OP: Simple French Food

It seems hard to believe that Richard Olney’s Simple French Food was published in 1974. This amazingly durable book, in print in a variety of editions almost continuously for nearly fifty years, has served as an introduction to fine cooking for innumerable professionals as well as devoted amateurs.  Rooted in the French tradition less known to most Americans—not the haute variety but rather cuisine simple—it combines in an effortless fashion the fundamentals of theory and technique with a huge battery of ravishing recipes. It is the food of the provinces and of the urban bistros of France—hearty preparations of fresh noodles with chicken breast; Breton chowder; braised stuffed oxtail; baked apple curd—lively, fresh, and conceptually simple. Olney (1927–1999), an American painter, lived in France, mainly in Provence, for close to fifty years, tutoring himself and cooking with some of his adopted country’s most admired home cooks and country restaurant proprietors. Filled with rich detai