Marseille

La Sicile Authentique: An Italian Hideaway

Located at the eastern edge of Marseille, Saint-Julien is a far cry from the bustling city center. Here, congested boulevards stretch into narrow streets, and birdsong, not the honking of scooters, fills the air. The residential neighborhood has mostly standalone houses, from 17th-century bourgeois bastides (farmhouses) to 20th-century homes built by immigrant families searching for a small-town vibe. One of them feels like it’s set in an Italian village, thanks to an enterprising Sicilian. Liliane Casteldaccia runs Sicile Authentique, an épicerie, restaurant and small catering company, out of the ground floor of the house in which she grew up. At the foot of the driveway, the wood-paneled dining area is peppered with maps and Italian memorabilia.

Marseille

U Mio Paese: The Corsican Pantry

Editor’s note: To further explore how the pandemic has affected the areas featured in our 2020 “Neighborhoods to Visit” guide and what recovery may look like, we will be publishing dispatches from restaurants, markets and food shops in these districts all week long. The close links between Marseille and the French island of Corsica are, in some ways, clearly marked in the city. Like the red-and-white Corsica Linea ferries docked in Marseille’s port that make daily crossings across the Mediterranean. Or the prevalence of Corsican canistrelli at Marseille’s boulangeries and biscuiteries.

Marseille

Essential Bites: Ludivine in Marseille

Homemade bread was a byproduct of the Covid-19 lockdown worldwide, as witnessed by the lack of flour on supermarket shelves and proudly displayed loaves on Instagram feeds. I understood the trend – bread gave people a sense of purpose, warmed homes with comforting scents and filled the void left by closed-down everything. Plus, the act of kneading gave the one-two punch of stress relief and tactile pleasure. Yet, I felt no need to knead. For I live in France, the land where boulangeries churn out 30 million baguettes a day. A place where bread is such an integral part of life that no meal is considered complete without it. Whatever I made at home wouldn’t match the loaves of someone who has devoted their life to the craft of bread making.

Marseille

Lucky 13: Treize Desserts de Noël, a Provençal Christmas Tradition

Holiday traditions tend to be tied to numbers. In southern Italy there is the Feast of Seven Fishes on Christmas Eve, while in Poland, the night before Christmas is celebrated with borscht, herring and poppy seed cake at the 12-course Wigilia. Here in Provence, our lucky number is 13, with the Treize Desserts de Noël. By no means a static tradition, the 13 Desserts of Christmas have evolved over the centuries. Its first mention in 1683 by Marseille cleric Francois Marchetti in Explication des Usages et Coutumes des Marseillais (An Explication of Customs and Traditions of the Marseillais) detailed 13 breads, not desserts, alongside cakes and dried and fresh fruit. The table was topped with three tablecloths to represent the Holy Trinity – a custom that some families still practice today.

Marseille

Patisserie Avyel: The Kosher Connection

Around this time of year, the smell of dough frying fills the air on a side street off Marseille’s busy Rue de Rome. The source of the enticing scent is Patisserie Avyel, a small kosher bakery and salon de thé in the midst of preparing for Hanukkah, which in 2020 begins on the evening of December 10. For Hanukkah, the Festival of Lights, Jews often make fried treats to commemorate the miraculous oil that kept a lamp burning for eight days instead of one in the rededicated Temple in Jerusalem some 2,200 years ago. Latkes – potato pancakes – might be the best-known Hanukkah food, but frying up dough is another popular tradition, with these holiday “doughnuts” varying by geography.

Marseille

La Chocolatière de Marseille: Raising the Bar

When we first moved to Marseille, a jewel box of a shop caught our eye while wandering around the Vieux-Port. Its window display was stacked with chocolates: smooth rectangular bars, green and brown olivettes (chocolate-covered almonds) and slabs studded with every kind of nut. When a customer opened the door to leave, the strong scent of cocoa hit our nostrils, luring us inside. The artisanal chocolate shop, named La Chocolatière de Marseille, is run by Alain and Zerrin Semerciyan. All the chocolates are made upstairs, hence the alluring aromas that perfume the shop. Since 2014, the couple has developed a faithful clientele for their delicious wares: slabs (tablettes) of dark, milk and white chocolate traditional to European chocolatiers, orange rinds (orangettes) dipped in chocolate, and the barre marseillaise, a delicacy that can only be found in Marseille.

Marseille

Essential Services: Pain Salvator, Organically Rising

Giant sacks of organic Moulin Pichard flour are stacked high at the entrance of Pain Salvator. In the back of the boulangerie, the open kitchen hums – a baker rolls out dough as another one pulls out beautifully browned loaves from the oven with a giant wooden paddle. A third clad in a flour-dusted apron stacks the freshly baked goods on a metal cart, rolling it beside the counter in anticipation of the midday rush. For owner Nicolle Baghdiguian-Wéber, being able to glimpse the bakery in action is intentional, the “real effort that goes into making bread,” she explains. Unlike others who “display their breads behind glass like in a pharmacy,” she wants her customers to see “flour on the floor, hands in the dough, the hard work.”