French Kids Eat Everything by Karen Le Billon

with no thought given to manners. This felt a little too close for comfort as I remembered the snacks Sophie gobbled in haste in our crumb-filled car after school and the pasta we served night after night at home.
    Meanwhile, Antoine’s comment had sparked a small tsunami of remarks. The French have a love-hate relationship with Americans, and something had been unleashed by our exchange. As so often with the French, this took the form of escalating sequences of witty one-liners and wordplays (the kind I often had trouble understanding, much less inventing).
    â€œAmericans think food is just a commodity; a matter of convenience ( une commodité ),” sniffed Frédéric.
    â€œBut they usually treat eating like it is inconvenient ( incom-mode )!” said his wife, Chloé, laughing. (I had figured out by now that she was my husband’s ex-girlfriend, and I permitted myself a small evil-eye glare directed her way.)
    â€œAmericans think that money spent on food is wasted because it goes in one day, out the next,” said Inès, laughing.
    â€œThe real problem is that Americans eat like children. American food is infantile ,” said Virginie gravely. She had spent several years living in the States and worked as a nutritionist at the local school board.
    â€œAmericans behave like two-year-olds at the table!” she continued, getting into her stride. “They are impulsive eaters: they snack all the time! They have no self-control: they don’t know when to stop eating. And their servings are much too large! They have childlike tastes: they love to eat fatty, sugary foods—exactly the kind of thing kids love.” She finished, damningly, with “Americans have no taste! Just compare a croissant to a doughnut!”
    This, of course, met with approving nods, as well as a few blank stares (“What’s a ‘doo-not’?” I heard one husband whisper to his wife).
    As the target of all of this, I didn’t know what to say. But I felt that I had to say something. I summoned up my courage, and croaked out, “I think your approach to eating is way too fussy and regimented. How can you expect everyone to eat like this?” My comment was met with silence. Luckily, Philippe came to my rescue. He had left France nearly fifteen years ago and had lived all over the world. So, more than anyone in the room, he had a balanced view. “Both cultures have good aspects,” he said mildly. “French people do eat better than Americans, and their approach makes sense. But you can’t impose a uniform way of eating in a country as young and diverse as the United States. They’ll have to evolve their own food culture, but it will take time, just as it did in France.”
    Before anyone could object, everyone’s attention was diverted by the main course, which had just arrived at the children’s table. Hugo had prepared a fish dish: dorade à la provençale , served with rice. Everyone got up to watch the children eating (a favorite pastime of French parents). Distracted, I watched the adults watching their children savor the food. Not hovering too close, they kept a discreet eye on the table, allowing Hugo to orchestrate the serving, which was met with an enthusiastic chorus.
    By now, Claire and Sophie seemed to be thoroughly carried away by the festive atmosphere. Claire, still dazzled by Jacqueline, ate everything on her plate. She even took a nibble at the bizarre-looking side dish: crosnes, a form of tuber that closely resembles waxy caterpillar larvae. Sophie, however, didn’t do so well, cautiously eating some rice, refusing to touch the fish after one tentative taste, and quickly hopping out of her chair with a mutinous look when the crosnes appeared on her plate. Being told that they were a French delicacy didn’t help, and for a few cringe-inducing moments she refused to return to the table. But after some coaxing, she reluctantly