I subscribe to any number of blogs. Most are food blogs – home cooks just like I am. Some are professionals in the food biz, with credentials and everything. A few are “food police” kind of blogs. I don’t read those quite so thoroughly as I just want to get the gist of things. Other blogs I read are funny, and we all need funny now and then. I do read appadvice because I own an iPhone and need to keep up on the latest apps that hit the wi-fi airwaves. That one, in particular, gets away from me. If I don’t read them every few days, I’ve got a backup of 292 of them. They must post between 200-300 a week on that site. I can’t keep up!
Some months ago, though, I started subscribing to NPR’s food blog, called The Salt. As with some of the other blogs I read, I may scroll right past the entries as they don’t interest me. Many of their posts are about legislation, about food lobbies, school lunches – you know, that kind of thing. Not always what I want to read. But I scan the titles. So when I ran across this post about McDonald’s in France, I was intrigued to click over to read it in full. Very interesting, that post.
The photo above is from the article, showing a typical McDo’s (that’s what they call them there) breakfast – a couple of good rolls, little bottles of jam, a cube of foil-wrapped butter, two little sleeves of sugar, and a nice big cuppa. Costs $4.55 (U.S.) for the tray. Not bad.
But, what was intriguing were the other factlets I read in the blog post. To start, before I give you a little laundry list of things, is to say that the biz experts at McDonald’s did their homework before they opened stores there. The French are very serious about mealtime. No in-and-out meals there – an anathema to them. They like eating at leisure. So the stores/restaurants reflect that environment. They’re larger than the American counterparts, and McDo allows for long sitting times.
- France is McDonald’s second largest market in the world.
- Why? Because of they adapted their stores to the French-style eating habits (there are 1200 franchises in France (30 of them in the last 5 years). In fact, Burger King has gone broke in France (supposedly because they didn’t adapt to the French style and eating habits).
- McDo’s offers all kinds of “Frenchified” dishes – like an Alpine burger (3 types of cheeses) and a King’s Cake (popular around Christmas-time.
- All McDo’s food is locally sourced and very high quality. Restaurateurs in France know they’ll go bust if they offer anything sub-standard. All the beef is grass fed (what cows are supposed to eat, not corn, as we do here in the U.S. mostly). And, unlike here, growth hormones are verboten there – every animal has a “passport” showing where it was born, raised and slaughtered. And chicken – well, you probably know that some of the best chicken in the world is served in France. Some think part of it the fact that here we rinse all chickens in chlorine to disinfect them. Yuck. A no-no in France. But, the fact of the matter is, that these standards (no growth hormones, grass fed) are law in France. Anyone buying meat in France will find the quality a big improvement over most supermarket American meat. McDonald’s isn’t altruistic here – they’re just following the law.
- The Parisian McDo’s are very popular – filled with families and young people. The writer of the article, Eleanor Beardsley, says that all the young people who hang out there, though, are in the restaurant, not hanging out in the parking lot.
In a short retort, I did read 10-20 of the comments on this blog piece at NPR. Some people were Francophiles who still believe that McDonald’s is ruining their ancient cuisine, and putting small restaurants out of business. But mostly the gripes were about saving the culture of French food. Most commenters just don’t want McDo’s in their towns. Some suppose that most of the customers are actually foreigners (tourists or people from other countries who live in France) rather than the typical born-and-bred French. One or two commenters mentioned that the bread at McDo’s is not good at all. If nothing else, the French are obsessive about their bread – it’s gotta be good or else. So I probably wouldn’t like that at all. It’s hard to find a bad roll in France, although I have been served some very mediocre croissants at Paris hotels.
So, I’m not saying I agree or disagree. I must admit that on occasion we have visited a Mickie D’s in some other country – sometimes just for a cup of coffee. Other times because we’d been gone from home for several weeks and were craving a hamburger, or their delicious French fries. We’re guilty of visiting them. I hope the McDo’s of the world aren’t corrupting the cuisine of the countries they’re in. I don’t see that as right. I’d hope they could co-exist with other restaurants. I’m no fan of fast food restaurants. My DH and I visit very, very few of them and only on rare occasions. Mostly when we travel, actually, because of speed and convenience. We never seek out a Mickie D’s here at home. Although we will visit an In-N-Out now and then. Enough said.
Toffeeapple
said on February 7th, 2012:
There was, some time ago, a mini French revolution lead by one man who managed to close one branch of the company and was treated as a hero. Whenever we are in France we use them as convenient toilet stops since you can guarantee that there is western toilet in them, not the usual ‘hole in the ground’. I have never eaten in one over there.
I’m not surprised – since I think there is a lot of anger from the general French populace about “nothing American here.” Only time will tell whether they’ll survive or not. . .. carolyn t