La Pachade: The Forgotten Potato Pancake of the Auvergne

La Pachade: The Forgotten Potato Pancake of the Auvergne | Food Tour de France

La pachade — the thick, crispy potato pancake of the Auvergne that has been feeding the mountain people of this volcanic landscape for centuries — is one of those dishes that is completely unknown outside its home region and completely fundamental within it. Today's Food Tour de France episode finishes at Le Lioran — right in the heart of the Cantal mountains, in the same volcanic landscape where the Cantal cheese we covered in Aurillac has been made since before the Romans noticed it — and tells the full story of a dish that was once called le petit coussin de Jésus, the little cushion of Jesus, made at Christmas in the farmhouses of the Auvergne and eaten at breakfast after the bacon soup and before the cheese. A batter of egg, flour, milk and salt, cooked slowly in oil and butter in a steel pan until the edges are deeply crisp and golden and the centre is soft, yielding and completely cooked through. Simple. Honest. Entirely specific to this landscape.

The episode covers the full history and tradition of the pachade — its role as one of the central elements of the daily diet in rural Auvergne, the specific logic of why it was served at breakfast after soup and before cheese, the tradition of bringing it to the men working in the fields at five in the afternoon alongside salad, bacon, bread and Cantal. The crucial detail of the steel pan — never non-stick, never washed, reserved exclusively for this dish — and why experienced Auvergne cooks read the pan rather than the clock to know when the pachade is ready. And the apple version — the pachade aux pommes — where apple slices cooked beforehand are folded into the batter to produce something that sits beautifully between sweet and savoury and belongs to the autumn in a very specific way.

The Food Tour de France is a daily series running alongside the 2026 Tour de France on Fabulously Delicious — one episode for every stage start and finish. The pachade episode connects directly to the Cantal episode from Aurillac — the two episodes together give a complete and deeply satisfying picture of the food culture of the Cantal mountains and the volcanic Auvergne. The pachade and the Cantal belong at the same table. They always have. Search Fabulously Delicious on Spotify and Apple Podcasts for the full series.

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