Savoir-Faire: A History of Food in France(Foods and Nations)

This is a comprehensive account of France’s rich culinary history, not only full of tales of haute cuisine, but seasoned with myths and stories from a wide variety of times and places; from snail hunting in Burgundy to female chefs in Lyon, and from cheese appreciation in Roman Gaul to bread debates from the Middle Ages to the present. It examines the use of less familiar ingredients such as chestnuts, couscous and oysters, French food in literature and film, the influence of France’s overseas territories on the shape of French cuisine today, and includes historical recipes for readers to try at home.

About the Author :
Maryann Tebben is Professor of French and head of the Center for Food Studies at Bard College at Simon’s Rock, Massachusetts. She is the author of Sauces: A Global History (Reaktion, 2014).

Review :
This is a chronicle of how French cuisine reflects its cultural traditions, with delightful meanderings about what workers ate, the influence of female chefs in the provinces, scientific and agricultural innovations, and how colonial products and dishes have been allotted space in the classical food pantheon. From the robust, pig-centric meals of the Franks, which set the table for “the embrace of pleasure over moderation,” Tebben charts the influential development of courtly Renaissance feasts and the first printed cookbooks, which staked out French gastronomic dominance with terminology, recipes, and cooking techniques that endure today. A masterwork of history . . . Tebben particularizes wine and beer cultures and tracks the advances in bread making from the Middle Ages through the Renaissance, citing shifts in basic ingredients from wheat flour to less familiar carbohydrate sources. Excellent illustrations draw on works of bas-relief, paintings, photographs, and line drawings suited to the text . . . Recommended. A detailed look at France’s food innovations and developments and how the country’s relationship with eating changed over the centuries. From garlic all the way to modern days, passing by medieval bread, cheese, and France’s nineteenth-century global food domination, this book is a beautifully complete story of one nation’s love affair with food . . . A particularly exciting section tells the story of cheese. It is impossible today to not associate France with the stuff – be it Camembert, Roquefort, or Mont d’or. As the author points out, "no practical justification can be made for 1,500 cheeses, and it is hard to fathom any country other than France creating and maintaining a government agency . . . dedicated to recognizing and protecting standards of quality." The book is admirably ambitious, crisply written and lively . . . It brims with an abundance of varied information . . . A very readable, wide-ranging and original synthesis on the subject. Savoir-Faire is a superbly researched and extremely comprehensive history of the complex food of France. Maryann Tebben's exhaustive documentation takes us from the salted pork of the Gauls to the bread of the middle ages, the 19th-century opulence of Carème’s buffet to the cuisine bourgeoise and les méres de Lyon. An all-encompassing work for anyone interested in the importance of cuisine in French culture. So much has been said—and written—on the subject of French food that the author wisely does not set out to accomplish such an impossible task. Instead, she gives the reader a guided tour to select highlights. The journey begins with the remote and quasi mythical, culinary habits of Gaul at the time of the Franks (and Romans), and ends with the soul-searching of a 21st century that questions the definition/nature of an ever-evolving “French” cuisine. Both producers and consumers—in Metropolitan France as well as in the far-flung colonies—hold center stage in an unfolding story told with verve. And, throughout this narrative, emerges the centuries-long ability of French culture to write about and represent food, turning it into one of the most easily recognized cuisines in the world.