Les Viandes

PORK USED TO be treat enough, especially in the poorer districts, but was enjoyed by almost everyone in the country because it was home-grown, home-killed and home-cured. Cows and oxen were the pride of every peasant farmer, wealth being measured by head of cattle as much as by the area of land you owned. They were therefore used for ploughing and working the land rather than as meat. Nor were they generally raised for dairy purposes, although in the Ariège cows’ milk formed a major element in the diet of the poor peasants up to the end of the last century. For milk the peasants often preferred that from ewes or goats. Butter was not a regular commodity and most of the milk produced was used to make cheese, especially where there was good pasture land as in the Cantal and the lower Pyrenees.