Ptipois

Japanese food is okay in Paris, IMO, as long as you stick to the real thing (1er, 2e as you say). It's only that the recent years have been witnessing the appearance of many poor-quality sushi-yakitori joints, none of them Japanese-run, but these places don't deserve to be called Japanese restaurants anyway. Frankly, I think that trying to seize that problem won't take us anywhere as long as you think by "nations" instead of "regions". The displacing of a border once or several times is a common thing in European history. It rarely affects the local cuisines to a large extent. Cuisines are more linked to traditional regions, duchies, counties, etc., than to unified nations. Political unification was a recent thing in Europe and the cuisines existed before it. Except for the case of court cuisines and elitist culinary codes, cuisines are a matter of regions, not nations. There is no significant difference in nature between the cuisine of Savoie and that of Val d'Aosta nearby; polenta is equally shared by Piedmont and Savoie-Dauphiné and who knows who influenced the other. It all arrived through Spain anyway. What makes one cuisine "French" and the other "Italian" is only a label pasted on by history. I think it's somewhat pointless to judge the "Italianness" or "Frenchness" of, say, Provençal cooking when you consider the development of Provence as a cultural entity. What about Provincia Romana, Occitan culture, the importance of Marseille as a seaport and so forth? Provence has black truffles and so has Ombria. Well, they grow there. and how exactly did tomatoes spread through Europe? Nice is a yet trickier problem if one insists on applying the "Italy" or "France" stencil over it. Catalunya is spread on both sides of the Spanish-French border and has a small strip in France, called Roussillon. The Catalan language is related to the Occitan language, like Provençal. Culinary dishes in Roussillon have a lot in common with those made across the border, does that mean that they are "more Spanish than french"? I don't think so, but I don't think they're "more French" either. I only think that once you start using the "nation" criteria trying to understand a process that has always been regional, you won't easily grasp it.

Quite right. The Comté de Nice always had its very special cuisine, distinct from Genoese-Ligurian cuisine (though closely related to it), and from Provençal cuisine too. In fact, since the comté was Italian until relatively recently, Nice cuisine is more related to its Italian parent the cuisine of Liguria than to the cuisine of Provence. Culturally, the region of Nice is Ligurian. Nice is also the birthplace of ravioli. Confusing Niçoise cuisine and Provençal cuisine is a mistake often done, including by the French themselves. The fact that Provence and Nice do have some dishes in common (the daube, for instance) doesn't make the identification easier. One of the specificities of Nice cuisine is the prevalence of blettes (chard greens) and other green vegetables, just like Ligurian and Genoese cuisine, but this feature is less pronounced in Provençal cuisine. Still, the description of Provençal cuisine as somewhat "Italian" just because there's olive oil, tomatoes, garlic and fresh vegetables puzzles me... In this case, let's label the whole Mediterranean as "Italian".

Since the late 90's indeed, those fake Japanese restaurants have been sprouting in many areas. The quality is generally very low. I think it is more the result of a marketing calculation than of popular demand, for I don't think these places are doing that well. Some Southeast Asian entrepreneurs probably decided that the yakitori-sushi business was more profitable than the already-saturated "traiteur chinois" scene (where the quality is also quite low). These restaurants should not be, at any rate, confused with the true Japanese restaurants of Paris, which are at least better. I don't think the trend will develop much. The process is the same as the "traiteur chinois" syndrome: once you start seeing a traiteur chinois in your street (generally replacing your local charcutier), and it's fine. Then you see two, then there are four of them between two metro stations. And finally you're sick of them and you never enter one anymore.

What's the best pho soup? ← Hard to find.

I go there every once in two weeks or so, I live close to the XIIIe. They make decent banh cuon too. Actually this Choisy-Tolbiac-avenue d'Ivry corner is a goldmine: my favorite Thai-Lao restaurant is there, as well as a very fine Lao restaurant and pastry shop (Rouam Mit), plus a lovely Chinese tea import shop, further along avenue d'Ivry. Still further on there's a great Thai fruit and food market, Big Store (a branch of Exo-Store). Down on avenue de Choisy there is the great Kawa shop for cookware, bulk teas and Yixing teapots. Actually it is less and less true that Vietnamese immigrants predominate in this area. There are plenty of Chinese too, Cambodians of course, Laotians and it seems that we're getting more Thais as time goes by. All this is good news regarding the restaurant situation

I think you are perfectly right.

