The State of French Dining

[Bux]

I guess the point here isn't that 30 euros is a bad buy for lunch for that quality, it's that the type of cooking you and I would call interesting can't be had for 30 euros and the chefs are pinned in by the price point.

But that price point exists for certain restaurateurs all over, not just in Paris. There are lower points as well in many places. The local gentry have long had traditional tastes in Paris. They do now and they did when I first got there and when you first got there. The difference is that you and I aren't satisfied with the same food that pleased us then. My duaghter wouldn't be and maybe your kids won't be, but I've got plenty of younger relatives who have the potential to have the same Paris experience I had.

You think that's a boring lunch at l'Afriole? I still vividly remember my first dish in Paris. It was cucumber salad. Nothing on my plate but thinly sliced cucumber with dressing and parsley and it was a revelation to me. Why shouldn't that sort of simple food not be available today. If well done with care, it beats the hell out of a lot of pseudo haute cuisine preparations I've seen on menus that do nothing but confuse your palate at the start of a lunch. I'd consider the loss of that sort of option, a loss. What I see as improvement is the elimination of a need to order a three course lunch in Paris and the appearance of saladiers and places like Cuisine de Bar a few door from Poilane where one can get an open sandwich of some style and a salad for lunch. I know the old European lunch was a romantic idea we all clung to while noting how much more the French enjoy life than Americans, but the quick lunch is here to stay and it might as well be delicious as well as fast. Paris is changing, but it needn't throw out the baby with the bath water.

Wilfird, While I may share your fantasy, I'm not always sure it's safe to go back.

[marcus]

I find this pinned down by price point argument unconvincing. I'm not at all sure that the chef at L'Affriole could do better at a higher price point. La Regalade is at that 30 euro price point and does great. I also consider it positive that a chef that could be at a starred restaurant has decided to devote himself to a bistro. How does one take this as an indicator of decline.

L'Ardoise serves very good food at an even lower price point, but admittedly it has no decor and they turn their tables rapidly.

The fact that Paris has all of these good and interesting choices is what makes it a great restaurant destination. I find it strange and ironic that one would describe decline in terms of so much goodness.

[robert brown]

Marcus, decline is relative; goodness an absolute. Paris and France in general still provide the highest highs. They are just getting harder to find.

[robert brown]

Between the Lander article and the wisdom of e-Gullet members, there are several points worth taking the time to comment on. The Lander piece strikes me as an example of dutiful but qualified criticism; in other words he knows that French gastronomy has deteriorated, but for whatever reasons chooses to pussyfoot it by dealing with relatively benign issues, digressing into unrelated or trivial matters, and making statements that are questionable or simply not true. While he states several reasons for the difficult time restaurant owners in France are having, he ignores the utter abandonment of France by Americans afraid to travel, spending deflated dollars, and avoiding the country on principle; and the idiotic naïve remedy of raising prices in the face of falling demand. Citing the turn-around in the French wine industry as an example of inspiration for the restaurant business is irrelevant. The two professions are so differently structured that developments in one are not transferable to the other.

Lander cites the culinary brain drain to other countries as an example of French culinary know-how benefiting the world, but fails to state that it is this loss of talent that has largely been responsible for other countries catching up with the French. He then states that the problem is not what is on the plate but how it is served just before mentioning formula menus and trips to the cash and carry and frozen food depots. (Most restaurant owners go to the professionals-only wholesale markets in their area). The 35-hour workweek rule is a point well raised, however. It accounts for the loss of pride dining room personnel used to feel for their restaurant and the egregious mistakes that are being made in the most famous restaurants of France—mistakes I have witnessed and what my fellow gastronomic travelers and some e-gulleteers report on a regular basis.

