Not Sparking Joy

Although I collect cookbooks, I am certainly not in the league with other cooking addicts who boast libraries of thousands of titles. I would regularly edit my collection so that the number was well under five hundred. The RWM (Resident Wine Maniac), who is loath to dispose of a wine even if it is in questionable condition, can never understand my predilection for disposing of cookbooks I don’t use. I must admit that I have a few post-purge regrets. One of these was my paperback copy of La Cuisine De France by  Marie-Pierre “Mapie” de Toulouse-Lautrec. I am sorely tempted to repurchase it. 

Marie Pierre Adélaïde Lévêque de Vilmorin was born in 1901 into a family of horticulturist elites. The Vilmorin name is as famous with French gardeners as Burpee’s is in the United States. She is perhaps overshadowed by her younger sister Louise de Vilmorin, a prolific and sharp-witted writer who had some high profile affairs with  Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Orson Welles and Alfred Duff Cooper.  Marie Pierre, after a trial marriage to a distant Vilmorin cousin, married the nephew of the painter Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, who had inherited the title of Comte.

1954BJ – Before Julia

She embarked on a career first as a gossip/society writer and theater reviewer for Femina Magazine and later as  a food writer for Elle, using the nickname “Mapie” and of course her highly marketable last name. In the latter she truly found her niche. Mapie wanted to make cooking easier and more accessible in post-war France and even developed the detachable recipe card for Elle Magazine. She made Quiche Lorraine a household word with her effortless and highly successful recipe. As a sidenote from a film fanatic (myself) this dish was introduced to an American audience by Cary Grant in “To Catch A Thief”. 

While Julia Child was embarking on her fabled career of introducing French cooking in both its high and more approachable guises, Mapie was already a household name in France. She was known for testing and marketing delicious regional dishes to a national audience that no longer was interested in the grand cuisine of wealthy households. We Americans can thank her for introducing us to doable versions of Coquilles Saint Jacques and  Tarte Aux Amandes. In fact, Lindsay Shere’s famous almond tart for Chez Panisse in the 1980s is based on Mapie’s recipe.

She even codified dishes from France’s colonial past, such as her Moroccan inspired lamb with lemon, saffron and cinnamon. With a postwar middle-class American population flowing through France via military, diplomatic and business opportunities, both she and the editors of Elle Magazine saw an opportunity to publish a book of her recipes for American readers.  Not only did she want to rewrite her popular recipes for Americans, but she traveled to the US to study home kitchens and equipment. She noted time constraints and ingredients that could be substituted. Fortunately you can download this book through Internet Archive

Orion Press published the American edition of La Cuisine de France in 1964 and then it was republished in 2004- copies are available hrough  used book sellers. My personal choice is Bonnie Slotnick Cookbooks. And while there are very few photos available now of Mapie, one of my favorites is of her in hat, pearls, corsage and fur coat presiding over a roast turkey. I think my mother would have enjoyed cooking like that. 

French Books for American Cooks 

I remember cooking from her book and enjoying the results, particularly her mocha cake,  but then my husband and I became entranced with the PBS series starring Julia Child and we avidly cooked out of her TV Series cookbook with occasional stabs at Mastering The Art of French Cooking, Volume I. Later, when I had opened the store and bought and splattered happily through Jeannette Seaver’s cookbook,  Jeannette’s Secrets of Everyday Good Cooking, Mapie’s paperback was shoved further back on the shelf.

Fortunately, I found that Maida Heatter, who was an inveterate recipe collector with a commanding sweet tooth – had extracted this recipe that Mapie wrote for McCall’s Magazine in 1959. She included a very precise (Mapie occasionally was a bit vague on measurements and techniques) version of the cake. While it is not the bull’s eye of chocolate that my beloved Chocolate Nemesis is (see this post for two versions of this drop-dead chocolate cake), it is one that the RWM prefers – with whipped cream, of course. You should not make it with a chocolate that is over 62% cocoa solids. It can be refrigerated, but I prefer it kept at room temperature in a cool area, but well covered. A small slice at midnight is a great nightcap with a spicy Amaro, and it is a welcome change from normal breakfast fare…with ample whipped cream of course.