var isReferenceAnswers = true; BodyLoad('s'); On this page Library Health History, Politics, Society ... Technology French and British Cooking French and British Cooking Home Library This entry is a subtopic of France England and France are two countries which, in world perspective, are actually rather similar. Their pattern of long-term development differs subtly in detail but in broad terms is equally similar, and their cultures and cuisines have been in reciprocal contact ever since the Middle Ages. Moreover, the alimentary raw materials available were broadly the same though not identical. How, then, did their strikingly different culinary cultures take shape? Caricature is a serious danger in this field. What people eat is universally a potent ingredient of national and social stereotyping . That applies both to the formation of people's "we-images" of their own group and of their "they-images" of outsider groups. Food has long played a prominent part in the sense of national identity of both the English and the French, and it is very risky to accept their reciprocal stereotypes of each other's cuisine at face value. At the very least, one must not fall into the trap of comparing, say, the food of Paul Bocuse with that served at some British transport café, or French professional cuisine with English domestic | |
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