September 09 |
Armand Jean du Plessis Cardinal-Duc
de Richelieu |
Cardinal de Richelieu's popular image has been distorted by
the Dumas père
(novels as Louis XIII's treacherous, self-seeking first
minister who was inundated in court intrigues. While all of this may be at
least partially true, these are only a few facets in the mosaic of the man
whose political brilliance shaped modern France
into a strong, centralized state and
whose elitism was the hallmark of contemporary French culture. Richelieu was
convinced that his standards of grace, order, and harmony were ordained by
God to be the standards of the French nation and eventually the world's. The cardinal's extraordinary aesthetics helped him establish one the the greatest art collections of the seventeenth-century. The collection was divided between his Paris residence (the Palais-Cardinal, now the Palais-Royal on the Rue Saint-Honoré) and his country home (the chateau de Richelieu). Painting really mattered to Richelieu, not so much for its own sake as for its power to suggest states of mind that he regarded as indispensable. The Palais-Cardinal housed collection of five hundred major paintings including masterpieces by Da Vinci, Raphael, Titian, del Sarto, Poussin, Reubens, Bellini and Correggio. The two marble slaves of Michelangelo, now in the Louvre, flanked the gate to the main pavilion of the chateau de Richelieu. His collection of antique sculpture, jewels, bronzes, tapestries, Persian rugs, and Chinese lacquers was unmatched and envied by the kings of Europe. Richelieu is credited with introducing the eggplant to French cuisine and serving it often at state banquets. Eggplants had been nicknamed the "mad apple", because of their reputation of being poisonous, a reputation that they shared with the Cardinal. Richelieu's passion for eggplant spawned a wide spectrum of recipes. The most impressive is Aubergines Cardinal which is the French version of moussaka. In this creation, eggplant, duxelles, and chopped ham are cooked in a charlotte mold lined with the eggplant skins |
Aubergines Cardinal
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Ingredients |
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2 lbs cooked ham, ground *See Appendix A |
4 large unblemished eggplants |
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Instructions |
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Serves 6-8 |