Here is Au Pied de Cochon: Sugar Shack, written and self-published by Montreal chef Martin Picard (buy on Amazon). The book, which won Cookbook of the Year at the Gourmand Awards in Paris this weekend, is a fantastical journey through a season at Picard's Sugar Shack, a maple syrup-producing cabin in rural Quebec that serves diners maple syrupy (and often meaty) delights. As on might expect from the Au Pied de Cochon chef, each dish is more over the top than the last.
The book contains: four photos of totally naked women, four photos of mostly naked women, five illustrations of mostly naked women, one photo of a mostly naked man, one recipe for pancakes, one recipe for something called "Squirrel Sushi," eight recipes that include foie gras, three recipes that call for lobster, and recipes that call for calf's brain, bone marrow, truffles, caviar, oysters, veal, hare's kidneys, beaver tail, and Canadian Club. Oh, and dozens of recipes that call for gallons upon gallons of maple syrup. It is, in other words, exactly what you might expect from a bunch of Quebecois stuck in the woods standing over a boiling pot of tree sap for weeks on end, and it is insane and wonderful. Below, a list from the back of the book titled, simply, somewhat menacingly, "One Season at the Shack." It should give you an idea of what you're in for.
One Season at the Shack
750 Gallons of Maple Syrup
990 Shoulders of Suckling Pig
220 Boxes of Apples
1 Parmesan Cheese Wheel
132 Salmon Fillets
5,500 Pounds of Lobster
1,200 Pounds of Sturgeon
209 Pounds of Cheddar
46,200 Broken Eggs
66 Slabs of Bacon
66 Hams
3,300 Tourtieres
1,100 KG of Fatback
550 KG of Foie Gras
5,500 Cornish Chickens
45 Days Open For Business
66 Sittings
40 Employees
5 Wounded
1 Resignation
75,000 Photographs
1 Scuffle
10 of Our Pigs Slaughtered
1 Total Electrical Breakdown and Water Shortage During a Sitting
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