History Main / FrenchCuisineIsHaughty

* During [[ComicBook/TheAmazingSpiderManJMichaelStraczynski John Michael Straczynski's run on]] ''ComicBook/TheAmazingSpiderMan,'' there was a minor [[RunningGag running gag]] of Peter and MJ repeating visiting a French restaurant and Peter getting aggravated with the snooty waiter.

* The movie ''Film/EuroTrip'' features a deleted scene where the kids go to an upscale French restaurant in Paris, complete with a snooty, condescending French waiter. When the kids receive the bill and see how expensive it is they quickly leave without paying. A moment later the waiter returns to the table to find it empty, and mistakenly believes that it was his insulting attitude that drove his customers away. We are then shown a montage of all the times in his life when he believed his personality drove away the customers when it reality it was the high prices of the food (beginning when he was a kid and waited on a table full of German soldiers during the occupation in World War II).

* Highly refined BloodKnight Chou Komei from ''Manga/SoulHunter'' invites Taikoubou and Supu to a fancy lunch in which vegetarian French cuisine is served. They eat everything with gusto, though they admit that everything's good as long as it's edible.

* ''Manga/FoodWars'': Already a French cuisine expert as a student, [[TheAce Kojirou Shinomiya]] was determined to make a name in France as the best French-Japanese chef. After a long struggle and BreakTheHaughty process, not only did he succeed, but he became more arrogant, as he refused any slight alterations to the recipes as he considered them already perfect.

* The Kalos region from ''VideoGame/PokemonXAndY'' is based on France. It was the first game to feature the protagonist's eating food at restaurants. Compared to the other regions more casual foods like ramen or sushi, Kalos cuisine is certainly different. The higher end restaurants serve such delicacies as 3000 year old bones boiled in snow for 100 years.

French Cuisine Is Haughty refers to the association in many works of fiction between French cooking and high class, expensive gourmet dining, or SnootyHauteCuisine. For factual information about French cuisine, see '''UsefulNotes/SnailsAndSoOn''' and the Website/{{Wikipedia}} article on [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_cuisine French cuisine.]] French cuisine differs from other food due to its use of fine wines and reductions in cooking, sauces like Bechamel, its love of Herbes de Provence, and its use of foods such as frog legs and rabbit.

French Cuisine Is Haughty refers to the association in many works of fiction between French cooking and high class, expensive gourmet dining, or SnootyHauteCuisine. For factual information about French cuisine, see '''UsefulNotes/SnailsAndSoOn''' and the Website/{{Wikipedia}} article on [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_cuisine French cuisine.]] French cuisine differs from other food due to its use of fine wines in cooking, its love of herbs, and its use of foods such as frog legs and rabbit.

French Cuisine Is Haughty refers to the association in many works of fiction between French cooking and high class, expensive gourmet dining, or SnootyHauteCuisine. For factual information about French cuisine, see '''UsefulNotes/SnailsAndSoOn''' and the Website/{{Wikipedia}} article on [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_cuisine French cuisine.]]

France in general and GayParee in particular is considered by many to be the food capital of the world, and the French culinary tradition is often portrayed as the gold standard of fine dining. Characters visiting Paris will most likely make a point of sampling the fine dining and extensive wine lists there, and shows and stories about chefs and fine dining establishments take place in France and more specificallyin Paris.

The French chef is one of the central figures of this trope. Even in many non-French works that take place outside of France, whether in Europe or in North America, or Australia the elite chefs in top restaurants and luxury hotels and to be either are French, France-trained or experts in French food. The French chef is always a SupremeChef, and will generally regard himself as a true artist, be something of a drama king, and may be very temperamental if he feels that his genius is not being appreciated. He will probably speak PoirotSpeak and describe his creations in loving, sumptuous detail reaching the point of FoodPorn. A non-French chef attempting to establish his credentials as a gourmet chef will likely learn French cooking and litter his language with GratuitousFrench.

In fiction, a French restaurant is practically synonymous with high class dining. Most French restaurants are going to be upper-class preserve with an exclusive guest list, reservations required a month ahead, a {{dress code}}, a maître d’, an extensive wine list where the "cheapest" bottle is a vintage for $100, and a [[HaughtyHelp supremely snooty waiter]] who practically tries to force the customers to order what the waiter thinks is proper rather than what the character wants, and who speaks French most of the time and whose English has a heavy French accent.

If characters of lesser standing can even get into such a place to begin with, they will likely end up embarrassing themselves with their inability to afford most of the things on the menu, their inability to understand and pronounce the French on the menu, and by a committing culinary faux pas such as ordering ketchup or having the wrong choice of wine with their meat. If the customer's culinary choices are particularly egregious, the chef will likely come out and fuss at them. If the restaurant does anything wrong, however, the chef may come out and personally apologize.

