Evolution of French Cuisine

Je m'appelle Jacob “Jaques” Therien

A recent study shows that 100% of people eat food.1

1. Statistic is inferred and does not necessarily reflect factual evidence.

Many inland regions had Romanesque styles

of cuisine, And later Moorish influenced styles towards the end of the era. This was mainly due to Roman occupied Gaul

Present day France, Luxembourg, Belgium, most

of Switzerland, and the western portion of Italy .

http://www.billcasselman.com/unpublished_works/sousveillance.htm

Coastal regions relied more on seafood. Inland dishes consisted of spiced pork, poultry,

and beef. Main dishes changed with the seasons;

whatever food was the most abundant and readily available was the food of choice.

Service en confusion

Medieval Food was very basic. Simple cooked

meats with various spices. Those spices included; salt, black pepper, cinnamon, cumin, nutmeg, ginger, and gloves. Since spices were all imported from Asia and

Africa, herbs and spices were reserved only to the wealthy population, as it was a rare and expensive import.

At the beginning of the 15th century, French

cuisine was influenced majorly by the Italian culture, predominantly due to the marriage of Catherine de’ Medici of Florence and Henri duc d’Orleans (King Henry II) of France.

At this time, Italian food was far more advanced than French cuisine. This marriage introduced master Italian chefs to the French world.

Paris has become the central hub of all

economic activity. Master chefs came to exchange trades. This is where France really gained momentum

to sprout is own style of cuisine. Food distribution was regulated by the city

government by creating guilds. They were regulated by only allowing certain guilds to operate in certain areas. This hampered the development of the culinary

arts at this time.

Foods are heavily

influenced by Italian culture and newly opened trade with the “New World”.

Crepes refined and mastered. One of the first

pastry dishes to be refined from traditional medieval practices.

In the 17th to early 18th century, French cuisine

was almost entirely pioneered by chef François Pierre La Varenne, who published the first textbook on new age French cuisine. He essentially broke away from the Italian

cooking traditions that were set in the previous years.

His practices involved abandoning the heavy usage of herbs and spices and focused more on natural flavors of the foods itself.

Foreign spices were replaced with local herbs

Parsley, thyme, bay leaf, chervil, sage, and tarragon.

This allowed for more economic and affordable dishes.

New, locally grown vegetables such as cauliflower, asparagus, peas, cucumber, and artichoke also worked its way into many recipes.

Due to improvements in transportation fish arrived significantly fresher than before.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fran%C3%A7ois_Pierre_La_Varenne

Le Cuisinier françois (1651): His first book on French cookery, essentially the footstone of his work to follow

Le Pâtissier françois (Paris 1653): His next book, which focus on pastry-making, which, previously was not a defined dish of importance.

Much like Haute Cuisine, the French Revolution

was a prosperous time for cuisine. The guild system was abolished, so any chef

could effectively make and sell whatever he/she wished and where to sell it.

“King of Chefs” Marie-Antoine Carême, chef to Napoleon Bonaparte came into the spotlight as the next innovator to shape French cuisine following La Varenne.

Marie-Antoine Carême worked in an

environment in his early years as a chef that actively encouraged him to refine and redefine food styles of the earlier years.

Genius who developed the Chef’s hat which is still used to this day and is universally recognized.

Changed the traditional service en confusionto the newer method of serving in order from a printed menu.

Post revolution and into modern day cookery,

is just organization and modernization of dishes and practices from the later years. The birth of the industrial revolution changed

the way kitchens were set up and essentially sped up processing time in the kitchens, but the core of French cuisine remained the same.

Georges Auguste Escoffier is the head figure that updated French cookery into the modern light.

"TheFood Timeline: History Notes--international Cuisine." Food

Timeline: Food History & Vintage Recipes. Web. 13 Dec. 2011. <http://www.foodtimeline.org/foodfaq6.html>.

Scully, D. Eleanor, and Terence Scully. Early French Cookery: Sources, History, Original Recipes and Modern Adaptations. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan, 1995. Print.

Peterson, T. Sarah. Acquired Taste: the French Origins of Modern Cooking. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1994. Print.

Oliver, Raymond. Gastronomy of France. [London]: Wine and Food Society in Association with World Pub., 1967. Print.

Ferguson, Priscilla Parkhurst. Accounting for Taste: the Triumph of French Cuisine. Chicago: University of Chicago, 2004. Print.

Works Cited