It is almost a badge of honor in France to profess a great liking for andouillettes. If you are not fond of them, the implication is that you’re not really French, or not a true francophile. Yet among francophiles I can think of few more polarizing foods—and by no means every French person is enthusiastic: sales have been quietly slipping for years.
Let’s not beat about the bush: it’s the smell. Even among people who are happy to linger in a small, airless space breathing in the pongiest washed-rind cheeses, getting past the smell of an andouillette to eat it can be an insurmountable hurdle (could it be a genetic thing, like coriander?). Meryl Streep showed admirable tact when she described andouillette as having “a bit of a barnyard.”
She and Stanley Tucci had ordered them for lunch at a bistro in France when they were filming, appropriately enough, Julia & Julia, in which Streep plays the chef Julia Child. Tucci assumed that andouillette would be a smaller version of the Louisiana andouille (aka chitterlings or chitlins sausage). It is not (see below). His description is as colorful as it is evocative, but sadly unsuitable for this magazine. I suggest you look it up on YouTube. My own history with andouillettes has also been challenging, including a kilo bought (not by me) and put in the fridge where they demonstrated that, given time, they could become even more fearsomely noisome.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O1VHO5Uf_A
While it’s not eaten on the scale it once was, andouillette dishes are still common on French bistro menus,
This Article was originally published on World of Fine Wine