If the French chef does not work at a high class restaurant, he will be the personal chef for an upper class household or cook on their yacht. Indeed, there was once a time where the French chef was considered as indispensable a part of the standard wealthy person's domestic staff as the FrenchMaid.

Overlaps with EverythingSoundsSexierInFrench, as even an ordinary dish will sound fancier and more cultured when given a French name. Case in point: would you rather eat "crème brûlée" or "burnt cream"? As well, you expect a little bowl of applesauce to be free in a non-French restaurant, but at a snooty French restaurant, you happily pay $5 for a side of "compote de pommes".

French Cuisine Is Haughty refers to the association in many works of fiction between French cooking and high class gourmet dining, or SnootyHauteCuisine. For factual information about French cuisine, see '''UsefulNotes/SnailsAndSoOn''' and the Website/{{Wikipedia}} article on [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_cuisine French cuisine.]]

France in general and GayParee in particular is considered by many to be the food capital of the world, and the French culinary tradition is often portrayed as the gold standard of fine dining. Characters visiting Paris will most likely make a point of sampling the fine dining there, and shows about chefs may take place in France.

The French chef is one of the central figures of this trope. Even in many non-French works that take place outside of France, top quality chefs tend to be either are French or experts in French food. The French chef is always a SupremeChef, and will generally regard himself as a true artist, be something of a drama king, and may be very temperamental if he feels that his genius is not being appreciated. He will probably speak PoirotSpeak and describe his creations in loving detail reaching the point of FoodPorn. A non-French chef attempting to establish his credentials as a gourmet chef will likely learn French cooking and litter his language with GratuitousFrench.

In fiction, a French restaurant is practically synonymous with high class dining. Most French restaurants are going to be upper-class preserve with an exclusive guest list, a dress code, a maître d’, and a [[HaughtyHelp supremely snooty waiter]] that practically tries to force the customers to order what the waiter thinks is proper rather than what the character wants. If characters of lesser standing can even get into such a place to begin with, they will likely end up embarrassing themselves with their inability to afford most of the things on the menu, their inability to understand and pronounce the French on the menu, and by a committing culinary faux pas such as ordering ketchup or having the wrong choice of wine with their meat. If the customer's culinary choices are particularly egregious, the chef will likely come out and fuss at them. If the restaurant does anything wrong, however, the chef may come out and personally apologize.

If the French chef does not work at a high class restaurant, he will be the personal chef for an upperclass household. Indeed, there was once a time where the French chef was considered as indispensable a part of the standard wealthy person's domestic staff as the FrenchMaid.

Overlaps with EverythingSoundsSexierInFrench, as even an ordinary dish will sound fancier and more cultured when given a French name. Case in point: would you rather eat "crème brûlée" or "burnt cream"?

* Most of ''The Hundred Foot Journey'''s plot centers around this -- along with a healthy amount of CultureClash.

* Played with in regards to the Americanized offshoots of French cuisine: Cajun and Creole. New Orleans is famous for an abundance of 4-star restaurants that specialize in local fare that is comparatively unpretentious while still being quite fancy and sumptuous, but its most famous dishes owe as much to French culture as they do to Spanish, Italian, and African contribution. Cajun food, meanwhile, is more directly borrowed from French, but is primarily derived from the traditional recipes of France's peasantry and is rather removed from what's usually considered ''haute cuisine'', with its own spin on Creole mainstays like jambalaya and gumbo (lack of tomato is the easiest way to tell them apart from Creole style).

* For most of American history, the "official cuisine" for presidential functions at the White House in Washington DC was French. This was because of UsefulNotes/ThomasJefferson, who believed that French Cuisine was the ''only'' real cuisine, and that certainly his countrymen had no grand culinary tradition to fall back on (it had only relatively recently begun to develop the economic wherewithal to support any kind of high-class dining; the early years had been devoted to hacking out a society in the wilderness). In 1921 UsefulNotes/WarrenGHarding decreed that from now the White House would serve American cuisine at official functions. Though some presidents since then would switch it back to French (UsefulNotes/JohnFKennedy being the best-known example), the official cuisine of the White House has stayed American since then. Mind you, like most "high-class" cuisines in the West, this "American" cuisine has some very heavy French influences.

French Cuisine Is Haughty refers to the association in many works of fiction between French cooking and high class gourmet dining, or SnootyHauteCuisine. For factual information about French cuisine, see '''UsefulNotes/SnailsAndSoOn''' and the Wiki/{{Wikipedia}} article on [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_cuisine French cuisine.]]

** In ''VideoGame/MassEffect2'' there is a Turian chef on the Citadel that exhibits a haughty, condescending attitude that is typically associated with French chefs/waiters. In his defense, however, the guy he was talking to was apparently an idiot, trying to mix dextro-amino spices with levo-amino foods, which would probably make anyone who ate the food sick.

