale it's right now it's not just medieval ramparts up here but a whole town enclosed within the ancient walls a bit later on Petes brands groupies show up from Spain and we head to the main square of Carcassonne to gather ingredients [Music] the castle is one of those dishes that predates potatoes so it's based on white beans and folk around here are extremely picky about the right varieties back home I start cooking up a nice duck stock chicken stock Saul so perfectly authentic just let it simmer away for two hours or so so for an authentic traditional cassoulet from Carcassonne here all the ingredients we have the sausage the local Toulouse variety or enlarged pork sausage will do fine here's the Quan this is the pork rind so so valued in French cookery we have half a pig's Trotter here's the oisin de pau in English this is China neck or sometimes referred to as collar but any slightly fatty cut will do the job perfectly and here's the confit duck legs the confetti gunner some duck fat garlic onion tomato and a very generous bouquet garni tomato concentrate salt and pepper as well as a few clothes these beans the local Castaneda a variety have been soaking overnight the stock we made earlier and this delicious caucus on red goes in the cook not in the castle [Music] so how the beans gonna be cooked in the flavorful stock to which we had a carrot a whole onion studded with five or so cloves the bouquet garni the chopped garlic [Music] the pork rind the pig's Trotter and vitally a good dollop of duck friend now let all this simmer away for an hour and a half giving one time to sit back and admire the ancient ramparts from below [Music] when the beans are almost done lightly browned the pieces of pork and sausage this is done not surprisingly in another good dollop of duck fat the task I've entrusted to my daughter Jessica who's quickly rewarded with local refreshments [Music] in the same fat a sliced onion is fried and when soft a few cloves of garlic are added followed in a minute or two by a small dollop of tomato concentrate and the grated or finely chopped pulp of a whole tomato now this lock seemed to have lost interest already back inside all foreign objects are removed from the beans though the delicious one them the pork rind is reserved and cut into little squares like this now we mix all the remaining ingredients onion tomato chunks of pork the Quan and lastly towards the top gather sausage making sure there's enough liquid to just come to the top of the beans so in a fairly low oven about 150 degrees centigrade the cassoulet is cooked gently for around 2 and a half hours each time a crust forms on the top it should be gently pressed back down and submerged into the mixture this operation is done typically three or four times and if at any stage the cassoulet seems to be drying out too much add a little more stock or water the end result should not be dry but somewhat somewhat saucy like beans in a very thick sauce yet not at all watery so with just 15 minutes remaining in go the pieces of confit other way around love yes skin side up [Music] and then we have the one true cassoulet the Carcassonne [Music] I'm off to seek out many many more local traditional dishes from the longer dock region of southwestern France and beyond so le bon appetit a larger swath [Music] you [Music]

Channel: Pete's Pans

Views: 63,657

Keywords: cooking

Id: RiSAm2XDyQo

Length: 8min 27sec (507 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 29 2020