The Taste of Things for Movies & Munchies

I am always on the lookout for a good foodie film. I found one (with culinary scenes to spare) with The Taste of Things (France 2023). I’m hosting for Movies & Munchies for this month. (Check out our Facebook page and ask for an invite if you would like to be a part).

This is just a lovely gem of a movie. It is quiet and serene. A lot of the scenes have no dialogue and focus on the love of food (and making food for those you love). 

I have one caveat though. One almost needs Escoffier as a handbook to catalog everything in this film. (You might also want to have some tissues handy.)

The movie revolves around Dodin, the Napoleon of Gastronomy, and his club of cronies who come around for his inventive and delicious fare. Dodin imagines the dishes but Eugenie creates the magic in the kitchen. Dodin can create culinary genius as well. He can cook on his own merit as he proves later in the film.

As with most French food, everything is fresh. The opening scenes show Eugenie in a lush garden, digging potatoes, pulling carrots, and cutting lettuces. Once she returns to the kitchen though, the viewer is bombarded with food preparation—gutting and frying fish, boiling eggs, cheeses, omelettes, mirepoix, crayfish, straining butter, vintage wine (truly vintage), ice cream, etc.  So much food.  I could list menu after menu but I will just describe a few.

The first meal Eugenie serves on screen:

• Consomme (“so gentle”)
• Montrochet (“The perfect expression”)
• Vol-au-vent
• Milk poached turbot
• Veal loin with braised lettuce
• Baked Alaska (and almost crying with the first bite)
• Liqueurs in the salon

Again, there’s not a lot of dialogue (a bit that I quoted above), mostly just sighs of contentment.

One of Dodin’s gourmand friends hosts a rustic meal at his cabin: braised Ortolans. (I had to look that up.) To truly enjoy these little song birds, one must dine with a napkin over one’s head and apparently grunt a lot. 

I won’t list the Prince of Eruasia’s ostentatious meal, a meal that lasted over nine hours and only impressed the host. Upon Dodin’s arrival back home after this marathon meal, Eugenie still cooks for him. Dodin did not want to sleep on the Prince’s meal, so Eugenie served him a clear soup with a poached egg and wisps of tarragon, turkey breast in wine jelly and a fricassee of asparagus tips, a few biscuits and a glass of Grenache. Honeyed lime tea was his nightcap.

Dodin creates a bit of controversy as he and Eugenie plan a meal to reciprocate the Prince’s feast. Dodin wants to serve peasant food: Pot-au-Feu. His friends respond with “Inconceivable!”

Amidst these feasts and meals, it is noticeable that Eugenie’s health is failing and has been for some time. It is also revealed that Dodin loves her. There relationship is much more than one of employer exploiting an employee. Eugenie holds the cards on this relationship.

Dodin makes her a beautifully exquisite meal, serving it to her solo so she can relish each bite. Dining alone can be exquisite if you know that the one that you love is making you his finest. 

The scene for the wedding announcement feast looks like a Manet painting.

Dodin waxes poetic about his fiancé and the pleasures of an Autumn harvest, things like “chestnuts, artichokes, green grapes and pears. And though quails, warblers, and corncrakes depart, the woodpigeon, woodcock and duck arrive…Normandy apples are harvested with sticks…One dines by candlelight.”

Trust me, there’s more food but these are the meals that stayed with me.

What to make…. I almost wanted to do a flatbread with artichokes, grapes and pears with some good cheese.  But, it’s not harvest time here. I kept coming back to the omelette. That simple dish, “best eaten with a spoon” as he points out to the young Pauline, is something I have never been able to master. To complete the dramatic cycle of the plot, the omelette is something that he judges (and fails) all of the potential cooks he interviews. 

I used three farm fresh eggs and herbs from our garden—chives, tarragon, parsley and dill. (I know chervil is a classic ingredient but I don’t have any in the herb garden yet.)

You be the judge.

I’m not posting a recipe, but find any Jacques Pépin video to learn. They are fantastic tutorials. Then I morphed in a technique from America’s Test Kitchen: turning off the heat and putting a lid on the pan for 1 minute.

I served it with some just picked raspberries from our growing thicket.

All in all, this try was probably a bit too well-done (less tender). Jacques would have failed me. Dodin would not have hired me. I feel more confident about mastering this technique though.

“This is the best moment of the day.”
–Dodin (As he and Eugenie share an omelet with some wine and cheese and fruit)

I’m posting up at the very last minute but look here soon for the roundup. Our June film is Nonnas and Camilla is hosting. Look for more details soon at our FB page or at Culinary Cam.