Marxist Healthcare is as Nothing Compared to the End of Your Civilisation

[Louis VI the Fat]

Ils nous ont battu à Trafalgar et fessé à Waterloo, cette fois-ci c'est la fin, les Anglais nous ont tout pris : ils nous battent en cuisine. Selon une enquête réalisée sur les lecteurs de Madame Figaro et de ceux du magazine culinaire de la BBC, Olive, les britanniques passent plus de temps au fourneau que les Français, les rois autoproclamés de la boustifaille.


Selon une enquête réalisée sur les lecteurs de Madame Figaro et de ceux du magazine culinaire de la BBC, Olive, les britanniques passent plus de temps au fourneau que les Français, les rois autoproclamés de la boustifaille. 72% des Britanniques cuisinent à la maison chaque jour, contre 59% des Français, conclut cette enquête. Et quand ils sont dans leur cuisine, un Britannique sur deux passe plus de 30 minutes à cuisiner, contre un quart des Français. Ceux-ci vont trois fois par mois au restaurant, contre deux fois seulement pour les Anglais.

And the winner is...la cuisine italienne
Comme la cuisine française est la meilleure du monde entier et que celle d'outre-Manche est un poil moins réputée, les Anglais cuisinent plus souvent des plats étrangers que nous : 99% des Britanniques et 87% des Français cuisinent italien, 76% des Britanniques et 40% des Français préparent parfois des plats chinois et 76% des Britanniques et 31% des Français cuisinent indien. La cuisine italienne est d'ailleurs désignée comme la cuisine étrangère préférée des Français comme des Britanniques. Soit nous sommes rancuniers soit nous avons l'instinct de survie développé, toujours est il que seulement 1% des Français choisissent la cuisine anglaise comme leur favorite.

Pour les britanniques, la crêpe suzette est le plat le plus emblématique de la cuisine française, tandis que les Français jugent que leur tradition culinaire est la mieux représentée par le veau, suivi du foie gras. Les lecteurs de Madame Figaro ont élu le Christmas pudding comme symbole de la gastronomie britannique, alors que les Anglais attribuent plutôt ce titre à un rôti avec du Yorkshire pudding, suivi du fish and chips."Si vous voulez bien manger en Angleterre, prenez trois petits déjeuners", disait l'écrivain britannique Somerset Maugham. Celui des Anglais, vraiment fameux, avec haricots, œufs, saucisses et bacon, est également cité dans les plats emblématiques du pays.

Le rédacteur en chef de Madame Figaro Sébastien Stehli a souligné que les Français comme les Britanniques "se dirigent vers une cuisine plus internationale, plus ouverte, curieuse des autres cultures"et aussi"moins nationaliste", contrairement à ce billet ...
http://lci.tf1.fr/insolite/2010-03/les-anglais-meilleurs-cuisiniers-que-les-francais-5764809.html

They've beaten us at Trafalgar, kicked our arse at Waterloo. This time it is the end, the English have taken the ultimate prize: they've beaten us in the kitchen.


They spend more time in the kitchen, were they prepare more varied meals, of better quality etc.
:shame:

That's it then. A thousand year old feud has come to an end. They win. We lose.

I proclaim the end of French civilisation, I apologise for wasting your time singing the praise of it, and I, for one, welcome my new English overlords.


http://matousmileys.free.fr/tr42.gif

[Centurion1]

its because your at your astoundingly good restaurants instead of cooking.

[Kagemusha]

Dont be sad Louis. There is still the wine and ladies to fall back.

[Subotan]

Damn, I was going to post this in a VM to Louis.