Concerning Lander’s proposal to lower dining VAT from 19.5% to the 5.5% of other enterprises, you can bet that the lion’s share to be gained by the client will end up in the restaurant owner’s pocket in the form of higher prices. Lander then follows on that the price to quality ratio is “invariably impressive”—sometimes yes, sometimes no, but never “invariably”. Last, what is wrong with the waiter reciting the ingredients of a dish? It is when they put the dish down in front of you and walk silently away that I fault them, especially when I am anxious to know what I am about to eat. If that is the shallowness of his argument after 25 years of traipsing around France, he either had blinders on or he is pulling a lot of punches.

I don’t think it is being romantic, jaded, and nostalgic to state that gastronomy in France is not what it was, (nor does that mean it is no longer the country most endowed with gastronomic riches.) It should be a premise provable quantitatively (with great time and effort, however) at every socio-economic level of restaurant going by looking at such phenomena as the size of menus; the flexibility in ordering; the number of kitchen and dining room employees; the sources, range and availability of produce; the amount of food on offer; the background and training of kitchen and dining room staff,; how often menus changed; the number of apprentices who went immediately on to open their own ambitious restaurants and stayed in France as opposed to migrating to foreign countries; and the opportunities for chefs to earn outside income that allowed them to cater to their clients with pride and generosity.

As for how good the food was, you will just have to believe me.

[Steve Plotnicki]

I'm not at all sure that the chef at L'Affriole could do better at a higher price point. La Regalade is at that 30 euro price point and does great. I also consider it positive that a chef that could be at a starred restaurant has decided to devote himself to a bistro. How does one take this as an indicator of decline."

Marcus - I find this sort of circular. Let's parse it. Agreed that Yves Camdeborde is a better chef then whomever is at L'Affriole. But how can one deny that the ingredients one can buy at a 50 euro price point won't be superior to the ones you buy at 30 euros? Or how about my Cream of Bean and Foie Gras soup? You certainly can out a larger tranch of foie in for 50 euros can't you? Maybe some cubes of foie too.

All things being equal, meaning, if chefs all have the same price to ingredient markup, price is 90% of the ballgame because the quality of the ingredients go up proportionately. Better beans, better cream, better lardons, better foie makes for a better soup. Even with a mediocre chef. And then of course, a great chef like Camdeborde can do a better job with more middle of the road ingredients, but he can't turn a sow's ear into a silk purse.

The reason I point to Camdeborde's restaurant as a sign that France is in decline is that in the days of yore he would be a 2 or 3 star Michelin chef by now. The reason he runs a small place on the outskirts of Paris is because it's a foolish investment to try and gain 3 stars. And the reason it's a foolish investment is because the entire dining scene is in decline. Yes there are still holdovers from the old days, and occassionally someone new comes along and offers interesting food. But it does not have to buzz to it that it had 10 years ago. I also think that less French men are interested in being chefs. Back in the days of yore, when there was a great fortune to make in the restaurant business it attracted good candidates. But if less men are interested, and many of them leave the country to work in the U.S., what's left for France? I also think that French kitchens are more chauvenistic then U.S. kitchens so the men aren't being replaced by French women. At least I don't hear about it.

Okay so the rest of the world is catching up, Then what? What does that have to do with the fact that the ingredients used to be home grown, and of better quality? Or that some now retired grand-mere used to be able to get the maximum flavor out of her canard but her replacement's is a little blander? Or that every brasserie in the city is controlled by one company and serves common food prepared in an off premises canteen? Or that there are only something like 15-20 boulangeries that use their own dough and don't buy mie from a common source, like shitty NYC pizza joints buy their dough. Or how many charcuteries don't make their own pates anymore and buy industrial pates from a wholesaler at Rungis? Or try to get some artisinal cheese in France. It ain't easy. My wife said the most telling thing yesterday as we were walking up the rue St. Dominique at lunchtime yesterday. She said the kids were all dressed in American clothing. Quicksilver, Billibong, Ralph Lauren etc. She said that since the last time she was here (about a year ago,) that the style has changed completely.