Yes but I described a different character. I don't think your in-laws could be described as "bloated with national pride" and I don't think you would either. I am talking about a very definite kind of nationalist whose opinions have never prevented him or her from enjoying foreign food. In the provinces you will find people who feel intimidated by new dishes, as they will in any other country. In the Korean countryside, how many people would be instantly familiar with andouillette à la beaujolaise?

It's Pho Banh Cuon 14, 129 avenue de Choisy, around the corner from rue de Tolbiac. The second best pho soup in the area and certainly the best-known. Just next door there is the Le Kok, which is very fine too.

Allright, I get your point. So let's try something fun and get closer to the truth: take the original question of the thread and this is what we get: Well, MacDonalds has flourished in France. MacDonalds food is done very well in France (so I was told). No, I don't think there is something about French culinary culture that inhibits MacDonalds' cuisine. I'm afraid I am not competent enough on how to get good Mexican, Chinese, Indian, Srilankan, Vietnamese, North African, Lebanese, etc., foods, but in general MacDonalds is doing very fine here. See my point?

What makes you think this prevalence is exclusively Italian in nature?

Well, what puzzles me is that I can't seem to figure out where you're headed to. First you ask some precise questions about the "non-French restaurant situation" in France. Several have tried to answer, including me. I have answered truthfully, according to my experience. I have felt more than a little baffled by your reaction and the more you insist on it, the less I understand it. Then it sounds like you're willing to ask questions but not willing to get any answer, which leads me to think that you already have an answer of your own, so why ask questions in the first place? Some here have tried to put forward some factors like, indeed, supply and demand, the French palate, vacation destinations, etc., and I wrote what I thought of it: regarding the Parisian situation they don't really appear as the dominant factor, and I have explained why. Now someone more skillful than me at supply-and-demand issues could probably apply their skills to the French situation and tell us about it. I don't think it would contradict my conclusions though. All I can vouch for is the way I have seen the restaurant map in Paris change for nearly thirty years, being also well aware of the distribution of restaurants area by area according to the different communities that settled there. What more can I say? Now I have asked you to explain to me in what way exactly you believe, or rather know, that the "French palate" has played a role in the existence or nonexistence of restaurants in Paris (notwithstanding the fact that many non-French restaurants in Paris do cater to the immigrant communities in the first place). Being absolutely ignorant of this matter, I am waiting to learn from you. What I have noticed is that the "French palate" influences the taste of the food but not the existence of the restaurant. But there may be a "French palate" I have never met in my life, and perhaps it is fooling all around me while I'm totally unaware of it. I am expecting the same enlightenment from you concerning "supply and demand" because at this date I still don't grasp how precisely it functions in my own city, for I was under the naive illusion that the main thing, for instance, a Vietnamese restaurant needed in France was the existence of Vietnamese people to cook the food. And that the authenticity of the Vietnamese food was, in a large measure, conditioned by the existence of Vietnamese people to eat the food. This is not ironical at all, it is a true request, I'd really like to be pointed out what my eyes have been failing to see, because otherwise I can't see why you should be so irritated by my posts.

Nice is Italian in many ways and its cooking is a trans-border variation on the Genoese style of cooking. So I wouldn't describe the Italian restaurants there as completely "non-local". This is true for the Comté de Nice, which was Italian until 1860 or so. But mind you, I cannot see how Provençal cooking could be described as "Italian", though naturally it shares quite a few features with its Eastern neighbor.

This is quite normal. There may be a lot of chilli in the Vietnamese diet (though never as much as in Thailand), but usually not directly in the food. The chilli is most of the time presented on the side, as a sauce or as whole fresh peppers to break up and add to your plate at table. Dishes and soups are served without chillis. So it is inaccurate to speak of "spiced down" Vietnamese food just because the dishes contain no chillies. The spiced-down versions are only the ones where no side dishes of fresh or pickled chillies are provided. As far as Asian food is concerned, catering to Western tastes often means serving a less refined version of the cuisine. Wow. Where can we see that?