English:http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/mar/22/british-cook-better-than-french

It is one of the pillars of the French "exception culturelle": haute cuisine so lofty that the president, Nicolas Sarkozy, wanted the United Nations to declare it a "world treasure". Those perfidious Rosbifs could attack their language and buy up half the Dordogne but they could never compete in the kitchen, declared the Gallic gods of gastronomy.But a poll has undermined France's reputation as the home of unrivalled culinary excellence with results that suggest the British cook more often, for longer, and produce greater variety than their French counterparts.
As the French television station TF1 put it: "They trounced us at Trafalgar. They whipped us at Waterloo. Now the English have scored their ultimate victory: they are better at cooking than us … we, the self-proclaimed kings of nosh."
The survey, carried out by the French magazine Madame Le Figaro and the BBC's food magazine Olive, has produced an agony of French soul-searching – and a certain amount of disbelief – over the apparent erosion of the country's most celebrated heritage.
More than 2,000 French people and nearly 1,350 Britons were asked about their eating and cooking habits. Their answers revealed that 72% of the British cook at home daily, compared with 59% of the French. One British cook in two spends more than 30 minutes preparing a meal while only a quarter of the French spend that long.
Four per cent of the French polled admitted they never cook, four times as many as Britons questioned. While French and British cooks are just as likely to bake a cake or fillet a fish, nearly twice as many British people as French make their own bread.
Grandmother Marylene Gaggioli, 60, from Corsica, who has three daughters, said: "French women don't cook as much as they used to during the week because they work more and don't have the time.
"They freeze a lot more or serve ready-cooked things instead of serving something freshly prepared and made from scratch. It's just not the same. But many of them, like my friends who work, make up for it at the weekend when they have more time."
One of Gaggioli's daughters, Marilyn Jarman, 36, a French marketing manager, has lived in London for 15 years and admitted she had noticed a huge improvement in British food.
"When I first arrived in Britain, chicken kiev was about as adventurous as it got. Now there are farmers' markets and gastro pubs and we eat really well.
"French food is good but it tends to be very traditional and the same. My mother's a great cook but it's always the same dishes: sautéed veal, wild boar stew, cannelloni with cheese, fish soup."
Jean-Christophe Slowik, a French chef who runs L'Absinthe in Primrose Hill, north London, was deeply sceptical about reading the last rites to French gastronomy. "Maybe people in Paris don't cook much, but when I go to the French country cooking is still at the heart of French daily life," he said.
"If I'm there with friends we spend the morning talking about the meal we'll make for lunch and the afternoon talking about the meal we'll cook for dinner and the evening talking about what we'll do the next day. We French talk about food and drink and you British talk about business and property."
Lulu Grimes, food director at Olive magazine, said British cuisine had suffered from a postwar ready-made food boom but had improved enormously since the 1990s.
"The French have always been a bit sniffy about British food, thinking it came down to roast beef or nothing," she said.
Thierry Darras, responsible for the poll at Madame le Figaro, rejected outright any suggestion the British are better cooks than the French.
"They may spend more time than the French in the kitchen during the week but the findings were reversed at the weekend," he said.
"The interest in cooking in France has not lessened, it has changed. The savoir faire is still there and is being refined."
Asked what he thought of British food, Mr Darras did not mince his words. "I have not had many occasions to try it but I can say I am not a fan at all," he said. "It is not very refined."

[Tellos Athenaios]

I proclaim the end of French civilisation, I apologise for wasting your time singing the praise of it, and I, for one, welcome my new EnglishItalian overlords.

There, there. In 50 years time Napoléon will be known as a remarkable Italian who happened to speak French and set into motion culinary reforms that led to the conquest of the French goûte by Italy in 2010.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

They've beaten us at Trafalgar, kicked our arse at Waterloo. This time it is the end, the English have taken the ultimate prize: they've beaten us in the kitchen.


They spend more time in the kitchen, were they prepare more varied meals, of better quality etc.
:shame:

That's it then. A thousand year old feud has come to an end. They win. We lose.

I proclaim the end of French civilisation, I apologise for wasting your time singing the praise of it, and I, for one, welcome my new English overlords.


http://matousmileys.free.fr/tr42.gif

We have finally recovered from the blockade during WWII.

[Louis VI the Fat]

In 50 years time Napoléon will be known as a remarkable Italian who happened to speak French and set into motion culinary reforms that led to the conquest of the French goûte by Italy in 2010.
Napoléon was a great man. We mustn't insult the Corisan by claiming he spoke French or was part of French culture. France is grey and drab and a historical mistake. Napoléon belonged to the civilised Italian world.

As the Italian saying goes: French are Italians with a perennial foul mood. They are right too. What worth a temperamental Mediterranean civilisation condemned to live in drab northwest Europe? What's the point? What could possibly have been any other outcome than a nation doomed to misery and ultimate failure? I say the experiment must end.