[John Whiting]

Whatever one's philosophical, political or economic orientation may be, it's obvious that the world has become a place in which constant change is a prerequisite for prosperity or even for solvency. The great strength of French cuisine at foundation level was always that you you could go to a particular region -- or even a particular restaurant -- and know exactly what would be on the menu and what it would taste like. The old Blue Guides used to include recommendations of hotels and restaurants -- complete with prices -- knowing that they would still be reliable when the the book was falling apart.

In today's world the very foundation of French gastronomic reliability has been devalued. Dignified gastronomic elder statemen must climb up on their tables and tap-dance. *Everyone* is doing it, no one is being let off the hook. Being the best yesterday just isn't good enough. Every diner asks the proverbial New York question -- "Yeah, but what have you done for me lately?"

[Tonyfinch]

But times HAVE changed, and so have customers needs and demands. For example,in general people are far less physically active than they used to be and generally don't want/need such large heavy meals. Yet by far the cheapest option on most ordinary restaurant's menus in France is the four course prix fixe. The pricing structure penalises those who only want one or two courses.

People may not wish to sit down every night between 7pm and 9pm.. Yet outside of Paris woe betide you if you want to eat in a proper restaurant outside of those hours. So fast food fills the gap.

Some people Do object to eating in a smoky environment. Do most French restaurants have no smoking areas? Like hell they do. I could go on.

Adapting to the times is not the same as change for change's sake. It's about understanding people's wants and needs and striving to meet them. And the fact is that that happens much more outside of France these days than in it.

[lxt]

The great strength of French cuisine at foundation level was always that you you could go to a particular region -- or even a particular restaurant -- and know exactly what would be on the menu and what it would taste like.

John – You seem to promulgate isolation as an essential measure to preserve culinary triumph. One of the common debates in an attempt to justify decline in French gastronomy is whether losing traditionalism consequently leads to losing integrity. Therefore, even though globalization successfully disseminates French culinary techniques throughout the world, for France globalization is viewed as nothing more but a threat to a French identity. The question is however whether one of the reasons the relative decline is so noticeable lies not in the fact that the French chefs turned their backs on a traditional approach, but that the international chefs surpassed their French teachers in applying their learned skills with more spontaneity and creativity, and that this fact alone may result in the end of the era of French culinary supremacy the same way as French language, literature and fashion lost much of their influence.

Ducasse, for instance, as one of those who propagated isolation as the only way to sustain originality of French cuisine 10 years ago seems to take a contrary position now by stating that globalization is invaluable in that it boost quality and provides enormous possibilities for exchange and assimilation.

[John Whiting]

Tonyfinch wrote:

The pricing structure penalises those who only want one or two courses.

That's because the price for the prix fixe menu is so low that breaking it up proportionally would hardly cover overheads.

People may not wish to sit down every night between 7pm and 9pm.. Yet outside of Paris woe betide you if you want to eat in a proper restaurant outside of those hours. So fast food fills the gap.

If you were trying to run a restaurant with reasonable prices and within the limits of the 35 hour week, how much earlier or later do you think you could afford to open?

Some people Do object to eating in a smoky environment. Do most French restaurants have no smoking areas? Like hell they do.

First, just how much demand is there for no-smoking areas, aside from American tourists? I would like *all* parts of *all* restaurants to be non-smoking, but I don't flatter myself that I am even in a majority. And most small restaurants/bistros are laid out in such a way that a non-smoking area would either require expensive alterations or be merely an empty gesture.

In other words, moderately priced French restaurants are running a ballancing act in which they try to provide such good value for money that locals will eat out habitually rather than just on special occasions.

You can eat a sow's ear but not a silk purse

Precisely. And it would take a silk purse full of Euros to create the bistro of your dreams.

lxt wrote:

You seem to promulgate isolation as an essential measure to preserve culinary triumph.

I'm not promulgating anything, I'm merely stating cause and effect. For better or for worse, insofar as people around the planel come to resemble each other in their tastes and demands, globalization is a threat to *everyone's* identity. You simply have to decide whether or not you think that's a good thing and then govern your life so as to maximize those values which you most prize, independently of how many others happen to share them.

