Famous French food

French food and wines are well known throughout the world and French are passionate about their food.

For example there are more than 350 different varieties of cheeses.

The world’s favourite French cheese is Camembert, which originated in a region called Normandy.

Can you name any other French cheese?

France’s favourite food has to be bread, especially the long thin loaf called baguette.

The French love pastries and among the favourites are croissant and pain au chocolat.

Bread and croissants

Other less well known pastries are pain aux raisins and chausson pommes.

Pastries

Crêpes

Now almost every country has its own version of the crepe, but it was in France's Brittany region where the tools and techniques were created and perfected, elevating the crepe to an art form.

Can you work out the meanings of this crêpe menu?

Use your knowledge of French, cognates and a dictionary to work out meanings

The truffles are called “Black diamonds”. They are one of the most expensive luxury foods in France. The warty fungus grows underground in the roots of oak and hazelnut trees and is harvested in winter by specially trained sniffing dogs.

Les Truffes: Truffles (not chocolate) …

Frogs legs: cuisses de grenouille

Foie gras is the fattened liver of goose or duck. The birds are allowed to feed outdoors until they reach a certain size. Then they are fed with corn to fatten up their livers. After the animals have been slaughtered, the livers are kept in goose or duck fat before cooking. It is one of the most sought after foods in the world.

Foie gras

Boeuf bourguignon

Beef casserole with potatoes and carrots

Snails: escargots

Chocolate soufflé

The word soufflé is the past participle of the French verb soufflerwhich means to ‘blow up’ or to ‘puff up’, a good description of what happens to this mixture of custard, cocoa and egg whites.

Crème brûlé

Crème brûlée is French for ‘burnt cream’. If fact, neither the cream itself nor the sugar on top are "burnt", although both are cooked.

Have we had enough French jokes about food today or would we like one more?