I can deal with Italy. After all, Italians were very influential to mediaevil French cuisine. To this day, those aspects of gastronomy that Italy excels in, it does better than France.

Maybe they'll have us.


http://matousmileys.free.fr/tr05a.gif

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Historically, I believe our Queen has a better legal claim. Given that we are now randier, cook better and (let's face it) we cut better suits, you should probably join us.

[Tellos Athenaios]

Splendid idea; full EU membership for the UK at last! ;)

[Louis VI the Fat]

Historically, I believe our Queen has a better legal claim. Given that we are now randier, cook better and (let's face it) we cut better suits, you should probably join us.
Seeing as how everybody else knows where its at nowadays (France watches as its former colonies aspire to join Commonwealth (http://www.strategypage.com/militaryforums/54-217.aspx) ), is the following offer still valid? :





Formerly secret documents unearthed from the National Archives have shown Britain and France considered a "union" in the 1950s.

On 10 September 1956 French Prime Minister Guy Mollet arrived in London for talks with his British counterpart, Anthony Eden.

Formerly secret documents held in Britain's National Archives in London, which have lain virtually unnoticed since being released two decades ago, reveal the extraordinary proposal Mollet was about to make.
http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/shared/img/o.gif

The following is an extract from a British government cabinet paper of the day. It reads: "When the French Prime Minister, Monsieur Mollet was recently in London he raised with the prime minister the possibility of a union between the United Kingdom and France."

[...]

Secret document
So, when Eden turned down his request for a union between France and Britain the French prime minister came up with another proposal. This time, while Eden was on a visit to Paris, he requested that France be allowed to join the British Commonwealth.

[...]

A secret document from 28 September 1956 records the surprisingly enthusiastic way the British premier responded to the proposal. The PM told him on the telephone that he thought in the light of his talks with the French:


"That we should give immediate consideration to France joining the Commonwealth

"That Monsieur Mollet had not thought there need be difficulty over France accepting the headship of her Majesty

"That the French would welcome a common citizenship arrangement on the Irish basis"


http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6261885.stm

Of course, in light of Britain's ultimate triumph in the Thousand Year War, France accepts that it can no longer apply for Commonwealth status as a free an equal nation. Perhaps, we can start by applying for second rank Commonwealth status, like former francophonie member Rwanda?


http://matousmileys.free.fr/sad02.gif

[KukriKhan]

To this day, those aspects of gastronomy that Italy excels in, it does better than France.

Maybe they'll have us.

Gotta love the French; it's always either Armaggedon or a Brave New World. Had you only embraced ketchup in the late 40's, France and Texas would have ruled the world, Hemisphere by Hemisphere.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Seeing as how everybody else knows where its at nowadays (France watches as its former colonies aspire to join Commonwealth (http://www.strategypage.com/militaryforums/54-217.aspx) ), is the following offer still valid? :




[/INDENT][/INDENT]Of course, in light of Britain's ultimate triumph in the Thousand Year War, France accepts that it can no longer apply for Commonwealth status as a free an equal nation. Perhaps, we can start by applying for second rank Commonwealth status, like former francophonie member Rwanda?


http://matousmileys.free.fr/sad02.gif


Don't be sad Loius, France's attempt to build a Latinate culture in the North was a valiant effort, but now it's time to rejoin to the Germanic tribes.


*Dabates whether to have a cup of Tea or a warm beer.*

[miotas]

I was talking to my Italian room mate yesterday, and he said that the British are the worst cooks in all of Europe :laugh4:

[Gregoshi]

France is the measuring stick for many things in this world. :thumbsup:

[Fragony]

its because your at your astoundingly good restaurants instead of cooking.

Ever been to France lol, when I finally found a good restaurant I stick to it. The food you get at the traiteurs is fantastic but 90% of the restaurants are crap, and they all serve the same crap on tops. For truly good food go to Belgium.

