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TSG — Île-de-France
Born from the bubbling springs of Essonne, the French capital of watercress has been cultivating since 1894 a crisp leafy vegetable that Parisians have vied for since the Middle Ages.
Vegetable from Île-de-France, TSG (STG) since 2022.
Watercress has been eaten and prized in Paris since the 11th century, but its organised cultivation in Essonne was established only much later. The department's first watercress bed was created in 1854–1856 in Vayres-sur-Essonne, in the Gâtinais. It was not until 1894 that cultivation spread to Méréville, spurred by its first "cressonnier", Charles Lefèvre, who harnessed the region's pure water springs — water essential to the growth of this aquatic plant. Watercress itself has been known since Antiquity for its virtues, praised by Hippocrates as an expectorant and by King Saint Louis for its health benefits.
Cultivation flourished: horse-drawn carts carried the watercress to railway stations, from where it was transported, freshly picked, to the halles de Paris. Numerous watercress beds were built throughout the neighbouring valleys — the Juine, École, Essonne, Chalouette and Éclimont — and the years 1930–1935 marked the peak of this crop across the region. Since the 1950s, falling consumption has reduced activity across many sites, but Essonne remains today France's leading watercress-producing department, with twenty-six watercress growers out of the sixty across the country.
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A watercress bed is a rectangular plot dug with long parallel trenches 50 to 80 metres long and 30 to 40 centimetres deep, with such a gentle slope that it allows water to flow through without ever stagnating — fed upstream by an artesian well or a spring, and drained downstream into the river. The watercress grower steps down into them in rubber boots and harvests bent double, once protected by leather kneepads and a waterproof canvas caparison strapped to the back; the cut watercress is gathered into bunches, carried to the market or the halles de Paris in wicker baskets. This arduous, physical work is carried out with hands in the water whatever the weather.
At Villa Paul, founded in 1897 by Paul Barberot, this family tradition has been handed down through several generations: Olivier and Isabelle Barberot carry on the trade there today, with the hope that a son will take over. The farm, which now has three production sites, has opted for computer-controlled greenhouses to regulate temperature and achieve more consistent harvests — a new level of comfort for a trade that had remained largely unchanged since the 19th century. It sells around 700,000 bunches a year, one third to restaurants, one third to supermarkets and one third to markets; since 1 April 2024, cresson de Méréville has even been served at the tables of the Eiffel Tower's restaurants.
Faced with consumption that has tended to decline since the 1950s, the watercress growers of Essonne — along with several neighbouring producers in Loiret and Seine-et-Marne — created the collective brand "Cresson de Méréville" in 2023, which now brings together and maps seventeen local watercress growers, a first step towards PGI recognition: the application is in preparation ahead of its submission to the INAO, with no fixed timetable to date. The tradition remains very much alive and is celebrated every year during the Foire du cresson, in Méréville.
Appearance
Light green leaves, carried on stems submerged in running water.
Taste
Slightly pungent and peppery flavour.
Texture
Crisp leaves and stems.
Cresson de Méréville is traditionally sold in fresh bunches, but is also available as processed products — veloutés, pasta, tapenade, watercress pesto — and, more recently, as dehydrated watercress for the cosmetics industry.
in spring, directly in the watercress bed.
the aquatic or semi-aquatic plant anchors itself by its root system to the bed or bank of the watercourse thus created.
the cut watercress is gathered into bunches, today bound for the restaurant trade, supermarkets and markets.
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Cresson de Méréville can be enjoyed all year round, raw in salads or cooked in a velouté, and pairs equally well with fish and meat. Its pungent, peppery flavour also makes it an ingredient of choice for open sandwiches and toasts. Since 2024, it has even featured on the menu at the Eiffel Tower's restaurants — a testament to the place this long-humble vegetable now holds in French gastronomy.
Since: 2022
Area covered: Protection européenne partagée entre la Belgique, l'Espagne, la France, les Pays-Bas, le Portugal et le Royaume-Uni — la dénomination n'est utilisable qu'associée à la mention « produit selon la tradition de » l'un ou plusieurs de ces pays.
Key requirements: Aquatic or semi-aquatic plant, anchored to the bed or bank of a watercourse or spring by its root system; light green colour; traditional harvest in water.
Registered sign for "cresson de fontaine" in general — application submitted by the United Kingdom, supported by Belgian, Spanish, French and Portuguese producers — and not specifically for Méréville, whose traditional production in watercress beds falls under it.
Cresson de Méréville has been designated a "Site Remarquable du Goût", a tourism and gastronomic distinction — not an official quality sign. In 2023, the watercress growers of Essonne created the collective brand "Cresson de Méréville" and are preparing an application for PGI (IGP) status, with a view to submitting it to the INAO: process underway, not yet concluded to date.
Family-run
Family-run
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