Petit Pois a la Francaise - Stèphane Reynaud

I made a bit of a feast tonight, and made a couple of recipes from Stèphane Reynauds book, Roti, which is a book all about roasting different cuts of meat and fish and different accompaniments - Roti is French for roast after all!

I ended up choosing 3 dishes to cook from it, all simple. This recipe for french style peas is a winner, and SO easy! Any leftovers can easily be made into soup - which I've done, and can confirm that it's totally delicious! Its such an easy accompaniment to a roast and a different way of serving peas, and very boy friendly - it has bacon. S told me they were the best peas he's ever had, "still peas....... but the best ones". Thats good enough for me.


Petit Pois à la Francaise (French Style Peas)


2kg fresh peas
200g piece of smoked streaky bacon, chopped
Heart of 1 lettuce, chopped
6 spring onions, chopped
1 bouquet garni
50g butter
Olive oil


1) Heat 2 tablespoons of oil in a heavy based pan, and add the onion and bacon and saute over a medium heat.
2) Add 2kg of peas, lettuce, 1 bouquet garni and 200ml of water.
3) Cover and cook over a low heat for 15minutes, stirring regularly.
4) Add butter to the thicken the juices, and season with salt and pepper


I did pretty much as the recipe called for, however I used 2 fresh bay leaves instead of a whole bouquet garni, and added a small amount of stock to the water. I halved the recipe and we had enough for 2 of us, with leftovers.

Its really important that you use smoked bacon for this recipe - it adds a depth of flavour that you wont get with regular supermarket bacon. The leftovers make a fantastic pea and smoked bacon soup - I added some of the crispy potatoes from the other dish I made, to thicken it up a bit and another layer of flavour. I cant wait to eat it with some good bread and butter! This is easy to scale up or down so its perfect for feeding a crowd and WAY more interesting than plain old peas!