[Beskar]

I was talking to my Italian room mate yesterday, and he said that the British are the worst cooks in all of Europe :laugh4:

It lacks Tomato, Mozerella Cheese and Bazil, no wonder he didn't like it. :tongue:

[Brenus]

“That's it then. A thousand year old feud has come to an end. They win. We lose.”: Nope. They perhaps spent more time but their cooking (mash potetoes, roast potetoes, paes and rost chicken) is still not good enough…

“our Queen”: Who? The German origin one, who took the job of a Native?

“France and Texas would have ruled the world, Hemisphere by Hemisphere.” France rules the World: metric system, 1st of January as start of the Year, Guide Michelin, the baguette…

[Sarmatian]

Am I reading this wrong or Louis just admitted that Brits are superior to French? 2012 may indeed be the end of it all...

[Subotan]

I was talking to my Italian room mate yesterday, and he said that the British are the worst cooks in all of Europe :laugh4:
Finnish food is probably worse.

[Fragony]

Mwah, these meatballs in whatsitcalled-sauce are pretty yummie, lots of fish as well. And yay for lukewarm roast

[Kagemusha]

Finnish food is probably worse.

And what do you know about Finnish food? You must be hater of wild game, fresh water fish, wild berries and mushrooms.:brood:

[al Roumi]

They've beaten us at Trafalgar, kicked our arse at Waterloo. This time it is the end, the English have taken the ultimate prize: they've beaten us in the kitchen.


They spend more time in the kitchen, were they prepare more varied meals, of better quality etc.
:shame:

That's it then. A thousand year old feud has come to an end. They win. We lose.

I proclaim the end of French civilisation, I apologise for wasting your time singing the praise of it, and I, for one, welcome my new English overlords.


http://matousmileys.free.fr/tr42.gif

Betises...

Although there may be many British "foodies" or whatever, rarely do they actually know what is good or how something should be.

You can't fault the British for trying but, while offering a true panoplie of culinary options and tastes, most are pale immitations and certainly not authentic. To be fair, this is mostly due to the cost/impracticality of getting good quality neccessary ingredients in the UK -the Uk's climate doesn't readily support produce from other climates, e.g. the mediterranean. Nonetheless there are the odd gems where a British chef can source the right ingredients and does know how something is traditionaly cooked.

On the other hand, perhaps because they have a self respecting cuisine of their own, the French, Italians and Spanish can be some of the most closed minded people when it comes to trying something different. But what they have -they do well.

For me, there is nothing that can compare to authenticity, although it would be nice if we (in the UK) could get away from the tedious TV chef's programmes where everything is protrayed as quaint -that's you Rick Stein.

[The Stranger]

they're only good at curry.

[Fragony]

they're only good at curry.

http://www.dumpert.nl/mediabase/621741/ca3f4142/beef_wellington_maken.html

:sweetheart:

[Subotan]

I've eaten in his restaurant :yes:

[HoreTore]

And what do you know about Finnish food? You must be hater of wild game, fresh water fish, wild berries and mushrooms.:brood:

It's basically the same as Norwegian and Swedish food.

In other words; it's complete crap. As he said.

Luckily, we've imported food from everywhere else, so I never have to eat any of it.

[Kagemusha]

It's basically the same as Norwegian and Swedish food.

In other words; it's complete crap. As he said.

Luckily, we've imported food from everywhere else, so I never have to eat any of it.

Damn commies. Staying alive with Turkish pizza.:antlers:

[The Wizard]

At least you still have cheese.

[Subotan]

Blue cheese :yes:

[Fragony]

In other words; it's complete crap. As he said.

What's so bad about it, simple hearty meals. Lots of fish, lots of roast. Nothing wrong with the food there, if you walk into a moderately priced restaurant, say 40 euro a person, you cannot go wrong really.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Cooking and variety are both overrated. Besides, the org poll showed that American cuisine was the best (once you transfer the votes from people who misunderstood the question).



For me, there is nothing that can compare to authenticity, although it would be nice if we (in the UK) could get away from the tedious TV chef's programmes where everything is protrayed as quaint -that's you Rick Stein.

What does authenticity taste like?

