Why, these just sound absolutely delightful! Have any of you been lucky enough to try them?
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I confess I’m a little skeptical that smoke from pine needles would have a desirable flavor. I’ve been to a few barbeques/smokes where someone put an errant chunk of pine on the fire, and they didn’t end well.
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Good point. I just read “smoked mussels,” which I love.
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Me, too. Not a fan of resinous flavors redolent of pine, though, e.g., retsina.
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Retsina. Shudder.
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I was once in a long Greek situation where I really had no choice about retsina. I kept telling myself it is an acquired taste…like bat guano cheesecake.
Ironically, retsina opened some doors to me to learn about other “ancient” wines. We tend to think of Italy and France as the Eden of wine, yet they stand on the shoulders of the Greeks, Armenians, Georgians and others.
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I think anyone who’s ever spent some time in Greece will encounter Retsina. When I was a kid I thought that was the only Greek wine around.
No, but I’d sure like to, just sayin’
Yes, I spent a couple of days in the Marais Poitevin, aka The Green Venice. Some time in the 14th century monks canalised a bay with a network of hundreds of canals. In some parts alder trees grew on spits of land in between the canals. That part is called The Marais Mouillé which is shady in the summer.
At the time there was a well-known traditional restaurant in the lieu-dit of La Garette-Sansais. It is a one street long community along a canal where you can rent a barque (flat bottom boat) which are paddled standing up. like a gondola in Venice.
The mouclade was a treat. Pine needles produce a lot of smoke, so they are effective that way. But aside for the smokiness I did not detect a particular flavor.
Like in much of rural France, unfortunately, many traditional restaurants or other places to eat are dying out. I am guessing there are a tiny number of places you could try this anymore.
Another specialty of the region is farcis maraichine, a pork and spinach terrine. Really wonderful. Another is jambon vendéen mijotée avec ses mogettes, a white bean. The ham is more interesting than good, however, but maybe that’s because I am used to ham that is fattier or has more of that in the flavor. This ham is quite lean tasting.
The Marias Poitevin is a wildly beautiful area with tiny port villages sandwiched between the canals. I very much enjoyed trying my hand at paddling the barque, though it is really hard work if like me you don’t know what you are doing.
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So how long did it take you to acquire a taste for bat guano cheesecake?
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So, no piney aftertaste?
And thank you for sharing — I knew at least one person here might’ve tried them.
That was enlightening 