A few remarks on this seductive but slightly-too-mechanical-to-be-true explanation: - The places catering for new immigrants are not necessarily small "mom and pop" joints. They can be quite large, busy restaurants, though they are generally cheap. They are a sign of the fact that newly arrived communities are beginning to get more organized, and some of them do get organized very fast. - I know a few "better lit and larger" restaurants that appeared recently but they are not geared mostly to the French. A quick look at the clientèle and type of food served is enough to see that. Size and lighting are not good criteria to judge the potential public of such restaurants, especially in recent years. The most authentic Chinese food in Paris, for instance, may be found in some of those large, busy, cheap, canteen-like places. - Among those new and larger places, there are exceptions but (Moroccan pseudo-riyad set aside) I can think only of one type, the chic Thai restaurant hoping to cater to those lucky French who have been to Thailand. I know two examples, and one of them is a chain, another one is located in the Southern Paris Chinatown. It is true that spices are toned down but the quality of ingredients is not particularly improved. The quality is much better in more "genuine" places. And the most refined version of native cuisine is to be found also in the more genuine places catering mostly to immigrants. Thai and Lao restaurants are an interesting example because one can see the situation changing right before one's eyes: until now, there wasn't a very large Thai community in Paris. Though this needs confirming, I believe this is changing gradually and perhaps more Thai restaurants will appear in the near future. Warning signs can be spotted in many of the large food stores in the 13e arrondissement Chinatown. - I mildly disagree with the assertion that the French, generally, demand high standards. They certainly do as far as French food is concerned (and even so...), but they are not as discerning concerning non-French cuisines, especially when they don't know much about them. Though we have our share of true open-minded gourmets, of which I know quite a few, I have also been appalled seeing what some of my countrymen are able to swallow under a Chinese, Indian, Japanese or any other non-French label. So the quality situation in non-French restaurants is not that easy to decide. It takes a lot of tasting and trying.

I can't see that I now "seem to acknowledge" these factors. I always wrote that they did exist, but that they were quite unimportant and by no means the general rule. Just study the map of non-french restaurants in Paris if you have access to it, and draw the conclusions yourself. The McDonald's chain as ethnic restaurants, and furthermore representative of the "non-french restaurant" situation in France? Surely you must be joking. By being born in France, living in France, precisely in Paris, and still being there today, my friend. I didn't make this determination, this is only the truth. Why do you find this so difficult to accept? I fail to understand this question. From what I do understand of it, I only have to say that if all Parisians loved hot peppers, there would be hot peppers everywhere. But not necessarily a different restaurant map. Perhaps we'd have started importing chillies from Mexico, and maybe some Mexicans would have come along with them on top of the bargain and opened plenty of restaurants. But this is only conjecture and not the way things really happen. And frankly, I really find it unlikely. In any case, there is something you seem to overlook: there are a few different kinds of Vietnamese restaurants in Paris, reflecting the successive waves of immigration from Southeast Asia that arrived here from the 70's on. And some of them cater mostly to Vietnamese people living in Paris (though native Parisians seem to love them more and more, chilli or not). That should suffice as an explanation. Anyway, since you seem to know the non-French-restaurant situation in Paris better than I do, I beg you to please enlighten me. What misled me in the first place is that this thread was started by some questions of yours.

France has many excellent Vietnamese and Southeast Asian restaurants, yet the small department of Asian ingredients in any supermarket — from greyish, sodden mung bean sprouts in a glass jar to average-quality soy sauce — is enough to make you cry. The same applies to the El Paso taco stuff, which isn't very successful anyway. It is not even Mexican ingredients, it is a limited range of Tex-Mex items. No, of course, that's not the Parisians' perception of Mexican food. Why is it so difficult to understand that once there isn't a Mexican diaspora in a country, there will be very little opportunity for good Mexican food?

I'd have said 1920. But I've looked carefully and I can testify that no waiter in our Chinese restaurants wears a long braid on their back.

I agree. Now please do us a favor, send us plenty of Mexicans to show us the way! Preferrably Mexicans who can cook.