[Furunculus]

British food is generally pretty bland so I am willing to concede that French food is more interesting and inspired*, and you are probably a better lover too**, for that matter your language is mellifluous***, and you climate is simply superb compared to our own****.

to counter that I can only add:
> that we rarely eat our own food, cos we brought everyone elses food back home
> that we rarely partake of our own ladies, our universities are full of foriegn young hotties
> you got me there, but we burgled your best words anyway
> what do you think Costa del Empire was all about, holiday homes in sunnier climes ;)


* a roast dinner is lovely, but there has to be more to a national cuisine than that
** is is to our shame that we used to mock the french for "making love with their faces" as if that were some kind of insult
*** no one whos seen Alfedersein Pet (sp?) would argue otherwise
**** nothing nice about wales, let me tell you!

[Kagemusha]

Cooking and variety are both overrated. Besides, the org poll showed that American cuisine was the best (once you transfer the votes from people who misunderstood the question).

Oh no,no, no,nooo. You had it all. All the emmigrant cuisines from French and Italian to Chinese. All the fantastic new ingredients and spices and what was the result? Fried Chicken and burgers.~:thumb:

[Sasaki Kojiro]

Oh no,no, no,nooo. You had it all. All the emmigrant cuisines from French and Italian to Chinese. All the fantastic new ingredients and spices and what was the result? Fried Chicken and burgers.~:thumb:

The straight dope--who invented pizza? (http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/1695/who-invented-pizza)


So we need to start with some definitions. Shall we confine our attention to American pizza, now found throughout the world? If so, no problem--it was invented in America in the 1950s. That's probably not the answer you were looking for, although the New World did make possible pizza as we know it today.

...

However, it was the 1950s when pizza caught on outside the Italian-American community, and quickly spread throughout the U.S. and became an international food, now found in every country.

Same story for all of our "foreign" food. "Chinese Food" is chinese-style American food, etc.

We also invented potato chips.

Additionally:


History of Marshmallow Fluff
Part One
On May 14, 1920, a small article appeared in the Lynn, Massachusetts, Daily Evening Item announcing that two young men, H. Allen Durkee and Fred L. Mower, both graduates of Swampscott High and veterans of the United States Infantry in World War I, had formed a partnership in the manufacture of Marshmallow Fluff. The actual date that they started working together is hard to pin down, because they had been making candies together before they started making Fluff. The company numbered two men in those days, and they started out cooking their confections in the kitchen at night and selling them door to door in the daytime.

As Durkee wrote in 1930: "Ten years ago we started out with one barrel of sugar (at 28 cents per pound) a few tin cans: two spoons: one second hand Ford, and no customers, but plenty of prospects. Today (after a short span of only ten years) we have thru the fine cooperation of the wholesale grocers, the largest distribution of marshmallow cream in New England, and no Ford."

The origins of Marshmallow Fluff actually go back to 1917. Before WWI, a Sommerville MA man named Archibald Query had been making it in his kitchen and selling it door to door, but wartime shortages had forced him to close down. By the time the war was over, Mr Query had other work and was uninterested in restarting his business, but he was willing to sell the formula. Durkee and Mower pooled their saving and bought it for five hundred dollars. Having just returned from France, they punningly renamed their product "Toot Sweet Marshmallow Fluff" but "Toot Sweet" didn't stay on the label for long. The situation of "no customers, but plenty of prospects" didn't last long either. An early receipt still in the company's scrap books records the sale in April, 1920 of three one gallon cans to a vacation lodge in New Hampshire. The price at the time was $1.00 a gallon! The door to door trade gained a reputation among local housewives that eventually placed Fluff onto local grocers shelves. Retail trade spread from there to the point where in 1927 they were advertising prominently in Boston newspapers.

In 1929 they moved to a factory on Brookline Street in East Lynn, more than tripling their floor space to 10,000 square feet. At this point, they also hired four new employees, bringing their numbers to ten. They also merged with the Cream of Chocolate Company, makers of Rich's instant Sweet Milk Cocoa, and Durkee-Mower entered the Hot Chocolate business. Rich's Instant Sweet Milk Cocoa was too long a name for shoppers to be expected to remember easily, so in 1937 the name was shortened to simply Sweeco, and made more prominent on the label. The name and label change was backed up by a large newspaper advertising campaign, and the product's sales increased rapidly. Durkee-Mower continued to make Sweeco until 1962.

