How to Be Parisian: Dietary Requirements

The French no longer find dietary requirements quite so hard to swallow.

I’ve read several amusing articles about Paris I recently. Amusing for the wrong reasons, I should add. This is nothing new, of course. How many times have I read British tabloid headlines along the lines of “The French plan to…” followed by “ban hamburgers”, “invade Cornwall”, or “force tourists to smoke Gauloises at breakfast”? Well maybe I’m exaggerating slightly, but there is quite often a huge difference between what is really happening in the street outside my Parisian apartment building and what I read online. These recent articles were about French food, a subject that, as a Parisian, I think about almost every mealtime. There have been big changes in French eating habits in recent years, and things are getting more relaxed. Gone are the days when anyone with an allergy or a dietary requirement was treated like an alien.

No laughing matter

I still remember a British friend telling me that she always carried a card saying in French something along the lines of “I really do have a peanut allergy and it could kill me”. Back then, the French word for peanut allergy was something like arachidophobie, which to uneducated ears made her sound as though she wasn’t fond of spiders. Joking aside, until ten or so years ago most French people thought that unless it was against your religion, everyone should eat everything (except perhaps beans on toast and Christmas pudding). Allergies and dietary requirements were for unfortunates whose palates had been badly trained in the cradle. These days, however, you are perfectly safe going into almost any Parisian café and saying, “I’d like the salade niçoise without tuna” or “no ham in the goat’s cheese salad, please”. That last one is a favourite of mine, and is always well received. This is why I was annoyed to see an article published online about how Parisians were supposedly up in arms about a boulanger selling vegan croissants. Apart from the fact that vegan croissants have been around forever (they’re called croissants ordinaires and are made with margarine instead of butter), Parisians don’t honestly care who tries to sell what food.

If you want to open a shop selling donkey cheese or fish-flavoured wine, that’s up to you. If there are enough crazy customers to keep you solvent, pourquoi pas? All Parisians actually care about is being able to get what they want – so they’ll only get upset if your donkey cheese shop replaces their boulangerie. I’ve also read recently about cruffins (muffin-shaped croissants) “taking Paris by storm”. Personally I’ve never spotted a cruffin in the wild. So if they did take the city by storm, that same storm clearly blew them away again.

Don’t believe all you read

In fact, it turned out that both these articles were barely disguised plugs for newly-opened businesses. Some entrepreneur opened his or her shop and sent out a press release saying it was causing a sensation, either positive or negative, and a journalist fell into the trap of believing any old nonsense about Paris. The great truth for me about Paris is that the city’s focus is on pleasure. And it’s excellent news that Parisians are getting more and more easy-going about what provides gastronomic delight. I’m sure that if you Google whatever food you’re looking for, you’ll find it. It probably won’t be causing a sensation, it will just be present, in some side street or market, to cater for people with your particular taste. Faites-vous plaisir, as the French say. And if you want to sample a dish while depriving yourself of a pleasure (like ham in a goat’s cheese salad, for example), that’s fine too. Just don’t try to convince a Parisian to eat beans on toast or Christmas pudding.

Stephen Clarke’s latest Paul West novel, Merde at the Paris Olympics, is out now.

From France Today Magazine