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Limousin
Between a flan and a thick crêpe, the fruit dessert that Limousin bakes in the oven — and which one takes good care not to call "apple clafoutis".
Pastry or bakery speciality from Limousin.
For the Dictionnaire des régionalismes de France, flognarde, or flaugnarde, is a "dessert made of milk, sugar, beaten eggs, flour, optionally enriched with fruit", flavoured with lemon, vanilla, orange blossom water or rum, and baked in the oven. The word is mainly in common use in Creuse, Corrèze, Haute-Vienne and Dordogne: surveys conducted between 1994 and 1996 showed it was recognised by 100% of respondents in Corrèze and Haute-Vienne, 90% in Dordogne and 80% in Creuse.
The dictionary sees it as a borrowing from the Limousin and Périgourdin "floougnardo", attested since 1823, and links the word to the family of "flan"; it dismisses as an "unfounded claim" the explanation deriving it from the Old French "fleugne" (soft, cosy), which was put forward by a food magazine in 1994. The Contrées Vertes tourist office, for its part, derives the word from Occitan, where it evokes "something soft, tender, almost downy".
Written records appear late. The dictionary notes an isolated mention of "flauniardes" for Limousin in 1733, then the word in French from 1890 onwards: a culinary journal then mentioned, for the day after Ascension Day, a "flognarde", a "symbolic and delicious cake flavoured with aniseed and lemon", a "home-baked pastry" so light that "it barely lacked wings to fly up to heaven". In 1928, A. de Croze described "La Flaugnarde" as a "delicious dish from the surroundings of Clermont-Ferrand"; a 1929 work recounts that the people of Périgord christened flaugnarde "a kind of delicious flan that melts in your mouth".
It subsequently found its way into books. In her Mémoires d'une jeune fille rangée (1958), Simone de Beauvoir ranked flognardes, along with clafoutis, among the "hearty foods" her grandfather loved during holidays in Haute-Vienne; D. Tillinac featured it, "with plums", on the menu of a "traditional meal" from Corrèze, after the walnut-oil salad, in Spleen en Corrèze. A 1979 regional cookery encyclopedia described it as "generously sugared straight from the oven" and called it "a very popular Limousin preparation". Even today, the Haute-Corrèze tourist office presents it as "a recipe handed down from generation to generation", with a few variations depending on the family.
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In Corrèze, the distinction is clear-cut: made with cherries, the dessert is called a clafoutis; with other fruits, it is a flognarde. The Haute-Corrèze tourist office puts it this way: clafoutis is prepared exclusively with cherries, whereas flognarde "varies according to the seasons and orchards"; the batter is "relatively similar", but flognarde offers more variations. Visit Limousin calls it the "twin sister of clafoutis", and the Limoges webzine L'Homme en Bleu puts it bluntly: clafoutis is "with cherries and THAT'S IT", flognarde "with everything else".
Not everyone adheres to this: in 1996, Le Monde described flognarde as "this Corrèze version of apple clafoutis that Jacques Chirac relishes for dessert", something the Contrées Vertes office rejects today: "a flognarde is not 'an apple clafoutis'. Don't say that to someone from Corrèze."
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Flognarde is first and foremost a dessert of seasonal fruit. In Haute-Corrèze, the most common version is made with apples; it is also made with pears, plums or quinces, and in winter with prunes and walnuts. Tourist bodies recommend local apples: those from the market, from a small Corrèze producer or "from a Limousin PDO" according to the Contrées Vertes, "6 Limousin PDO apples" in the recipe from Visit Limousin, which concludes: "Our Limousin apples are so good, it's hard to resist them". This PDO is that of the pomme du Limousin.
Appearance
a cake baked in an oven dish, lightly golden at the edges, with the fruit set into the batter — wedges or thin slices in the case of apples —, dusted with icing sugar.
Aroma
depending on the recipe, the batter is flavoured with lemon, vanilla, orange blossom water or rum.
Taste
sweet — "generously sugared straight from the oven", states a 1979 encyclopedia —, with seasonal fruit — apples, pears or plums — flavouring the batter.
Texture
a smooth batter, "between a flan and a thick crêpe", meltingly soft at the centre.
Flognarde has no fixed fruit. The most common in Haute-Corrèze is made with apples; it is also made with pears, plums or quinces, and in winter with prunes and walnuts. According to a 1994 cookery magazine, prunes and apricots are also suitable, provided the fruit is not too watery. In Périgord, a 1929 work gives a "flaugnarde aux pruneaux", presented as a Périgord flan. In Limoges, a specialist establishment offers sweet flognardes with chocolate-praline or pear-almond, as well as a savoury selection.
There is no single recipe: it varies according to the family. The Contrées Vertes tourist office and Visit Limousin each publish a recipe, followed by the steps below.
the apples (or pears) are cut into wedges or thin slices and arranged in a buttered dish.
the fluid batter is poured over the fruit; the Visit Limousin recipe dots the top with diced butter and brown sugar.
in the oven, for around 40 to 45 minutes.
dusted with icing sugar, the flognarde is served warm or cold, in its dish.
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Traditionally served warm or cold, flognarde can be enjoyed on any occasion: family meals, winter afternoon snacks, countryside picnics. It is savoured plain, with a touch of sugar, or lightly caramelised in the oven; warm, its texture is softer and more melting, cold — the following day —, firmer. A 1979 encyclopedia, however, called for it to be eaten "preferably hot".
In Haute-Corrèze, restaurants, inns and tables d'hôtes offer it on their menus, often revisited using local or seasonal produce; on the other hand, it is not found in pastry shops, "this dessert being typically a family dish". In Limoges, the establishment "Flognardes et Clafoutis", opened on Place de la Motte in spring 2023 according to L'Homme en Bleu, has made it its only recipe: clafoutis returns there only with the summer cherries.
Flognarde carries no official quality mark (PDO (AOP), PGI (IGP), Label Rouge, TSG (STG)): it is a family recipe, which varies from one home to another. Only the apple often added to it, the pomme du Limousin, has a PDO.
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