(All Photos: Pauline Boldt)

Probably every profession produces a recurring nightmare for those who practice it: the politician dreams of campaigning on national TV, opening his mouth but unable to make a sound; the sprinter is still glued to the blocks after the gun has sounded, the race is run and the fans are leaving the stadium. You can probably imagine how it is for us chefs as we toss and turn at night. We’re in the kitchen to cook a seven-course tasting menu for a palace full of VIPs, but while they’re all already on their second cocktail, we’re still looking in the empty walk-in fridge to see if there isn’t any food hiding somewhere, and all the other cooks seem to have gotten bored waiting for our plan and just disappeared. 

Even if you’re not a professional cook, you may have experienced a taste of kitchen panic if some “friends” or your crazy aunt dropped by in the late afternoon rather unexpectedly, and you feel obligated to offer them dinner.  You know the fridge is empty, but you cross yourself and open the door anyway, to find that, behind that ketchup bottle and strawberry yogurt, it does indeed look too much like the tomb after the resurrection.

Well, it’s never as bad as it may first appear, unless you’ve just gotten back from one month of summer vacation. If you rummage around your cupboards, fridge and freezer with optimism and a sense of adventure, I’m sure you can find the ingredients for an entirely acceptable meal (three courses are not necessary at every meal, even in France!)

In my case, the only things of substance I had on hand this day were ricotta-stuffed tortellini and some canned lentils (at least they had been cooked in duck fat, putting them on a whole ‘nuther level than watery canned lentils). If you’re a chef, your friends won’t let you get away with serving them a bowl of noodles and microwaved canned lentils! 

Who do we call to the rescue? Gaston Pierre Charles de Lévis-Lomagne, Duke of Mirepoix, or rather, his chef. This man must have had an even more difficult name to attach to a recipe, but it was Gaston’s chef who came up with the classic and ubiquitous base of flavor and aroma in French cooking: onion, carrot and celery in small dice, bay leaf and thyme, with the option of a bit of diced bacon. You may already know it as “mirepoix.”  Such a practice of dish-nomenclature in French cuisine is yet another example of the aristocracy clearly riding on the backs of the working class, before the French Revolution eventually elevated chefs to TV superstardom.

Yes, some carefully diced Mirepoix gently caramelizing in bubbling bacon fat almost salvages a microwave dinner, but can certainly elevate our lentils and pasta to a level worthy of serving a dear friend. As you can see, I was only missing some parsley or chives to warrant a small “wow” as the dish would have reached the table. Mirepoix gives most of what the senses require: flavor, aroma, and visual pleasure.

You may be asking yourself how pasta slipped into the thread of this column, since we were to be focused on French cooking.  Perhaps you’ve lined up behind some low-carb guru from the last 15 years, and can’t even find a box of pasta in your pantry?  Even certain Italians have been known to rant against pasta.  The avant-garde thinker F. T. Marinetti, who published “The Manifesto of Futurist Cooking” in 1930, tops them all. Herein he advocates the abolition of pasta from the diet to free the Italians from somnolent laziness and awaken them to a quick-footed and passionate existence. What kind of pasta were they eating back then? Sounds like he was describing the fettuccine alfredo served in every family restaurant across Canada. Or maybe the spaghetti and ketchup you’re letting your kids eat four times a week? 

Firstly, noodles go way back in most European countries and have their own rightful place on the French dinner plate. The spread of the Italian Renaissance and Catherine de Médici’s arrival from Florence just meant we were to see about a hundred more types and brands of pasta on the shelf for the rest of human history. And secondly, mirepoix, or only a handful of fresh vegetables and herbs, is enough for you to be able to cook and serve dinner with dignity.

Instead of recipes this time ‘round, I offer you a list of simple ready-made or pantry items that you can bring to life with mirepoix the next time you’re in a pinch: Canned lentils, canned white beans, potato gratin, pretty-much any plain vegetable gratin, cream of mushroom soup, pretty-much any cream or puréed soup, cheese ravioli or tortellini, and more. You can also cook any hunk of meat, poultry or fish in this and be so pleased with yourself. Please draw the line at pizza. Please leave the mirepoix off your pizza.