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Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur
A little cushion of wafer-thin pastry, fried and filled with potato and tomme fraîche: the festive dish of the Champsaur valley.
Traditional dish from Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur.
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The tourton is a speciality of the Champsaur valley, in the Hautes-Alpes. Traditionally served for Christmas celebrations, it was also known as the 'coussin du petit Jésus'. 'We used to eat them over the festive season and called them coussins du petit Jésus,' recalls Jean-Louis Pellegrin.
It is a convivial family dish, reputed to 'stick to your ribs' and to be very restorative in bitter cold or during hard labour. Born of ancestral family know-how, its recipe remains a closely guarded secret. Indeed, each Champsaur family keeps theirs strictly secret.
The tourton is also said to have travelled: it was reportedly popularised in Provence during the 19th century by the gavots, the mountain folk from the Provençal hinterland who came down from the Alpine valleys for agricultural labour.
In 1985, the Pellegrin brothers revived an ancestral recipe that had been almost forgotten. The company that today bears the name of the speciality relates that Jean-Louis Pellegrin began selling tourtons on local markets that year; in 1988, he went into partnership with his brother Eugène to found the company Tourtons du Champsaur, setting up their workshop in Chabottes, on the Champsaur plateau, at an altitude of 1,050 m. Marketing them under the 'Tourtons du Champsaur' brand contributed greatly to making the tourton known beyond its native region.
A second production site opened in 2004 in Saint-Firmin, 26 km from Chabottes, and numerous savoury and sweet variations emerged over the years. In 2022, the business was taken over by brothers François-Xavier and Bertrand Ranvier, who, according to the regional tourist board, are keeping this ancestral recipe alive.
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The regional tourist board recommends tasting tourtons 'in a restaurant in the Champsaur or Gap, or at a local workshop'. In Saint-Bonnet-en-Champsaur, Pierrot and Manu shape theirs by hand according to a family recipe; Pierrot sells them during summer at the village market, in their original versions: savoury with potato or sweet with prunes. At Papi Ours, in the Gapençais, family recipes have been handed down through four generations.
Today, tourtons are sold directly from the workshop and at certain markets.
Appearance
a little cushion of wafer-thin pastry, fried and filled; in the tourist office recipe, two squares of dough measuring 6 to 7 cm on each side, sealed over their filling.
Taste
for the savoury version, mashed potato with tomme fraîche and onions; for the sweet version, apples or prunes.
Texture
crisp, thin pastry enclosing a smooth puréed filling.
There is no official recipe and the filling comes in various forms. Savoury tourtons are made today with potato, spinach, or goat's cheese; sweet ones with apples, prunes, raspberry, or blueberry. Certain workshops reinvent the tourton: at Papi Ours, a summer version with sweet peppers and tomatoes is available.
There is no official recipe. The Champsaur Valgaudemar tourist office publishes one, which is set out in the steps below.
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Savoury tourtons are eaten hot, generally as a starter with a garlic-dressed green salad, or as an accompaniment to meat. Prune or apple tourtons are also served for dessert. At Papi Ours, they are also enjoyed for an apéritif, in a summer pepper-and-tomato version.
The tourton bears no official quality mark (PDO (AOP), PGI (IGP), Label Rouge, TSG (STG)): it does not even have an official recipe, as each Champsaur family keeps their own. 'Tourtons du Champsaur' is also the name of a business in Chabottes, founded in 1985, which markets the speciality under this brand name.
No producer is listed for this product yet.