[Bux]

globalization is a threat to *everyone's* identity

Quite simply, globalization, or homogenization means that things are the same all over to an increased extent. In terms of regional differences it means they disappear. In terms of quality, it means a trend to towards a uniform quality. If you were a leader in a field, it means everyone is catching up or you're being pulled down. Obviously, globalization has it's effect on the state of French dining. It becomes less distinctive.

[Bux]

My wife said the most telling thing yesterday as we were walking up the rue St. Dominique at lunchtime yesterday. She said the kids were all dressed in American clothing. Quicksilver, Billibong, Ralph Lauren etc. She said that since the last time she was here (about a year ago,) that the style has changed completely.

I'm not sure that was all that telling. I seem to recall my first trips to Paris from the sixties. One of the things we most noticed was that each time we came to Paris, it seemed as if about a quarter of the women on the street were wearing the same item of clothing. On the next visit, no matter how soon it was, no one was wearing that garment. The only thing that hasn't changed in France is the attitude towards being fashionable. The only safe bet is that next year the kids will be wearing something else. The success of American designers is related to their ability design for fashion obsolescence.

One question, are Quicksilver and Billibong American companies. I thought they were both Australian. Of course I thought Bennetton was American for the longest time, so what do I know about fashion.

[John Whiting]

Bux wrote

Quite simply, globalization, or homogenization means that things are the same all over to an increased extent. In terms of regional differences it means they disappear. In terms of quality, it means a trend towards a uniform quality. If you were a leader in a field, it means everyone is catching up or you're being pulled down. Obviously, globalization has it's effect on the state of French dining. It becomes less distinctive.

Bux, that's about as clear as it can get. Unemotively, it simply states what is actually the case. With regard to the rising generation of virtuoso pianists, a highly respected musician of an older generation put it less neutrally: "The standard of mediocrity is rising all the time."

[Bux]

I trust he didn't mean that what we consider mediocre is of better quality today than it was yesterday and fear he means that what we accept as quality is getting more mediocre every day.

[Steve Plotnicki]

"Whatever one's philosophical, political or economic orientation may be, it's obvious that the world has become a place in which constant change is a prerequisite for prosperity or even for solvency. The great strength of French cuisine at foundation level was always that you you could go to a particular region -- or even a particular restaurant -- and know exactly what would be on the menu and what it would taste like"

John Whiting has made the right point, he has just stated it from the wrong perspective. I'm not sure if he intended to draw any inferences by it. And to avoid having an argument about the inferences (intended or not, ) let me try and restate that paragraph.

The key to economic stability and success is constant growth. Regardless of your business, if you can't keep up with the Jonses, i.e., keep pumping capital into your business, you eventually lose ground. There is no value judgement in that statement, it's just how a market economy works. The way around this fact of life about the business world is to own something that has significant intangeable value that can't be replaced by money. To me that is what the French did. They invested heavily in agriculture, and created a method of cooking to maximize the return on that investment. And they did it when the cost was cheap. They were so far ahead of everyone that they coasted on their advantage for 80 years of the last century. Now that the rest of the world is prepared to compete with them, they have no way to maintain superiority. And even if they wanted to, and there is also a question of desire, I think the cost of doing it would bankupt their food industry. And indeed that was starting to happen with chefs like Gagnaire and Veyrat. The cost of maintaining the high standards became prohibitive.

I had dinner at Arpege last night, and although I will save the review until after I eat at Gagnaire later in the week, as I am working on a comparison of the restaurants, 300 euros is a hefty tab for a tasting menu that is mostly vegetables. My wife and I left saying the entire food cost couldn't have been more then 30-45 euros between the two of us. Even if it was 60, that is a 10X cost to price ratio. And if you want to see why French dining is in decline, just look at those numbers. If it really costs that much money to maintain the standards, how are they going to do it in the long term?

