This week, Nicolas Carreau went to visit the library of the famous cook, also a columnist in "La Table des bons vivants" on Europe 1. In the lobby of his restaurant in the Latin Quarter nestle classics of French gastronomy, to the value sometimes invaluable.
INTERVIEW
"When I started, I was very interested in what was going on in this profession, and especially what had happened there before."
This is how Yves Camdeborde explains the size of his culinary library.
In the lobby of his Parisian restaurant, Le Relais Saint-Germain, two large pieces of furniture are protected by display cases.
Nicolas Carreau discovered priceless treasures there on Sunday in
La Voix est Livre
.
>> Find all of Nicolas Carreau's shows in podcast and replay here
"My traveling companions for forty years now"
"As soon as I was able to buy books, I did so, to understand why there was this craze around the world in relation to French gastronomy", develops Yves Camdeborde, also a columnist for
La Table des bons vivants
, on Europe 1. "I have bled myself from time to time to succeed in having these books which have been my traveling companions for forty years now."
Among these companions, some were bought at auction at the Drouot room.
Others are much more contemporary, like those "from the Robert Laffont collection which brings together all the cooks of the 80s, the guys who built the nouvelle cuisine by revolutionizing this somewhat invigorating and heavy French cuisine".
The former
Masterchef
juror
quotes Alain Chapel, "'a reference as much in the way of thinking as of cooking", and of which he has the editorial of his main work,
La cuisine, c'est bien more que des recipes
,
read.
to all the apprentices who pass through his restaurant.
"One of those old recipes that sublimated the product"
On the shelves of the library, there is also an original edition of
Viandier
de Taillevant, heir to "the time when the kitchen was divided into parts, in places where we worked exclusively on a raw material, whether meat, fish. or vegetables ", smiles Yves Camdeborde.
Uses have changed, but "we continue to use it a lot technically," says the chef.
"For the competition for the Meilleur Ouvrier de France, we will systematically look for one of these old recipes which sublimated the product."
"The great master of all these is Escoffier", enthuses the chef.
The great culinary guide
is the one that we recommend to all apprentices to buy.
As you turn the pages, you come across words that are almost poetic.
“It's a foreign language, a very precise vocabulary, it's almost our own dialect,” admits the owner.
“Steaming means respecting, passing delicately in butter without giving any color, without stressing”, he illustrates.
>> READ ALSO
- Yves Camdeborde's advice to give your children a taste of cooking
"We tend to have very beautiful photo books, but nothing but reading a recipe ... We see each other as the cook, we make it all the more our own", explains Yves Camdeborde.
In his hands, the list of the few steps to follow to achieve wonders, "a cookie that we bake at home in Béarn, when we come back at 4 o'clock."
Literature, "very close" to the profession of a cook
If he never tires of flipping through the pages, the chef cultivates "a big complex" when it comes to writing.
"I try to write regularly and I never find it very good", confides the one who tries his hand at poems and novels.
"But I am lucky to have met a writer named Sébastien Lapaque, who educated me a little in the world of literature. (...) It is very close to my profession as a cook: them play with words, I play with colors, materials, seasonings, "breathes Yves Camdeborde.
"With the same words you can say a lot of different things, and with a poultry you can make a lot of different dishes."