What are some different foods associated with French religious festivals?

Answer 1

Provencal cuisine is very much like Italian cuisine, it uses a bounty of summer plants such as tomatoes, basil (pistou), green squash, squash flowers, eggplant, bell pepper, extra fresh vegetables such as young (purple) artichoke, but also garlic (in the aioli mayonnaise,) olive and olive oil, rocket.

Being on the Mediterranean Sea, all the local fish are used, for instance in the bouillabaisse dish, or barbecued fresh sardines.

Tuna is also used in the pain bagnat (pan bagnat, literally wet bread, wet with olive oil, of course), a sandwich which comes straight from the Italian pane bagnato and is now popular all over France.

Up until last century, local hunt and gather resources such as snails, small birds such as bunting or thrush were also very popular.

The saffron in the bouillabaisse probably comes from Spain, although saffron was cultivated as high north as Germany in the Middle Ages.

Provencal cuisine is almost vegetarian in nature, and has almost none of dishes in heavy sauce that are prominent in traditional French cuisine. One of the few exceptions (the only one I know) is the daube, of dish of beef slowly cooked in red wine the day before eating it.

The ratatouille, an iconic stew of summer vegetables has become world famous since the eponymous movie, and is an example of such a vegetarian dish.

The simplest soup, the purgative aigo boulido (literally boiled water) uses only garlic and fresh sage leaves. It is usually served over stale bread slices brushed with garlic and olive oil.

Local spices such as thyme, creeping thyme, summer savory (pèbre d'ai, donkey pepper), marjoram, oregano, rosemary, sage, tarragon, chervil, lovage, fennel, bay laurel are frequently used and most of them are ingredients to the herbes de Provence mix. In the United States, it sometimes includes lavender for a more Provencal touch.

Provence has many desserts and sweets inspired by the local fruits, such as almond, fig, melon. The nougat de Montélimaris for instance similar to the Spanish turrón, but most recipes seem original to Provence.

Provence is also famous for its anise alcoholic drinks such as Pastis, Pernod and Ricard, its wines from the Rhone valley or the rosé of Provence.

The sea salt from Salins du Midi present in your Safeway enjoys less fame, even though it is the only salt used all over France. No real influence on Provencal cuisine though. Growing rice such as the naturally red rice grown in Camargue certainly takes its origin from Italy, the largest rice producer in Europe, but no Provencal recipe uses it, not even the salade niçoise or stuffed vegetables such as tomato, eggplant and zucchini that use mostly sausage meat, bread and milk. One traditional Provencal recipe of stuffed cabbage (lou fassum) uses rice, with sausage meat and green peas.

More than cultures, it is probably the terroir and climate that influences Provencal cuisine most. The Alps isolate Provence from pretty much all of Italy and most of France, so it could develop its internationally recognized unique cuisine over the centuries.

The Italian influence probably came as much by sea as by land, the pan bagnat sandwich was for instance the cheap lunch of the Italian fishermen at sea, when it used to be made up of anchovies instead of the more expensive tuna that is in its modern recipe.

Answer 2

Restaurants offer fish on Fridays, and many people eat it.