If you ever take a cooking class, or get serious and go to culinary school, a Mirepoix is probably one of the first things you will study. Of course this is after learning how to properly chop parsley - BORING!!!
So, to help enhance your food brain file of enlightened knowledge, let's take a moment and talk about this...
According to my vast and exhaustive research the name Mirepoix actually comes from the French title for a duke in the Lanquedoc region of Southern France. This dukedom has been around since the 11th century, but a certain duke named Charles-Pierre-Gaston Francois de Levis, due de Levis-Mirepoix (1699-1757) was said to be:
"An incompetent and mediocre individual, who owed his vast fortune to the affection that Louis XV felt toward his wife, and who had but one claim to fame: he gave his name to a sauce."
Or translated by me:
"Duke Charley had a wife whom the lecherous Louis XV was hot for and therefore bought off Charley; all Charley had left was cooking, so he made a sauce using carrots, celery and onions and named it after his duke title!
What a way to be remembered!
Anyway, Mirepoix is an essential combo of carrots, celery and onions (aromatic vegetables) used in all stocks and most sauces, and for roasting pot roast, and all sorts of things. Who among us doesn't remember our grandmothers and mothers cooking with this combo of vegetables on a regular basis?
The most important thing when prepping a Mirepoix is to cut each of the vegetables at roughly the same size...
So, now you know what a Mirepoix is. Check out a VERY cool picture of the dish I'm going to blog about tomorrow. It uses Mirepoix as a major ingredient in the method...
So, to help enhance your food brain file of enlightened knowledge, let's take a moment and talk about this...
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| Mirepoix |
"An incompetent and mediocre individual, who owed his vast fortune to the affection that Louis XV felt toward his wife, and who had but one claim to fame: he gave his name to a sauce."
Or translated by me:
"Duke Charley had a wife whom the lecherous Louis XV was hot for and therefore bought off Charley; all Charley had left was cooking, so he made a sauce using carrots, celery and onions and named it after his duke title!
What a way to be remembered!
Anyway, Mirepoix is an essential combo of carrots, celery and onions (aromatic vegetables) used in all stocks and most sauces, and for roasting pot roast, and all sorts of things. Who among us doesn't remember our grandmothers and mothers cooking with this combo of vegetables on a regular basis?
The most important thing when prepping a Mirepoix is to cut each of the vegetables at roughly the same size...
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| Mirepoix chopped roughly the same size - did you get the ROUGHLY part? |
SUPER COOL PICTURE OF TOMORROW'S RECIPE AFTER THE JUMP...
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| Left over roast used for Bolognese, served with an AMAZING Meritage |
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