Image from www.couleur-lauragais.fr
Cassoulet, the traditional dish on most restaurant menus in southwestern France, derives its name from the cassolle, an earthenware dish made from the clay of the Lauragais region that is especially good for making heat proof pots.
The local version of the famous white bean and meat stew, cassoulet, is said to have originated in Castelnaudary, a market town since the time of the Romans, situated on the Canal du Midi just over the Montagne Noire ridge from our village of Soreze.
Image from wikipedia.fr
Cassolle dishes have been made in the region since the 14th century. The only place where the casolle is still made by hand is the NOT family pottery studio.
Poterie NOT Frères, is located just beyond the village of Labastide d'Anjou on the banks of the Canal du Midi near Mas Sainte Puelle.
On a beautiful Fall afternoon, after a leisurely lunch in the garden of a restaurant just down the road, we decided to drop by. Following the directions above the doorbell - Sonnez et Entrez, Tout Droit - Ring and Enter, Straight Ahead - we walked into the workshop to find one of the Not brothers deftly shaping cassoles, one after the other, on his pottery wheel, in much the way it must have been done here for centuries.
He encouraged us to look around and we wandered freely through the building and into the garden where casseroles and pots large and small were stacked on shelves and across the ground.
The green cassole in just the size I wanted was out of stock for the day. Msr Not told me that more were firing in the oven. I took home a green pot for the garden and promised to return one day soon.
Poterie Not Frères.
Route de la Poterie, 11400 Mas-Saintes-Puelles, France
Téléphone : +33 4 68 23 17 01
