Served hot or cold and either roasted, grilled, fried, sautéed or cooked in a stew or casserole, pork is always full of flavour. It’s easy to cook and goes well with all kinds of vegetables. Breton sausage is made traditionally from only pork leg and shoulder, 75-80% Breton pork to 20-25% fat. That means it’s made from the finest cuts in a natural casing, low in fat and seasoned with Guérande salt and black pepper. It can be cooked in 3 different ways: on the barbecue, in a bain-marie then reheated on the grill, or in the frying pan.

The administrative district of Brittany produces the equivalent of 1.2 million tonnes of carcasses, accounting for more than half the overall production in France (2018 figures). The pork sector is therefore a major provider of jobs with roots in the local territory. Around 31,000 direct jobs are generated by the sector, which numbers almost 6,000 breeding establishments. Over 90% of these establishments are recognised by quality standards (Le Porc Français, Label Rouge, Agriculture biologique Agriconfiance, Agriculture raisonnée, etc.).

Ferme de la Mare and the Guernion brothers

La Ferme de la Mare at Lamballe in the Pays de St. Brieuc has been breeding pigs since 1987, and selling them direct since 1995. They use only family and local recipes. No antibiotics are used, the pigs are fed a non-GMO diet produced on the farm, and animal welfare standards are observed. As a result of all these factors, the farm has been recognised by the ‘Cohérence’ mark since 2005, which certifies establishment as producing Sustainable Pork. It was the first farm to obtain this certification. Find their products on the farm’s own website or at Voisins de Paniers.

Also in Pays de Saint-Brieuc, in 1991 the Frères Guernion in Hillion set themselves the challenge of breeding pigs from birth to slaughter without antibiotics or GMOs. It involved a great deal of work with scientists to perfect the breeding techniques before the first direct sales took place in 2003, to individual customers and restaurants. Updates from the shop are now posted on their Facebook page. There’s also a meat-cutting plant at the farm where they process their own products for a regular clientele of around 3,000.

For more than 100 years, the market gardeners of Plœuc-L’Hermitage (formerly Plœuc-sur-Lié) have been cultivating potatoes, to which activity this small town of around 4,200 inhabitants in Pays de St. Brieuc has always owed a large part of its fame and prosperity.

The tale of the BF15

The technical know-how of local market gardeners in the operation and care of potato cultivation led them to produce what they refer to as planting or selection varieties. That’s how the BF15, a descendent of the Belle de Fontenay variety, appeared in Plœuc in the 1950s owing to the hard work of the town’s market gardeners. It soon became the reigning variety in this region.

In the 1960s, all the farmers in Plœuc cultivated the BF15. Renowned for the quality of its taste and its firm flesh, the dark yellow potato quickly acquired a sound reputation with catering professionals, especially in the Paris region, who ordered their supplies in 25-kilogramme bags by the lorryload. At its peak, 400 hectares across Brittany were dedicated to growing the BF15, half of which in the town of Plœuc!  It was so famous as to have a Breton pop group named after it in the 1980s.

Insupportable competition arrives

In the 1970s, the BF15 started to suffer from the arrival of new varieties more suitable for wholesale marketing. Bigger, more productive and allowing more plants per hectare, the Charlotte gradually displaced the BF15; the high cost of mechanisation and strict regulations gradually put the local growers off. Today there’s just one cultivator of BF15 left, in the town of Plœuc-L’Hermitage.

La Belle du Lié association, an advocate for local agriculture, campaigns for the Plœuc potato

In September 1998 Henri Bozec, Mayor of Plœuc-sur-Lié and a passionate defender of local agriculture, spearheaded a movement by various stakeholders in the region to hold a major event promoting the local agricultural bounty. The Belle du Lié association was created by the producers of seed potatoes in Plœuc, headed by Pascal Allo.

The first Belle du Lié event was held in September 1999 to showcase Plœuc’s most important cultural heritage: the potato. Since then, the Pomme de Terre en Fête has attracted a great many visitors free of charge to its 3-yearly festival (over 30,000 visitors each show). It is currently the biggest potato festival in Europe.

The BF15 potato, a rare and interesting alternative that’s still talked about!

Supporters of the BF15 claim many advantages for this variety. It’s actually still a sizeable complementary crop for growers and demands a production model that’s better for the environment – it’s impossible to mechanise, so it makes sense. It’s also the ideal crop for organising your rotation system, because it ‘cleans the soil’.

The BF15 is also still popular with leading chefs, such as Thierry Marx, for its extremely enjoyable, slightly nutty taste and the way it holds its form however you cook it. Alone or as a side dish, the BF15 can be enjoyed in a number of different ways – jacket-baked, mashed, potato gratin, tartiflette, or in a salad or casserole.

Although the Brittany region has been well known for cattle breeding for centuries, it has never had any appreciable cheese-making tradition. In fact, cheese has been long missing from Breton dinner tables.

Today, Brittany is a source of inspiration for cheese producers and the industry is getting organised. The region now produces cheeses of character with a pronounced iodine content, incredible colours and subtle flavours. Pays de St. Brieuc is not to be outdone!

The artisan family creamery of Vaumadeuc

Jean-François and Marie-Paule Lévêque took over the Vaumadeuc in Pléneuf-Val-André in 1987, continuing the family business of their parents and grandparents. They soon realised that to evolve, the profession of peasant farmers needed other activities to complement the traditional ones.

They had the idea of processing the milk they produced on the farm to give it added value. Their Tomme du Vaumadeuc was the first product of their cheese-making venture. Success led to the production of Val Doré, a monastery cheese, and eventually they created Grand Madeuc, a cheese in the Gruyère style. The creamery uses only unpasteurised milk. Unpasteurised milk contains lactic ferments which give the cheeses their varied, refined flavours, but requires the milk to be processed straight after the morning milking.

Along with the cheese-making enterprise, Jean-François continues to cultivate the land. In particular, he started planting buckwheat a few years ago, a common annual cereal in Brittany that goes to make the ‘black wheat’ flour used in the Breton galette pancakes. Since 2020, customers can now purchase products from the creamery all year round via the Pour de bon website.