Often forgotten between Provence and the South West of France, the Languedoc region is a rugged area caught between the Mediterranean and the Massif Central. The great playwright Racine declared after a visit to his uncle that the village “would support twenty caterers but a bookseller would starve to death”.

The Languedoc is a place where the food is always enveloped with strong and pungent smells.

The Mediterranean’s abundance in fish is reflected in the cooking, but the salt water lagoons add mussels, oysters, little clams called tellines and a local shellfish called Violets de Mer or biju to the menu. The biju, is a test of gastronomic fortitude, it has the appearance of a moldy potato, easy to cut through it gives up an egg like interior whose taste make oysters bland. Sadly overfishing has endangered some of the staple fish such as sea bass and monkfish though mackerel and sardines are still abundant.

In the back country the fruits and vegetables rule. The best peaches and apricots in France, the round fragrant melons of Cavaillon, figs, knarled tomatoes, glowing aubergines,olives, garlic, small leafed basil and of course grapes. This rugged back country also produced one of the main ingredients for the cassoulet; confits. Duck, goose and pork are first salted, and then cooked in fat before being stored in the fat.

At the eastern tip, the Camargue, where the Guardian, the French cowboy, keeps his bulls also produces a nutty chewy black rice.

Like a sponge, the Languedoc has also adopted the tastes of all its many visitors, the Romans, the Moors and even the English! If you are ever in a small village called Pézenas, walk into the local patisserie and ask for a Petit Pâté, you will be served a mince pie, and you can thank Clive of India who left the recipe during a visit in 1768.

In the northern hills of the Languedoc Roquefort is made, do visit the caves. They will take you in a little train deeper and deeper underground. The deeper you go the stronger the Roquefort, at each level at the head of the tunnel it is amusing to read which country that level supplies.