That is why they have issued a call-to-arms for the country to get behind a bid for France's rich culinary and gastronomic heritage to be officially recognized by the United Nations' cultural body, UNESCO.

"Everyone must act," said chef Philippe Legendre, of the Cinq restaurant in Paris' swish George V hotel, just off the Champs Elysee.

It's a conviction shared by Olivier Roellinger, his counterpart at the Maisons de Bricourt, in Cancale in the western Ille-et-Vilaine region. France tends to be "too depressive in its views about cooking", he said.

Both chefs are members of a committee set up by a French-based European institute of food history and cultures and Tours university, which have called on the French culture minister to take their case up with UNESCO.

Some of the biggest names in French cuisine have gotten involved, such as chefs Alain Ducasse and Paul Bocuse. Former French culture minister Jack Lang and French writer Irène Frain are also supporters.

But the bid "must not just be a matter for the top chefs," Francis Chevrier, founder and director of the French-based institute, warned adding it was important for everyone to get behind it.

The demand, for recognition by the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation of France's culinary and gastronomic patrimony as 'intangible' cultural heritage, is expected to be lodged at the Paris-based UN body in 2008 at the earliest.

But, last year UNESCO rejected a Mexican attempt to have its gastronomic traditions acknowledged as intangible cultural heritage, in what would have been a first for a country's cuisine had it succeeded.

French cuisine: a weak contender?

With France's coveted image, internationally at least, as the capital of haute cuisine and fine wine, it is perhaps surprising to hear that some people believe French cuisine is considered to have certain weaknesses.

According to Jean-Robert Pitte, president of the Paris IV-Sorbonne University, French people have let themselves go in their everyday, home-prepared food.

"Good cooking is a true national cause," he said. But he added that there was no room for arrogance, an opinion also expressed by Chevrier, who said: "It is not a question of claiming that our cooking is more exceptional than other people's."

Rather, he continued, it was simply a case of "stating and proving that for us French, cooking is firmly part of our culture, of our heritage and our identity."

"If UNESCO recognizes that cooking is culture, that's enough for me."

Ever passionate in their bid, supporters dismiss the idea that a successful outcome at UNESCO would actually hold back French cuisine by turning it into the stuff of museum conservation.

"Cooking is a movement," said Jean-François Piège, chef at Ambassadeurs restaurant at the top-notch Crillon hotel on the Place de la Concorde in the French capital.  
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December 2006

Copyright AFP + Expatica

Subject: Living in France