France and the Alps · Volume 16, Altitude, Cheese and a Border the Kitchen Never Drew
Papet vaudois
Vaud
Illustration
- Time
- 1 hour
- Researched
- 22 sources cited
Vaud. First documented references are only mid-19th century; no evidence of genuine medieval antiquity, and pork was in fact more expensive than veal in the final years of the Old Regime, which argues against an "ancient peasant sausage" framing this dish is often given.
As tradition built it
Serves 4. About 1 hour.
Ingredients
- 1kg leeks, 500g potatoes leeks and potatoes, sliced
- 1dl cream, 2.5dl white wine cream and white wine, to boil them in
- 2 saucisse aux choux vaudoise or saucisson vaudois, to serve
Method
- Boil the sliced leeks and potatoes together in a little cream and white wine until tender but explicitly not mashed together, each retaining its own shape.
- Simmer the saucisse aux choux vaudoise or saucisson vaudois separately, roughly 35 to 40 minutes at about 75°C.
- Serve the vegetables with the sausage.
Notes
No deposited, gram-quantified official recipe was located for this dish in the research behind this chapter; the quantities above should be read as indicative household ratios, not an authenticated standard.
What a modern chef changes
Precise low-temperature control for the sausage, and the leek and potato kept genuinely distinct rather than merely unmashed
Rung 4
Method
- Poach the saucisse aux choux sous vide at 75°C, matching the traditional temperature exactly, for 45 minutes, then finish with a brief, hard sear in a dry pan. This gives the sausage the same gentle internal cook the traditional simmer aims for, with none of the risk of a home stovetop drifting hotter over the same duration.
- Cook the leeks and potatoes in two entirely separate pans rather than one shared pot, the potatoes in a lightly salted stock, the leeks in butter with only a splash of the same stock, then combine only at the point of plating. This takes the tradition's own instruction, that the two must retain their shape, further than a shared pot easily allows, since even careful simultaneous cooking in one liquid tends to let the leek's own moisture soften the potato's edges.
- Finish the combined vegetables with a light cream and white wine reduction spooned over rather than cooked in, keeping the reduction's own acidity and richness as a separate, considered sauce element rather than a background cooking liquid the vegetables have simply absorbed.