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Bar-le-Duc, the Capital of Redcurrant
| The currant jam made with redcurrant deseeded with a goose quill, which has come from a tradition unique in the world that started in 1344, is nicknamed “Bar caviar.” |
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Today like yesterday, deseeding redcurrant berries is a really precise craft requiring a long training...and much patience. Every redcurrant berry is delicately seized by specialists between their thumb and forefinger, who split it and extract the pips using a sharpened goose feather without hurting the flesh.
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| No machine can take the place of those workers and three hours of work are necessary to get one kilogramme of deseeded redcurrant. Delicately poured into a slightly boiling sugar syrup, those berries remain colourful and tasteful. Once cooled, the jam is set out in multi-facetted glass jars. |
| Always considered as a luxury good, its reputation spread very rapidly throughout the aristocratic and royal circles, notably throughtout the King’s Court. Victor Hugo appreciated it and Alfred Hitchcock took delight in eating it every morning at breakfast. Regarding Raymond Poincaré, who was born in Bar-le-Duc, he introduced it on the table of the President of the French Republic. | | |
| Other Products Made with Redcurrant |
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The “Dive groseille” : a fizzy alcoholic drink made of redcurrant. Drink chilled. |
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Redcurrant sweets : chocolate, redcurrant, almonds, mirabelle plums and other ingredients. Definitely, they must be tasted! |
| Unexpected food combinations are offered by the craftsmen of Bar-le-Duc, André Cordel and the small compagny “Saveurs des Ducs,” who are both passionately involved in the production of savoury food and sweet food. |
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The “Duchesse,” genuine redcurrant jam of Bar-le-Duc deseeded with a goose quill by the workers of “Saveurs des ducs,” can be served with game for instance. |
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The “Ducale” and the “Chocolat Renaissance” became two of the specialities of André Cordel. They are true delights made of chocolate. The “Chocolat Renaissance” is shaped as a head, looking like both the French writer Rabelais and the French King Francis I. | |
| Appetizing Expertise |
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Thanks to motivated and expert apprenticeship supervisors, the chocolate and confectionner’s shops of Bar-le-Duc help to train skilled professionals. They were acknowledged to be the best apprentices in France in 1997, second best in 1998 and the “Grand Prix Charles Proust” prizewinners (pastry-making prize). |
| Japanese professionals regularly come to Bar-le-Duc in order to improve with one of the 25 best chocolate-maker in France. | | |
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