Durkee-Mower became a pioneer in radio advertising when in 1930 they began to sponsor the weekly "Flufferettes" radio show on the Yankee radio network, which included twenty-one stations broadcasting to all of New England. The fifteen minute show, aired on Sunday evenings just before Jack Benny, included live music and comedy skits, and served as a steppingstone to national recognition for a number of talented performers. The show continued through the late forties.



Some of the earliest Flufferettes shows included the Book-of-the-moment Dramas. In this series of thirteen short comic sketches, a fictional scholar with the proper Bostonian name of Lowell Cabot Boswell confronted some creatively rewritten moments in American history, from the Revolutionary War to the Harvard-Yale bicycle race. Each episode ended with a narrator reporting that Boswell had disappeared to continue work on his mysterious book, which was assumed to be a historical text of monumental importance. On the last episode

the Book-of-the-Moment was revealed. It was a collection of recipes for cakes, pies, candies, frostings and other confections that could be made with Marshmallow Fluff, appropriately entitled the Yummy Book. The book has been updated many times since then, and the most recent version is thirty-two pages long. It can be obtained by sending a request to the address on back of the Fluff label, with twenty five cents to help defray postage and handling costs.


SOURCE (http://www.marshmallowfluff.com/pages/history1.html)

[Kagemusha]

The straight dope--who invented pizza? (http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/1695/who-invented-pizza)



Same story for all of our "foreign" food. "Chinese Food" is chinese-style American food, etc.

We also invented potato chips.

Additionally:



SOURCE (http://www.marshmallowfluff.com/pages/history1.html)

Allright i add modern pizza and marshmallow fluff to that list then.:laugh4:

[Beskar]

I believe a black America invented Ice Cream too.

[al Roumi]

What does authenticity taste like?

Better? People tend to do things for a reason, although i can't deny that that reason can also be sheer bloodyminded-ness.

[Askthepizzaguy]

I believe a black America invented Ice Cream too.

I've been to Black America. It's very nice there. I hear they have a white president now.

:laugh4:


Seriously though, Black America?

(edit: didn't notice the "a".... concluded it meant something different. I'll be leaving now. :creep:)

[Meneldil]

All hope is not lost, we now beat the britishmen at rugby.

[AlexanderSextus]

Oh no,no, no,nooo. You had it all. All the emmigrant cuisines from French and Italian to Chinese. All the fantastic new ingredients and spices and what was the result? Fried Chicken and burgers.~:thumb:

Dude! America DOES have it's own Proper cuisine! Ever heard of Barbecue? New England Clam Chowder? Corn Pudding? Cranberry Sauce? Hot Cocoa?

[Kagemusha]

Dude! America DOES have it's own Proper cuisine! Ever heard of Barbecue? New England Clam Chowder? Corn Pudding? Cranberry Sauce? Hot Cocoa?

Well as you can see from the smilie. My comment was bit on the joking side.:wink3:

[Sarmatian]

Dude! America DOES have it's own Proper cuisine! Ever heard of Barbecue? New England Clam Chowder? Corn Pudding? Cranberry Sauce? Hot Cocoa?

Sorry to burst your bubble, but Ottomans were barbecuing things long before Europeans discovered America.

[AlexanderSextus]

Sorry to burst your bubble, but Ottomans were barbecuing things long before Europeans discovered America.

Still not the same way though.

[Strike For The South]

Sorry to burst your bubble, but Ottomans were barbecuing things long before Europeans discovered America.

lol

[Louis VI the Fat]

Sorry to burst your bubble, but Ottomans were barbecuing things long before Europeans discovered America.I think the first barbeque occured when lightning struck the African savannah, and Ugh the scavenging homo erectus couldn't find anything to eat in the scorched landscape, saw a burned impala, took a bite and thought to him himself 'hey....what if...'


Of course the technique has since been refined. Reaching its current pinnacle in me always driving unpredictably and erratically at 140 Mph. Then once at home I check the front grill of my pick-em-up for bits of game that I might have ran over, which I scrape off and burn for dinner at my longhorn bar-b-q.

Only for pro's.



https://img69.imageshack.us/img69/4760/4527bbqlhssteer.jpg

[Sarmatian]

You two change back. I'm seriously scared now - eloquent Texan and a French with a cow fetish.