Was the great lady Catherine able to change French mediaeval cooking?

Catherine de Medicine, daughter of Lorenzo de Medicine (born in Florence in 1519), was a remarkable lady who was responsible for a great deal of French history. For instance, the infamous St. Bartholomew’s night massacre and the resulting prosecution of the Protestant Huguenots was mainly caused by her political errors of judgement. She was the wife of Henry II, the regent after his death and the mother of three future kings, Francis II, Charles IX and Henry II, the last of the Valois dynasty. This makes her important enough as it is but one thing attributed to her, she was not responsible for, is the following myth:
“When Catherine, an Italian noble woman, arrived in France to marry the Dauphin Henry II in 1533, she brought with her a retinue of forty Italian cooks and proceeded to teach the French court a thing or two about cooking and dining which started the tradition of the so-called “Haute Cuisine” the French are so rightfully famous for and proud of. She, among other innovations, is supposed to have introduced the Italian style of cooking, ices for dessert, new vegetables like artichokes and parsley as well as the fork as a table utensil.”
It is true that, after the fall of the Roman Empire, the Italian kitchen had maintained some of the sophistication of that great civilisation. The rest of Europe, excepted only by the enclaves of peace of the monasteries, plunged into the great abyss of the dark ages and barbarism. But the above story, although often repeated even by authorities like Craig Clairbourne, Barbara Norman and other authorities who should really have known better, has some very weak points.
The theory is shaky to say the least. French “Haute Cuisine” did not really start until about a century after the event and the French kept on eating stodgy stews with beans, onions, sauerkraut and root vegetables for at least another century, exactly like the rest of Europe. There is no evidence that Catherine’s cooks, or for that matter her reportedly corrupt bunch of Italian courtiers, had any influence on the life style of the French nobility when she arrived as a rather unattractive fourteen year old girl.
In 1533 there was only a small chance that Henry would become King of France, as his older brother was still alive and he wasn’t even the Dauphin as the story tells us. Actually, the young girl was more or less ignored. Henry had a long liaison with a courtesan he adored, called Diana de Portier. This fascinating woman was extremely popular at court and beyond. She was admired and followed slavishly in fashions and whims. Thus Catherine was hardly in the position to bring about a revolution in the ways of the court.
In later years Catherine, after Henry died in one of the chivalrous but lethal tournaments he loved to stage, she did become a force to be reckoned with when she became first the regent, and then the queen mother for three of her sons in a row. She had numerous children, of which seven survived childhood but this, only after she had been barren during the first fourteen years of the marriage. At the time there was even talk of divorce. This should be added as a reason of her unpopularity with Henry’s host of courtiers. In later years - although the country was in turmoil with religious strive - she became known for her lavish parties. She loved to give these affairs, which were usually extravagant masquerades, allegories and garden bashes often lasting for several days.
In 1564, she, in desperation about the state of affairs in the country and the differences between the Catholics and Protestants, decided to arrange for a grand tour of France accompanied by her second son Charles who was then only 14 years old. This expedition lasted for more than two years and cost as much as a full scale war. Although her motives were political and not gastronomic, the organisation of the banquets she gave must have been tremendous and the logistics stupendous. The Royal train was so huge that they needed 8000 horses to transport it from castle to castle, from town to town and from village to village. This “Grand Tour” must have given the peasants and town’s people a good idea of what was eaten at the tables of the rich in Paris and they had an opportunity to observe the techniques used by the court’s “cuisiniers” which were led by the famous master chef Guilaume Verger who was assisted by a staff of five cooks and an unknown number of kitchen boys.
This was, we must admit, considered Italian cooking but it took much more to give French cooking the impetus to become sophisticated and the so-called “Haut Cuisine de France”. In fact, according to some historians, the influence of the Italian fine kitchen had started already much earlier, long before Katherine was added to the French court. It was gradual and not distinct at all in those early years of her marriage.
Referring to the above mentioned train of horses, people and equipment on that “Grand Tour” Catherine embarked on, one may try to imagine what would happen when this party put up their bivouacs at the estates of the rich, as hotels were out of question and the courts were often too short of funds to pay for the costs themselves. Free accommodations and nourishment was expected and this for thousands of people was often more than the host could afford. It was the proverbial white elephant scenario and many of the landed gentry were ruined by these visits of their “Royals”, who often selected such and such a nobleman to display his hospitality because he was out of favour with the monarchy or - more often than not - his courtiers.
While on the subject of French cooking, the following delicious preparation is probably in order: