Talk:French cuisine

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[edit] "Arguably considered to be the world's most refined cuisine?"

I think some people might take offense to this. Is there a credible source for this statement? Does the phrase "refined cuisine" really mean anything anyway? Were perspectives from cuisine experts from all regions of the world equally considered in this elusive argument? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.140.146.210 (talk) 22:31, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Recent move toward regional cuisine?

This is not a recent "phenomenon", France is based upon its regional cuisine eaten by the peasants and bourgeoisie since the inception of cuisine in the country. Slow Food works to "preserve" these items, not to "re-create" them. Haute Cuisine is not mainly influenced from Lyon and northern France either. It is a creation of refined dishes from regional dishes all over the country, as well as dishes that were newly created, common foods as well, which were all refined for haute cuisine's codification.--Christopher Tanner, CCC 07:05, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

just a question! when was it made famous first and by whom?
thank you very much please respond --User:193.251.10.73
Who made what famous? French cuisine itself took shape around the Middle Ages with chefs such as Taillevent publishing Viandier, whose style was later updated by chefs like Antoine Careme and later solidified by Escoffier in a concrete codification, that is haute cuisine though which is a national cuisine of France. If you are referring to regional cuisine, then that would be the peasants of old France and the peasants kept it as tradition. It was the bourgeois through gastronomic travel who more-or-less discovered its existence and began to publish it in tourism books with authors such as Curnonsky between 1921-1928 titled his series of books La France gastronomique and then later the Guide Michelin. This all needs to eventually go into the article, I have just been very busy with other obligations.--Christopher Tanner, CCC 15:15, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Medieval additions

Per request from Christopher I made a review of the medieval section and made several additions and only one minor correction. I don't know how important everyone feels that it is that I reference each and every additions separately, but I figured that since the section begins by linking to medieval cuisine, it didn't felt entirely necessary. Let me know if someone gets edgy about it. If anything, it should be pointed out that the statements added are very straightforward, well-known and can easily be found in just about any reasonably recent work on medieval cuisine.

I also switched the pic for something more colorful from Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry. The picture of the entremet swan is very representative of late medieval upper-class dining, even if it's from the early 16th century, but unfortunately not very exciting to look at.

Peter Isotalo 05:46, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] A national cuisine

I'd just like to say that the article has been superbly expanded and I'm really happy to see that Christopher is breathing life into the rather forgotten topic of cuisine. I'd like to point out a possible anachronism that might be worthy to address; the idea of a unitary French cuisine starting as early as the Middle Ages.

Now this is a complex issue and I don't want to sound like the expert I am not, but my impression after several volumes and essays by modern food scholars and writers that cover medieval and early modern cuisine (Scully, Adamson, Albala, etc) is that they are fairly unanimous in that a national cuisine did not come about until the late early modern period. Some of them even go as far as claiming that even regional differences were far less relevant that class differences. And when it comes to France, there has been a clear distinction between the north, which was had more in common with Norman England, while southern, Occitan-speaking, France had more in common with Catalan-speaking areas and to some extent Italy. Any comments on this?

Peter Isotalo 17:14, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree that what we think of as the French national cuisine did not develop until post middle age (and has been written about by scholars much more skilled in that realm than I), however I think it is important to note that they did have differences in some ingredients as well as a renowned chef (Taillevent) recognized as being a French chef. So although there are few differences from the cuisine of Italy at the time, there are subtle differences which have been illustrated by Mennel and Wheaton. Even if we say those differences aren't important, it is important to illustrate the evolution of France from this time period, which the section gives evidence towards the cuisine's evolution.
As for the differences between the south and north, I do not have any books on hand currently to go more in depth into that subject, but now that you bring that up I will look into some other's writings and see if it is worth adding. I have some books coming that explain peasant cuisine in more detail from that period and forward that I will probably address when I'm done with my research.
I hope all that made sense, I am horribly sick and my brain is not at 100%.--Christopher Tanner, CCC 18:16, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

I reworded the introduction of the history section mentioning "Starting in the Middle Ages, a unique national cuisine began forming.", which implies it had not formed as of yet, I think this solves the issue we are discussing?--Christopher Tanner, CCC 20:32, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] GA review

[edit] Successful good article nomination

I am glad to say that this article which was nominated for good article status has succeeded. This is how the article, as of July 7, 2007, compares against the six good article criteria:

1. Well written?: Yes, its a good read
2. Factually accurate?: Lots of references, facts are verifiable
3. Broad in coverage?: Yes, has quite a wide coverage
4. Neutral point of view?: Seems pretty neutral to me
5. Article stability? Yes
6. Images?: Lots of relevant images

If you feel that this review is in error, feel free to take it to a GA review. Thank you to all of the editors who worked hard to bring it to this status.


There can be further improvements still. Sentences such as "French cuisine was codified in the 20th century by Georges Auguste Escoffier to become the modern version of haute cuisine" should have a reference. But such instances are minor. Plus (this is nitpicking) I prefer uniform image thumbnail sizes across an article. The thumbnails vary in size in this article, and that makes it sort of jittery. Also, consider not using hardcoded thumb sizes, that prevent the thumbnails from scaling as per the user preferences and cause layout problems with non standard screen resolutions. —-soum talk 17:46, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] I HOPE THIS HELPED

[edit] Chartreuse

Hello. I would like to correct one sentence. In the paragraph Lyon Rhône-Alpes is the sentence: The liquor Chartreuse is produced in the town by the same name in this region.

As an inhabitant of the surrounding, I can assure you that their is no town named 'Chartreuse'. The introduction of the page Chartreuse (liqueur) is true: The liqueur is named after the Grande Chartreuse monastery where it is produced, which in turn is named after the Chartreuse Mountains, the region in France where the monastery is located.

I suggest to replace the wrong sentence with this one: The liquor Chartreuse is produced by a monastery in the Chartreuse Mountains.

The reason I do not do it myself is that this sentence is 'protected' by a reference to which I don't have access.

JeromeJerome 15:38, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Merci. I have made the correction. El Ingles 16:08, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] List of French dishes

I created a page titled List of French dishes, although it has not been an issue, it does give a way for people to add dishes to the article if they want to without making this article any larger, especially as I still would like to add a heading for "wine" and "cheese".--Christopher Tanner, CCC 02:31, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] GA Sweeps

This article has been reviewed as part of Wikipedia:WikiProject Good articles/Project quality task force. I am impressed with the number of references as well as the scope of the subject. I believe the article currently meets the criteria and should remain listed as a Good article. The article history has been updated to reflect this review. (oldid reference #:155891554) OhanaUnitedTalk page 15:01, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for the update.--Chef Christopher Allen Tanner, CCC 19:20, 18 September 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Roquefort redondant

I see roquefort is mentioned in both the Midi-Pyrénées (Toulouse, Aveyron, Cahors) section and the Languedoc one. Shouldn't it be only present in the former section? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.80.19.3 (talk) 10:49, 7 March 2008 (UTC)