I just can't get over the dichotomy of the 30 euro meal at Le Regalade, and the 300 euro meal at Arpege. Something has to be terribly wrong when the spread between the two is that large. And I think it's off at both ends. Arpege costs too much, and La Regalade costs too little. It says alot about the dining scene here. Look at the spread in NYC between a place like Daniel and Union Square Cafe. The average cover at Daniel isn't even twice what the average cover is at USC. But between Regalade and Arpege it's 10X? Has to make you wonder.

[marcus]

Steve, you don't mean 300 Euros each, do you?

[Wilfrid]

I bet he does.

[marcus]

I'm not sure. Michelin, which is usually quite accurate, shows menus at 140-225 and from Steve's description I would guess the lower end. The high priced menu is usually based on super premium ingredients.

[hollywood]

He says 60 euros would result in a 10x cost to price ratio. So, the math is he's talking a total tab of 600. Pricey.

[John Whiting]

SteveP wrote

The key to economic stability and success is constant growth.

It was not always thus. For centuries, except during periods of major instability from various causes, stability could result from doing the same thing well in exactly the same way, year after year.

Constant growth is the engine of capitalism -- only *capitalist* stability requires constant growth. If indeed constant growth is a necessary state, whatever the economic system, then the exhaustion of planetary resources is inevitable.

Why do I let myself get into these discussions?

Bux wrote

I trust he didn't mean that what we consider mediocre is of better quality today than it was yesterday and fear he means that what we accept as quality is getting more mediocre every day.

What he meant was that mediocre musicians -- i.e. those with nothing to say that's worth saying -- are becoming more and more technically proficient. Some would argue that there is also more and more flashy food that's just not worth eating.

[pirate]

Yes 600 euros is 10 times 60 euros. However the meals are not the same. So the comparison is flawed.

[hollywood]

If indeed constant growth is a necessary state, whatever the economic system, then the exhaustion of planetary resources is inevitable.

This sounds like the ultimate rationale for the space program: trash this planet, move on to the next one.

[robert brown]

Steve, are you saying that farmers were chefs? Are farmer-chefs in the universe of "they" and "the French"? Otherwise when are you talking about? Were the farms state-owned at some time? America used to be overwhelmingly agricultural as was every other country. What a country grew determined its cuisine. I always thought that what we consider French cuisine came mostly from Royalty and nobility except for peasant cuisine. Also, what level of cuisine are you indicating France had an advantage in from what you indicate to be between 1920 and 2000?

[Bux]

I think the cost of doing it would bankupt their food industry. And indeed that was starting to happen with chefs like Gagnaire and Veyrat. The cost of maintaining the high standards became prohibitive.

There really are all sorts of standards. La Regalade has its standards as does l'Astrance. Both Gagnaire, who went bankrupt in St. Etienne, and Veyrat, who couldn't pay his bankers in Annecy, over extended themselves, not by providing the finest food, but with over zealous construction costs, on borrowed money. Fortunately for the chefs and perhaps for us, Gagnaire was somehow able to open in Paris in a space that neeeded very little renovation and Veyrat's bankers understood that whatever he could afford to pay on his loans was more than they'd be able to make from his property if they took it over. At least those are the stories I remember reading in the media.

I never saw Gagnaire's place in St. Etienne, but I would have been quite happy to walk down a flight of stairs rather than take an elevator at Veyrat's and his rooms were far in excess of what I would pay for the night's stay. In other words, his expenses were lost on me. Guys like Bras, Marcon and Roellinger don't seem to suffer for visitors with rooms that run half or less the cast of Veyrat's. Architectural excesses are not essential for great food or great dining.

[robert brown]

Having recently been to L’Arpege, I can confirm 300 euros a head that was worth every one of them. That the Michelin shows the price that it does is a subject I brought up on the board in July. Meanwhile, Steve's post above is a good overture to something I have been thinking about posting for a while. Here ‘tis:

I date the beginning of the decline of eating in France to the spring of 1990, which began a long-lasting recession in Europe (as opposed to a short one in the USA). One way in which this manifested itself was the decrease in personal spending in France, notably in restaurants. The following year I remember the Gault-Millau Guide and magazine began harping on "rapport prix-qualite" and singling out restaurants that were cognizant of this. This recognition at that time mostly took the form of a prix fixe, no-choice lunch menu, thereby casting the dye for what we have today: degustation-driven dining at both lunch and dinner.

