The French pride themselves on their culinary savoir-faire, but many lack time to cook at home and well-heeled families are increasingly turning to traditional traiteurs, or delicatessens, for ready-made haute cuisine.
In Paris’s most exclusive areas, traiteurs employ highly skilled chefs and change menus daily. Their windows are models of elegant presentation. Dishes such as gratinéed scallops in the shells are typically laid out in elaborate displays beside several varieties of pâtés en croûte — terrine made on the premises and wrapped in a pastry crust — and specialities such as crayfish in aspic.
Many traiteurs are family-run and their owners are trained charcutiers, experts at preparing hams and terrines from scratch.
“We bring fine dining into the home,” Nicolas Verot of the Maison Verot said. A fourth-generation traiteur, Verot, 30, obtained degrees in law and business before spending two years training as a charcutier as preparation to enter the family business, which has expanded to six delicatessens in Paris.
“Each one is different because they cater to the tastes of local residents,” he said. “We know our regular customers, who live or work within a ten-minute walk from the shop. We know what they like and what they don’t like.”
Maison Verot has noticed a change in people’s eating habits: “They want to eat lighter”
GERALDINE MARTENS
Office workers queue at lunchtime at Verot’s Left Bank branch in the opulent 6th arrondissement, where a main course costs about €13.
“In the evening customers tend to be people who live locally, older couples and younger families with children who can’t find time to cook or just want to treat themselves,” Verot said. “We do all the traditional staples but one thing that’s changed is that people are eating less meat and more fish and vegetables. They want to eat lighter, so we make sure our food isn’t too heavy, even when we use butter, cream and cheese.”
At another family-run traiteur on the Left Bank, the Charcuterie Saint Germain, owned by Martine and Marc Fermin, customers said they used it for gourmet meals when entertaining, but also for hearty everyday dishes such as beef bourguignon.
“By the time I get home from the office it’s late and I have to make sure my kids do their homework, so cooking is out of the question,” Josiane, a 45-year-old lawyer, said. “It’s not cheap to eat this way, but I know it’s all freshly cooked and we can enjoy great French food. The days when people had cooks at home or mothers would spend hours in the kitchen are gone, but we’re trying not to lose the tradition of eating well. This is the next best thing to a personal chef.”
Martine and Marc Fermin of the Charcuterie Saint Germain have been traiteurs and charcutiers since they were 16. Their prices rise at the weekend when they cook more sophisticated dishes for locals hosting dinner parties
DAVID CHAZAN FOR THE TIMES
Martine Fermin said that her customers wanted traditional French cooking, although the most popular dishes include paella and couscous, a north African speciality. “We do like to innovate, but our mainstays are traditional French dishes. Today we have cassoulet [a southern French stew with beans, sausages and pork],” she said.
Fermin, 63, and her husband, Marc, who have been traiteurs and charcutiers since they were 16, cook more sophisticated dishes, such as veal sweetbreads, at the weekend when people have dinner parties, and their prices are higher.
Their business is thriving despite the cost of living crisis, with a mostly local clientele. About 10 per cent of their customers are tourists who tend to stay in Airbnbs near the delicatessen in Place Maubert, a short walk from Notre Dame and the former apartment of François Mitterrand, the late president.
All the food at the Fermins’ delicatessen is cooked on the premises
DAVID CHAZAN FOR THE TIMES
“We’re in an upmarket area and we do high quality food,” Fermin said. “Inflation has forced us to raise prices but luckily people can afford it in this area.”
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Menus are seasonal, but always include fish and meat dishes, with a variety of salads as starters, hams and terrines made on the premises, and desserts.
This week main courses at the two charcuteries included cod fillet, roast sea bass, pork with figs, rabbit in mustard and cream sauce, roast guinea fowl with morel mushrooms, gratin dauphinois, Basquaise chicken, salt pork with lentils and pot-au-feu beef stew.
Dining and Cooking