(Disclosures: am American. Strong views presented without evidence.)
The most damning indictment of French food I can think of is the fact that American capitalism hasn’t even bothered stealing it. We have Italian restaurants on every corner, Chinese and Mexican and Thai and Indian and Korean and every other cuisine from every other corner of the world...except French. One time I went to a Korean hotpot place, but it was too full and had a long wait, so instead of waiting I walked to a different Korean hotpot restaurant. There are two German restaurants within a few minutes’ walk of my apartment, because even if German cuisine isn’t a contender for the top spot it’s at least good at what it does.
And then we have one very fancy French place per state that stays in business by pandering to a tiny number of pretentious food critics who care about every aspect of food except its taste.
American capitalism “stealing” food is usually a process of lower-income, unskilled migrants moving to a country and adapting their cuisines to American tastes/ ingredients, which explains the wave of Italian (historically), Chinese, Mexican, Thai and Indian places far better than the quality of their respective cuisines. Not sure about Korean/ Japanese places (higher income), but (in Europe at least) they’re mostly run by people from Wenzhou, unless they’re high-end, which may be an interesting exception to the rule.
I’d guess you see very few restaurants from countries with low outmigration (East Africa) or higher-income migrants (Northern Europe).
In places in North America where they actually had a significant wave of French migrants, like Quebec, you see a lot of French cuisine.
This wouldn’t explain the “German restaurant phenomenon” you identify, but I think you’ll need some more evidence to back that up. I tried to get an estimate of this disparity by googling a few US cities, like: “chicago “german restaurant”“ and “chicago “French restaurant””. There seem to be 4 times as many results for French.
I’ll hazard a guess that there are more French restaurants in the US than restaurants of any other European cuisine except Italian.
On the other hand, Euros will constantly denigrate American food by appeal to the most unsophisticated examples of our cuisine, all the while pretty much every corner of their continent imports McDonald’s by the kiloton. Revealed preferences.
Europeans denigrate the American food they are exposed to, which is the “unsophisticated” stuff that they import the most of. It would be weird if they spent their time ripping into gumbo and fried rattlesnake.
Regular consumers of McDonalds in Europe are not the same people who also denigrate American food. The people who denigrate American cuisine are usually also a little sneering towards domestic consumers of McD.
Many consumers (in US and Europe) see McD cuisine as an inferior product, but it has obvious benefits beyond taste (convenience/ speed/ child-friendliness/ toilets/ wi-fi).
Your argument is sound but I think it’s actually because of its diversity in the base foods. Pasta and pizza is 95% of italian food, rice and noodles are the base of 80% of chinese/japanese/korean food, etc… In french cuisine, there is no base that is often used so you must have a lot of different ingredients. Not the best thing when you operate at “small scale” (when you’re not very expensive or cheesecake factory)
I don’t know if french restaurants are pretentious outside of france, but that looks more like a parisian problem than a french one.
I am confused to see multiple people make the ’95% pasta/pizza’ claim about Italian, Secondi is very much a thing, as are appetizers, even in NYC where pizza is everywhere I’d say maybe 65% when dining out.
When dining in, I suppose yes, because we wouldn’t think of the other dishes as Italian then—I don’t make an ‘Italian steak’ it’s just a steak, etc.
95% was most likely an overexaggeration but that was to underline the main idea that overall if all of your recipes need several ingredients that will be used in none of the other recipes, it’s much harder to make a restaurant work.
When dining in, I suppose yes, because we wouldn’t think of the other dishes as Italian then—I don’t make an ‘Italian steak’ it’s just a steak, etc.
Indeed, I may be biased but many “italian things” do feel like normal things were “italian” has been added to it because they have a great cooking culture. Especially among the appetizers, where the spanish do the same, incorporating every small dish under the tapas umbrella
That’s true for fancy meals, the opposite for regular diets. Chinese people have very high-carb diets (200 kg of grains (rice/ wheat) per person, one of the higher grain consumers globally), but fancy meals are intended to signal prestige, so therefore avoid cheap carbs.
But when you go to a chinese place that’s what you expect right ? Overall, even italian food is not as restricted as my comment makes it look but when you go to an italian restaurant you expect pasta and pizza
Cuisines are not limited to what is sold abroad as X cuisine but it’s easier to sell when customers can know pretty much what to expect. That’s not doable with french food, which is what I was trying to say
100%! I have seen abroad varieties of pastries that I have never seen in France (often weird ones) and I did not understand why but this actually makes it sense, if 50% of what you sell is “croissant with XYZ” it’s an easier sell. Can’t believe I did not get that before
Gregor in Berkeley is a take out French restaurant in Berkeley available to franchise. La Note, Berkeley’s not overpriced French restaurant, went brunch only after the pandemic!
(Disclosures: am American. Strong views presented without evidence.)
