Fred Ménager and La Ruchotte
"La Ruchotte" sounds clear, delicious, and cheerful like a tune, enough to get one ready and seated at the table. It emerges at the bend of a desolate path, a large square farm surrounded by hedges and dry stone walls. The place is a small piece of rugged and beautiful Burgundian limestone plateau, where one delights in the sight among the budding thickets, the yellowed grass of the moorland, and the dark coppices.
In 2002, Fred Ménager settles there, in the middle of nowhere, with the project of raising everything he will offer on a long table d’hôtes on five hectares. Armed with his cooking CAP, he arrives in 1991 in Mionnay, at Alain Chapel’s, who had passed away a few months earlier. "He was my role model; he placed insane importance on the product. I relearned everything, cooking techniques, making stocks, bisques. That’s where I found my culinary family. Skill can be learned, but the product itself cannot."
])
Jacky Durand and La Ferme de la Ruchotte
"Let’s admit it, our first encounter with Frédéric Ménager wasn’t promising. From the first step into his farm-Inn of La Ruchotte, we sensed a reserved being, an adventurer of long-standing natural flavors. That’s probably why we followed him for eight years before gathering our encounters into a book where you’ll find the unpublished words of our exchanges, but also reports for Libération. With Frédéric Ménager, there are no ’talking points,’ no ’media strategies.’ Just confidences with feet in the soil and noses above the stoves. Eight years is long but so precious for seeing, hearing, writing." Jacky Durand
Nearly 150 recipes including the famous "Vol au vent à la bourgeoise" and "pâté croûte," but also crayfish bisque, chicken ravioli, chicken broth, burnet, black garlic, chicken liver cake, frog legs in parsley sauce, emulsified mushroom broth, porcini consommé, pumpkin gratin, herb salad, etc.
Illustrated by photographer and art historian Laurent Dupont
Photographer and art historian, Laurent Dupont has conducted various reports at the Hôtel Lutetia, Fauchon, Patrick Roger, the Maison du Chocolat, or the Moynat leather goods store. He also works with the Robert Klein Gallery (Boston) as an associate correspondent for Europe. Passionate about cooking and gastronomy, he published "Le Prolongement du geste" (Éditions Keribus) in October 2014 and "Alexandre Couillon. Marine et végétale" (Éditions de l’Épure) in 2016.
Video & photo credits: La Ferme de la Ruchotte / Laurent Dupont - All rights reserved.
