🇫🇷 France · Provence
Aïgo boulidoProvençal garlic and sage broth
A Provençal broth of garlic simmered with sage, thyme or bay and olive oil in salted water, usually poured over a slice of bread. Some recipes finish it with beaten egg yolk and grated cheese.
Origin and history
Aïgo boulido, Provençal for boiled water, is described by MyProvence as the oldest traditional garlic recipe of Provence, a broth of sage and crushed garlic that Provençals saw as a way to recover from overindulgence. Communes.com says it was served at the Gros Souper, the Christmas Eve meal, as an inexpensive dish. A saying goes with it: l'aïgo boulido sauvo la vido, boiled water saves life.
Make it at home
- Makes
- 4 servings
- Total time
- 30 min
- Hands-on
- 10 min
Ingredients
- 1 litre4 1/4 cups water
- 6 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed with the flat of a knife
- 6 fresh sage leaves, a pinch of dried sage if fresh is unavailable
- 1 sprig fresh thyme
- 1 bay leaf
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tbsp coarse sea salt, to taste; one source uses 2 tbsp for 1.5 litres
- 4 slices stale country bread, grilled
- 2 egg yolks, optional, for the enriched household version
- grated cheese, optional, for the enriched version
Method
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1. Put the water, crushed garlic, sage, thyme, bay leaf, olive oil and salt in a saucepan and bring to the boil.
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2. Lower the heat so the liquid barely bubbles and simmer for 15 to 25 minutes, until the broth smells strongly of garlic and sage.
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3. Taste and add salt if needed; the broth should be savoury but clean.
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4. Lift out the bay leaf and the thyme sprig; the garlic can stay in or be strained out.
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5. For the plain broth, put a slice of grilled bread in each deep bowl and ladle the hot broth over it.
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6. For the enriched version, beat the egg yolks in a bowl and pour the hot broth over them in a slow stream, whisking hard so they thicken without scrambling, then pour over the bread and add grated cheese.
Notes
- Garlic quantities vary a great deal between sources, from 4 cloves for 1.5 litres to 15 cloves for 1 litre. More garlic gives a stronger, more medicinal broth.
- Some cooks boil only garlic and herbs in salted water and add the olive oil at the end; the version with 15 cloves strains the herbs out. Sage appears in every version read.
- Aïgo boulido literally means boiled water. Communes.com ties it to the Christmas Eve Gros Souper and to the days after festive meals, and a Provençal saying goes with it: l'aïgo boulido sauvo la vido, boiled water saves life.
- The plain broth has no egg or cheese; the egg-yolk and cheese version is the household enriched form. It reheats well; add the egg yolks only when serving.
Adapted from Leslie Forbes, A Table in Provence (1987), L'aïgo boulido, communes.com, Aïgo Boulido, and idealwine.net, recette de la semaine: Aïgo Bouido.
At the festivals
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