The most damning indictment of French food I can think of is the fact that American capitalism hasn’t even bothered stealing it. We have Italian restaurants on every corner, Chinese and Mexican and Thai and Indian and Korean and every other cuisine from every other corner of the world...except French. One time I went to a Korean hotpot place, but it was too full and had a long wait, so instead of waiting I walked to a different Korean hotpot restaurant. There are two German restaurants within a few minutes’ walk of my apartment, because even if German cuisine isn’t a contender for the top spot it’s at least good at what it does.
And then we have one very fancy French place per state that stays in business by pandering to a tiny number of pretentious food critics who care about every aspect of food except its taste.
American capitalism “stealing” food is usually a process of lower-income, unskilled migrants moving to a country and adapting their cuisines to American tastes/ ingredients, which explains the wave of Italian (historically), Chinese, Mexican, Thai and Indian places far better than the quality of their respective cuisines. Not sure about Korean/ Japanese places (higher income), but (in Europe at least) they’re mostly run by people from Wenzhou, unless they’re high-end, which may be an interesting exception to the rule.
I’d guess you see very few restaurants from countries with low outmigration (East Africa) or higher-income migrants (Northern Europe).
In places in North America where they actually had a significant wave of French migrants, like Quebec, you see a lot of French cuisine.
This wouldn’t explain the “German restaurant phenomenon” you identify, but I think you’ll need some more evidence to back that up. I tried to get an estimate of this disparity by googling a few US cities, like: “chicago “german restaurant”“ and “chicago “French restaurant””. There seem to be 4 times as many results for French.
I’ll hazard a guess that there are more French restaurants in the US than restaurants of any other European cuisine except Italian.
I wrote a reply to this but it got too long, so I posted it as its own post.
On the other hand, Euros will constantly denigrate American food by appeal to the most unsophisticated examples of our cuisine, all the while pretty much every corner of their continent imports McDonald’s by the kiloton. Revealed preferences.
A few points:
Europeans denigrate the American food they are exposed to, which is the “unsophisticated” stuff that they import the most of. It would be weird if they spent their time ripping into gumbo and fried rattlesnake.
Regular consumers of McDonalds in Europe are not the same people who also denigrate American food. The people who denigrate American cuisine are usually also a little sneering towards domestic consumers of McD.
Many consumers (in US and Europe) see McD cuisine as an inferior product, but it has obvious benefits beyond taste (convenience/ speed/ child-friendliness/ toilets/ wi-fi).
Am I a pretentious food critic if I say “it’s popular because it contains a lot of sugar”?
Though, to be fair, Asian food is popular because it contains a lot of sodium glutamate, etc.
*
Perhaps more importantly, fast food has the advantage that you can just grab it and go, so people also choose it for reasons other than taste.
Your argument is sound but I think it’s actually because of its diversity in the base foods. Pasta and pizza is 95% of italian food, rice and noodles are the base of 80% of chinese/japanese/korean food, etc… In french cuisine, there is no base that is often used so you must have a lot of different ingredients. Not the best thing when you operate at “small scale” (when you’re not very expensive or cheesecake factory)
I don’t know if french restaurants are pretentious outside of france, but that looks more like a parisian problem than a french one.
I am confused to see multiple people make the ’95% pasta/pizza’ claim about Italian, Secondi is very much a thing, as are appetizers, even in NYC where pizza is everywhere I’d say maybe 65% when dining out.
When dining in, I suppose yes, because we wouldn’t think of the other dishes as Italian then—I don’t make an ‘Italian steak’ it’s just a steak, etc.
95% was most likely an overexaggeration but that was to underline the main idea that overall if all of your recipes need several ingredients that will be used in none of the other recipes, it’s much harder to make a restaurant work.
Indeed, I may be biased but many “italian things” do feel like normal things were “italian” has been added to it because they have a great cooking culture. Especially among the appetizers, where the spanish do the same, incorporating every small dish under the tapas umbrella
On a recent trip to China I found the trend there—at least for fancy meals—is low carb, with few noodles and often no rice at all.
That’s true for fancy meals, the opposite for regular diets. Chinese people have very high-carb diets (200 kg of grains (rice/ wheat) per person, one of the higher grain consumers globally), but fancy meals are intended to signal prestige, so therefore avoid cheap carbs.
But when you go to a chinese place that’s what you expect right ? Overall, even italian food is not as restricted as my comment makes it look but when you go to an italian restaurant you expect pasta and pizza
Cuisines are not limited to what is sold abroad as X cuisine but it’s easier to sell when customers can know pretty much what to expect. That’s not doable with french food, which is what I was trying to say
That could also explain why French bakeries, with their staple and iconic baguette and croissant, seem to be faring better in my experience.
100%! I have seen abroad varieties of pastries that I have never seen in France (often weird ones) and I did not understand why but this actually makes it sense, if 50% of what you sell is “croissant with XYZ” it’s an easier sell. Can’t believe I did not get that before
Gregor in Berkeley is a take out French restaurant in Berkeley available to franchise. La Note, Berkeley’s not overpriced French restaurant, went brunch only after the pandemic!
I went to Le Note last visit and of man did it make me miss the old Venus Cafe.