So true. The most chauvinistic Frenchman, the most bloated with national pride, will gladly feast on nems, phat thai, fajitas, colombo, and particularly couscous (a national dish), as long as they're good. There is simply no correlation between his bigotry and his culinary tastes. Yes, isn't it so?

Very interesting post, Anzu. And an interesting point too (the holiday destinations). But I'm going to Paris-proof it immediately. Where do Parisians go away on vacation, aside from staying in France? Now I don't know exactly which is the n°1 vacationland for the French but the Mediterranean (Greece, Tunisia, Morocco) sure is successful. Now there are many North African restaurants but obviously there is a large North African population in France. Lots of French tourists go to Greece: of course there is Mavrommatis (which is fine) but apart from that, there are no good Greek restaurants in Paris. No comparison with Germany, where there are many Greek immigrants. The recent appearance of chic or pseudo-chic Moroccan restaurants complete with wall carpets and riyad-like décor and outrageous prices is directly correlated to the recent status of Marrakech as the perfect Parisian jetsetter destination. But in the 70's and 80's the Number One destination for the rich and trendy was the Seychelles islands, and there never was more than one seychellois restaurant in Paris. Judging from what I see around me and what a travel agent friend said to me recently, some of the preferred faraway destinations for the French are the French Carribean, Thailand and Mexico. There are some French Carribean restaurants in Paris, and many French Carribean people too. As for Thailand, there are many less Thai restaurants (the "Spécialités chinoises-vietnamiennes-thaïlandaises" places don't count as Thai) than the popularity of Thailand as a vacation destination should imply. Even less so for Mexico. Actually I don't believe there would be more and better Mexican restaurants in Paris if more Parisians went to Mexico. Demand is not always enough. There needs to be Mexicans to do the cooking.

I don't believe you read my posts very carefully because it seems that you're mixing my words up. It is not very fair to compare the "ethnic food" situation in the US, for instance in NY, and the equivalent in France. The whole world comes to the US and opens restaurants there. Not in France. France is not the US, Paris is not NYC. The situation of ethnic restaurants in France, precisely in Paris which happens to be the place where I live, is fairly easy to study. It reflects certain historical situations, some of them relatively ancient, some of them recent, all of them layered in a very interesting way. In fact it does reflect them to an almost blinding closeness. If the examples I have given in my previous posts are not enough to illustrate this, there is not much else I can do except give more examples of the same kind, but that would become overdemonstrative and boring. Immigration waves and the presence of more or less substantial foreign communities is what shapes the restaurant situation in France. There is another factor, dependent on the previous ones: who opens restaurants? Some immigrants are really "restaurant" people, i.e. the Vietnamese, the Africans, who like to reproduce the formula of the "restaurant de poussière" or the African "maquis". The Portuguese, for instance, seem to be more attached to cooking at home, which seems to explain the relatively small number of Portuguese restaurants (suburban cafés for the most part) and the importance of Portuguese produce stalls in suburban street and covered markets. Is there a contradiction there? Read again: I wrote that the French don't as a rule like spicy flavors but that this never was an obstacle to the opening of non-french restaurants that serve a de-spiced version of the original cuisines. So if, for instance, there are so few Mexican restaurants in France, that is certainly not because of the chilli or because we're not interested, as was hinted here and there. I am seriously contending that this is, in France, the main factor for the spread of non-French restaurants, yes. Not the only one, but the main one, for sure. It is the factor that has shaped the non-French restaurant situation in France to a very large extent. Certainly not irrelevant, but I never said so. If I knew exactly to what extent you really know French culinary culture, I'd find it easier to answer you here. But if French culinary culture is relevant in that respect, this concerns the way dishes are cooked (again: light on the spicing), not the number and extent of non-French restaurants. Now if you believe that some culinary cultures like Mexican are not represented in France just because they are too spicy for the French and would clash with the French culinary culture, and you want me to confirm this, sorry, I cannot do that because it is just not so. Writing about that subject implies that you take a good look at the "non-national" restaurant situation not just in France but in all other European countries. Look at Germany, England, Portugal, Holland. The origin, number and nature of immigrants, as well as the links left by the colonial history, are the key factor everywhere. You cannot compare with the US there. Not irrelevant at all, but again, it is a matter of how the dishes are prepared, not of what kind of restaurants are present. What do you exactly mean by that? I'll let you deal with this one because I have no idea of what part the "French national pride" (whatever this may be) may play in our ethnic restaurant situation. You seem to know more about this subject than I do, so I'm eager to be enlightened. Sorry, but I don't think so. I am only describing the situation and answering your questions honestly. I happen to know this subject, and the recent history of my country, pretty well, and I deal with this in my everyday life.

