French Gastronomy: The History and Geography of a Passion [Hardcover]

Pitte raises a glass to celebrate France's dynastic cuisine and culture, exploring everything from its earliest recipe books to the 10 commandments of nouvelle cuisine to prove the undeniable influence the country has on world cooking. His charming, concise history reveals the development of the national taste, including Christianity contending with the slippery sin of gluttony, commissioning roads to Paris for shipping cheese, the demands of the export market and the invention of table etiquette including the handy additions of plates and silverware. Importantly, Pitte traces the indelible Parisian reign of haute cuisine from the Sun King through Napoleon, but traces past the ugly years of the Paris Commune like a skipped hors d'oeuvre, before moving onward to a food culture currently at an impasse due to the rise of faster foods and the fall of national taste severe enough to make it worthy of an inquest by the Institut de France. The introduction brashly toots the French horn hubristically declaring victory over the other tables of the world although Pitte balances his hearty dishes with historical realities in this entertaining and probing addition to Columbia's Arts and Traditions of the Table series. Illus. and photos.
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The triumph of French gastronomy owes as much to France's geography as it does to any particular chef or any special national characteristic. Pitte places the real historical beginnings of the French passion for good cooking at the court of the Sun King, Louis XIV. Elaborate social rituals surrounding the king's every move--from his rising in the morning to his bedtime--showed equally at the king's table, where appetites had to match the sumptuousness of the palatial setting. Good food became so important that even the French Revolution could not distract people from the pleasures of the table. Yet it was France's favorable climate, its multiplicity of raw ingredients, and the nascent transportation system of the eighteenth century that moved fresh fare to every corner of the nation. The advent of British and American tourism in the late nineteenth century offered this bounty to new and monied audiences. Pitte's remarkable ruminations on religion's role both as goad and check on gastronomic pleasure offer new insights into the French psyche. Mark Knoblauch
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Will satisfy your hunger for knowledge while whetting your appetite for French food. France Today [Pitte's] charming, concise history reveals the development of the national taste... Pitte balances his hearty dishes with historical realities in this entertaining and probing addition to Columbia's Arts and Traditions of the Table series. Publishers Weekly Pitte's remarkable ruminations... offer new insights into the French psyche. Booklist To study the gastronomy of France, or any country's gastronomy, through the geographer's palate and eyes, makes perfect sense. Topography and climatic conditions, more than any other factors, define the lifestyle of people as well as their mood and eating habits. Furthermore, it's these differences in soils and climate which give us the Basque piperade, the potee of Savoy, the quenelles of Lyon, the filet of sole Normande, and the beckenoffe of Alsace. Vive la difference! -- Jacques Pepin Thought-provoking and original table talk from the academy. Kirkus Reviews Lively... leavened with humor and graceful translation. Bloomsbury Review Interesting, witty, and erudite. Rain Taxi

"This we can be sure of: when a restaurant in the western world is famous for its cooking, it is the tricolor flag that hangs above the stove," opined one French magazine, and this is by no means an isolated example of such crowing. Indeed, both linguistically and conceptually, the restaurant itself is a French creation. Why are the French recognized by themselves and others the world over as the most enlightened of eaters, as the great gourmets? Why did the passion for food -gastronomy -originate in France? In French Gastronomy, geographer and food lover Jean-Robert Pitte uncovers a novel answer. The key, it turns out, is France herself. In her climate, diversity of soils, abundant resources, and varied topography lie the roots of France´s food fame. Pitte masterfully reveals the ways in which cultural phenomena surrounding food and eating in France relate to space and place. He points out that France has some six hundred regions, or microclimates, that allow different agricultures, to flourish, and fully navigable river systems leading from peripheral farmlands directly to markets in the great gastronomic centers of Paris and Lyon. With an eye to this landscape, Pitte wonders: Would the great French burgundies enjoy such prestige if the coast they came from were not situated close to the ancient capital for the dukes and a major travel route for medieval Europe? Yet for all the shaping influence of earth and climate, Pitte demonstrates that haute cuisine, like so much that is great about France, can be traced back to the court of Louis XIV. It was the Sun King´s regal gourmandise -he enacted a nightly theater of eating, dining alone but in full view of the court -that made food and fine dining a central affair of state. The Catholic Church figures prominently as well: gluttony was regarded as a "benign sin" in France, and eating well was associated with praising God, fraternal conviviality, and a respect for the body. These cultural ingredients, in combination with the bounties of the land, contributed to the full flowering of French foodways. This is a time of paradox for French gourmandism. Never has there been so much literature published on the subject of culinary creativity, never has there been so much talk about good food, and never has so little cooking been done at home. Each day new fast-food places open. Will French cuisine lose its charm and its soul? Will discourse become a substitute for reality? French Gastronomy is a delightful celebration of what makes France unique, and a call to everyone who loves French food to rediscover its full flavor.

Jean-Robert Pitte is professor of geography at the Sorbonne and has lectured at a variety of universities in the United States and the United Kingdom. He lives in France.