I kept running across mentions of this book in other culinary books until curiousity finally got the better of me and I persuaded the local librarian to try to find a copy for me (which she did with considerable grace and speed).
De Groot found the nicest inn in France (and, it is to be assued, the world) lo many decades ago, and in 1973 wrote a book about it, even if that meant that the world would beat a path to its door, and thus break the enchantment.
Much of the charm of the inn in its very inaccessibility. Near the Alps, protected by austere granite cliffs, the village is the home of the Carthusian monks, famous for their Chartreuse liquor. In the midst of this handsome combination of spareness and luxuriousness is the inn, epitomizing both. An old stone farmhouse, with a central fireplace that forms the cooking source in the winter, even as it keeps the guests warm. This fireplace, with its may spits for turning meats at different heights and therefore different temperatures, and its holes in the hearth for simmering large pots of soup, is so lovingly described as to create huge jealousy--how much better food would turn out if cooked in such a way! How can we think food tastes as good the farther we remove it from the primal cook source?
Anyway, to continue--the best thing about the inn is not the rooms or the view (both of which are impressive), but the food, which is perfect to a degree to be nearly impossible. And very, very, old-fashioned (this is marked contrast to the rest of France, which seemed to be in the midst of being taken over by instant cappucino, according to de Groot). These perfect menus are lovingly recreated, and the recipes provided. An example: an autumn lunch begins with an apertif of pineau des charentes, a salad of green beans with mushrooms followed by a white savoy wine accompany the cream of mussel soup with sorrel, and a glass (or two) of red bordeaux to go with the leg of mutton poaced in white wine and garnished with fall vegetables and white haricot beans of soissons in watercress cream, followed with three cheeses (charolais, chaource de champagne, fourme d'ambert) and Bartlett pears poached in red wine. And all of this is followed by coffee, les bouffettes, and a post-prandial of eau-de-vie d'abricots d'alsace. And this menu is notable for its lightness and restaint. It's all tantalizingly described--don't start reading on an empty stomach, whatever you do.
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