Sure, but the topic was "non-french cuisines in France" so I replied about Paris because I frankly don't know enough about the situation of non-french cuisines in other parts of France. I only know that it is more difficult to get foreign produce in most provincial cities. Someone had a theory about the "non-french" food situation in France, thinking it was specifically French by nature, but I went to object that it couldn't work that way because it was not identifying the causes properly, and that France was no different from any other place except for the fact that in any case the amount of spices and chilli had to be very much subdued. So I described the French situation as I know it and have studied it. Think of this: France is described as "insular". I find this surprising indeed for a country that has seen most of the European world pass through its territory in every direction for centuries, leaving marks all over the place, and has adopted many foods and preparations from many cultures. However, this very country, which cannot honestly be described as "insular", has developed since the 17th century a very unique kind of cuisine, based on a very strict economy of spices. On the other hand, if there is one European country that can be described as "insular", it is Great Britain. And its food situation, now, is probably the most open and multicultural in all of Europe. So "insularity" doesn't make it as an explanation. I don't think French cooking served outside of France should count as "ethnic food", not because of any particular nature in se, but because of its past history as a "model" cuisine throughout the world, and its seminal nature. The question to ask here is: do Germans usually open lots of restaurants abroad? From what I've noticed, not many over the world. Maybe not everywhere, of course. But we were talking about France. In France it's mostly about immigration and colonial history. That is very clear. I don't believe that's true at all. The opposition to piquancy only produces restaurants that serve food with all or most of the piquancy removed. It has never been an obstacle, in France, to opening restaurants. There are plenty of Vietnamese restaurants here, but few of them (the genuinely Vietnamese ones, that is) provide the normal amount of chili and spices. Same thing can be said about the incredibly bland Indian restaurants that flourished here in Paris during the 80's and 90's, outside of the ethnic neighborhood of La Chapelle. Now that there is a Tamil and Sri Lankan population in Paris, there are decent Indian restaurants. Before that, there weren't any. It's as simple as that. There are not many Mexican restaurants because there is not much of a Mexican population in Paris. And there are many Vietnamese restaurants because there are plenty of Vietnamese people. This too is simple. Just imagine that the Maximilian episode in Mexican history had been more successful and durable, giving way to a substantial population exchange between Mexico and France: we'd have many Mexican restaurants by now, most of them opened since the 1950's (when non-french-food restaurants started becoming popular in France), but I'm absolutely sure that all of them, right from the beginning, would have served an extremely tame food, chilli-wise. À la française. Take a walk with me in Paris sometime, and I will show you that our restaurant scene reflects the multiethnicism of our society to the perfection. But by restaurants, I mean all restaurants.

Rabelais, in the 16th century, was mentioning the "coscoton à la mauresque" and, supposedly, described it pretty much as couscous as we know it. In the mid-19th century, George Sand (who was known for her great cooking skills) loved to make kouss-kouss for her family and friends in Nohant. So you see couscous has been a "French" dish for some time now...

I do understand Lucy's situation. Good Mexican food is one of the few things I really miss a lot from living in the States. The problem with Mexican food in Paris is that ingredients are really hard to come by. They were easier to find ten years ago or so, now most importers seem to have died away. "A la Mexicaine" is a nice place, not always great but basically nice. "Anahuacalli" serves elegant and tasty food, though not spicy enough (that darned French palate again...). There used to be a big cantina out in the sticks near the Buttes-Chaumont, "Ay Caramba", and the food used to be great. I don't even know if it still exists, I haven't been there for years. "Mexi & Co" comes in handy because they sell the odd canned jalapeno and sometimes dried black beans (with holes in them), but they seem to switch more and more to tequilas and beers, pushing food items into a trap of oblivion, and they serve terrible food anyway. As a general rule I'd say that the Mexican situation in Paris is quite poor. There used to be a great little place near the cimetière du Montparnasse, called Los Recuerdos del Porvenir, run by a lovely, round-shaped Mexican man whose name was Emilio if I remember well. The food was delicious and authentic (and the rompope was unforgettable),, but the restaurant was short-lived.

