Nancy Wake at the table

In the Auvergne of the Resistance, the meal does not follow the starter-main-dessert order: it is organized around the foundational soup served morning and evening from a large communal pot, supplemented by what the farm and neighboring farms provide—wholemeal bread, Tomme or Cantal cheese, preserved charcuterie. Feasts, rare, feature a shared main dish like the flowing aligot. The maquis men ate irregularly, to the rhythm of parachute drops and the generosity of peasants; Nancy Wake, for her part, kept a taste for the fine tables of her former life in Marseille, and above all for a good drink.

The heart of Auvergne mountain cooking: fresh tomme (unaged cheese) worked hot until it stretches into long ribbons, seasoned with garlic. This is the signature of aligot and the comforting soul of the cheese soup that fed the maquisards of the plateaus.