Although there was a nascent “grande" cuisine or innovative cuisine movements in the Anglo-Saxon part of the world, at the end of the 1980s, people still went to France to indulge themselves in the very special kind of eating that gave common currency to the term “tour gastronomique”. In the relatively short distance between northern Burgundy and Lyon, it was possible to eat in nearly a dozen three-star and would-be three star restaurants after eating in the best restaurants of Paris. In the early ‘90s, however, as the economy recovered in America and Great Britain and continued stagnating in France, these first two countries saw for the first time in their histories a culinary preoccupation and infrastructure (helped along a great deal by migrating Frenchmen looking for an escape from the diminishing opportunities in their native country). Hyped along and helped along by the mass media, the sentiment developed that while it was still pleasant and edifying to go to France to eat, it was not as “de riguer” as it had recently been..

Another factor that people overlook is that the major restaurants had put in an expensive infrastructure designed in part to impress the guidebook inspectors. Having borrowed heavily and taking on heavy maintenance and overhead, possibly relying as well on overnight guests, the decline of business in a difficult economy added to monetary burdens that had to be met with cutbacks in food costs and quality of service. (Steve and Bux mention the travails of Pierre Gagnaire and Marc Veyrat in the mid-90s as two glaring manifestations of some of this). To make a long story short, the economy of France has not experienced a hyper-growth period such as the United States, Great Britain, Ireland and even the Netherlands during the late 1990s. (and let us not forget the Japanese who flooded Paris between 1985 and 1992 and have all since disappeared). While better French restaurants have shared in the periods of the frothy economic periods of the US and Great Britain (and it is not the just numbers of Americans in particular eating in these restaurants, but the disproportionate “splurge mentality” money they spend) it has never been enough to make eating in these restaurants the bacchanal that it used to be, given that both the greed factor and the need for capital to renovate, expand, and start new 1990s-type ventures eats up whatever additional income came in during the late 1990s.

Now top French gastronomy is experiencing the quadruple whammy of 9/11, a weaker dollar, a stagnant world economy, and food inflation since the euro. While it is still possible to dine on sublime food ( I agree with Marcus that France is still capable of putting out the highest highs of high gastronomy), every indication is that even the best restaurants are starting to run with half a tank. One indefatigable e-Gullet member and spouse are in the middle of an ambitious “tour gastronomique” and reporting back on a near-daily basis both superb meals and, as the Lander article points out, rank-amateur mistakes in service. In the kitchen, there are, as Steve Klc has pointed out, chefs causing a stir; but among those who are, how many have a controlling interest in where they work and how much do they miss lording over an operation the scale of which their parents’ generation dined in?

[lxt]

Bux wrote

Quite simply, globalization, or homogenization means that things are the same all over to an increased extent. In terms of regional differences it means they disappear. In terms of quality, it means a trend towards a uniform quality. If you were a leader in a field, it means everyone is catching up or you're being pulled down. Obviously, globalization has it's effect on the state of French dining. It becomes less distinctive.

Bux, that's about as clear as it can get. Unemotively, it simply states what is actually the case. With regard to the rising generation of virtuoso pianists, a highly respected musician of an older generation put it less neutrally: "The standard of mediocrity is rising all the time."

Bux, John – Are you suggesting that globalization promotes mediocrity, as in facilitating lowering standards? In fact, it should stimulate raising them.

The only difference imposed by this trend is that instead of competing with a neighbor next door as in the past, now one has to compete with a neighbor in another country. The principles of success and competition are unchanged. If one can get “haricots vert with an abundance of flavor" [steve P.] from Kenya for half price now instead of a local producer, in order to protect his business and attract customers, the local producer has to provide a better product, and “that's about as clear as it can get."[John W] In an age of globetrotting gastronomic tourists, the same should apply to restaurants.