The French have no colonial past with Mexico (which personally I regret, since I adore Mexican food) and therefore have no reason to be good at restaurants from such a faraway cuisine, mostly because there is no sizeable immigrant Mexican population in Paris. I used to know of three very nice Mexican restaurants in Paris, now I know only two, and one of them isn't great every time. They are run by Mexicans who love their cuisine and love to make it known. But they are exceptions. There also is a confusion in France between Tex-Mex food and Mexican food. To illustrate this theory, there are some good Japanese restaurants in Paris (Opéra - rue Sainte-Anne) though there's no colonial heritage: but there are many Japanese people living and working in Paris. This is not a matter of "not being interested", but a matter of who is here to initiate us to good food from their native country, and how many of them live here. Moroccan food is fine in Paris because there are many Moroccans, furthermore the cooks know that their French customers are relatively knowledgeable. In the US, some years ago, when there were not many Moroccans there, Moroccan restaurants were positively terrible and everything but Moroccan. After ordering couscous in Brooklyn Heights and eyeing the dreadful mess of bloated semolina, huge carrot slices and tasteless red sauce in my plate, I complained to the waiter. He told me "this is couscous, this is the way you eat it." I said: "Sir, I come from France." His face became very serious, he said: "Oh, I am so sorry, Madam" and took my plate back to the kitchen. Of course the French are interested in Mexican food, and they would be so much more interested if there were more Mexicans to show them the way. But there aren't. Though what you're writing here is not completely untrue, it is exaggerated. The French are not that insular, but they are conditioned by the ancestral style of their cuisine, which, as you may easily agree if you study it a little bit, is based on as few spices as possible in order to bring out the true taste of things. So there you have it: opening up to spicy, strong tastes and flavors is very fine but it's not easy for the French in general. If they had been more "open", perhaps this definite style of French cooking would have disappeared long ago. I'm not saying this is good or bad, just that you cannot have it all at the same time. I haven't read "Paris to the Moon" but I find this Mr. Hoffman quite rude in labeling this "improper use of curry". First of all what is a "proper use of curry" when curry powder itself is, most of the time, a dubious spice mix of English origin and very remote from the realities of Indian cooking? The truth is that there is a proper use of curry in England and a proper use of curry in France, where English curry powder was adopted in the 19th century in a very particular way which I would describe as quite French, mostly with seafood. Too bad Mr. Hoffman didn't know enough about French cuisine to be aware of that. There is no doubt that there is an identity of French cuisine as far as spicing is concerned. However I know that the idea that "French cuisine is the best in the world" is almost universally shared in France (and dreadfully so, I should say, for I strongly disagree with it), but I don't think it is the reason why French cooks have always been so reluctant to include new tastes and spices. It is not chauvinism, it is because the taste of French cooking is a fragile equilibrium. There are two things to say here: first, it seems normal that a guidebook focuses on the native cuisines of the countries it is supposed to cover. Second, there are many great ethnic restaurants in Paris but, most of the time, you cannot guess their existence unless someone has acquainted you to them. It was perhaps too much of a job for Zagats, which, in Paris, probably chooses to focus on French cooking. No need to rely on an anthropologist for this. I think the main and only criteria is the significant number of people from the region. The interest in some type of food is by no means a guarantee that the food will be good and/or authentic. Look at all the terrible Indian restaurants in Paris before the Srilankan wave in the '90s. Also, I have never met anyone in Paris who knows a little about Mexican food and who didn't deplore that there were no decent Mexican restaurants here. That's for the interest. I believe that if, all of a sudden, good Mexican restaurants flourished in Paris, Parisians would be delighted. This is not only true of France but of every other country in the world with a colonial history, as well as of every country that has sizeable immigrant populations. It has nothing to do with France in particular. I agree with the second part of your conclusion, not with the first. The "not interested" is no more and no less true in France than anywhere else in the world.