[[folder: Real Life]]

* ''Series/TheGildedAge'': The NuveauRiche Russell family displays their opulence by hiring a French chef, who is quite proud of his cooking. It's a scandal when it turns out that [[spoiler:he's actually a Midwesterner who just ''studied'' in France]]. Interestingly, while the OldMoney of New York prefer to dine in a European style over American, they take their cues from Britain, and the Russells must scramble to adjust their menu to fit snooty ''British'' tastes.

* AvertedTrope by UsefulNotes/NapoleonBonaparte. Although he was Emperor of France, he, being Corsican, hence hired an ''Italian'' personal chef. The cuisine of Corsica is much more Italian than French--not surprising as Corsica had been French territory barely a year when Napoleon was born there; he grew up speaking Italian (well, Corsican—which is a dialect of Tuscan, of which Standard Italian is a slightly different but still thoroughly mutually intelligible register), and spoke French with a noticeable accent his entire life. Napoleon ate very quickly, taking almost no time to taste the food, contrary to French customs (a French family lunch might take up to two hours). During his tenure as First Consul, he himself tended to joke "If you want to eat well, go to the Third Consul, if you want to be entertained well while eating, go to the Second Consul, if you want to eat quickly, come to me."[[note]]Though if you ''actually'' wanted to eat well during the Consulate, you avoided the Consuls entirely and made directly for the table of the Foreign Minister, Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord (yes, ''that'' Talleyrand), who had the aforementioned Antoine Carême in his personal employ.[[/note]] Napoleon also preferred to have his food served ''à l'ambigu'' (also known as ''Service à la française''), i. e. all courses put on the table at once.

* AvertedTrope by UsefulNotes/NapoleonBonaparte. Although he was Emperor of France, he, being Corsican, hence hired an ''Italian'' personal chef. The cuisine of Corsica is much more Italian than French--not surprising as Corsica had been French territory barely a year when Napoleon was born there; he grew up speaking Italian (well, Corsican—which is a dialect of Tuscan, of which Standard Italian is a slightly different but still thoroughly mutually intelligible register), and spoke French with a noticeable accent his entire life. Napoleon ate very quickly, taking almost no time to taste the food, contrary to French customs (a French family lunch might take up to two hours). During his tenure as First Consul, he himself tended to joke "If you want to eat well, go to the Third Consul, if you want to be entertained well while eating, go to the Second Consul, if you want to eat quickly, come to me." Napoleon also preferred to have his food served ''à l'ambigu'' (also known as ''Service à la française''), i. e. all courses put on the table at once.

* AvertedTrope by UsefulNotes/NapoleonBonaparte. Although he was Emperor of France, he, being Corsican, hence hired an ''Italian'' personal chef. The cuisine of Corsica is much more Italian than French--not surprising as Corsica had been French territory barely a year when Napoleon was born there; he grew up speaking Italian (well, Corsican—which is a dialect of Tuscan, on which Standard Italian is based), and spoke French with a noticeable accent his entire life. Napoleon ate very quickly, taking almost no time to taste the food, contrary to French customs (a French family lunch might take up to two hours). During his tenure as First Consul, he himself tended to joke "If you want to eat well, go to the Third Consul, if you want to be entertained well while eating, go to the Second Consul, if you want to eat quickly, come to me." Napoleon also preferred to have his food served ''à l'ambigu'' (also known as ''Service à la française''), i. e. all courses put on the table at once.

* AvertedTrope by UsefulNotes/NapoleonBonaparte. Although he was Emperor of France, he, being Corsican, hence hired an ''Italian'' personal chef. The cuisine of Corsica is much more Italian than French--not surprising as Corsica had been French territory barely a year when Napoleon was born there; he grew up speaking Italian, and spoke French with a noticeable accent his entire life. Napoleon ate very quickly, taking almost no time to taste the food, contrary to French customs (a French family lunch might take up to two hours). During his tenure as First Consul, he himself tended to joke "If you want to eat well, go to the Third Consul, if you want to be entertained well while eating, go to the Second Consul, if you want to eat quickly, come to me." Napoleon also preferred to have his food served ''à l'ambigu'' (also known as ''Service à la française''), i. e. all courses put on the table at once.

* During [[Comicbook/JMSSpiderMan John Michael Straczynski's run on]] ''Comicbook/TheAmazingSpiderMan,'' there was a minor [[RunningGag running gag]] of Peter and MJ repeating visiting a French restaurant and Peter getting aggravated with the snooty waiter.

* In the ''[[VideoGame.TeamFortress2 Team Fortress 2]]'' fic ''Cheesy Potaters,'' [[FrenchJerk Spy]] uses a sack of potatoes bought by [[SouthernFriedGenius Engineer]] to make a potato dish with cheese, leading to him arguing with Sniper over whether to call it "gratin dauphinois" or "cheesy potaters".

[[folder:Web Comics]]
* At one point in his [[https://twitter.com/Othar Twitter-depicted adventures]], ''WebComic/GirlGenius'' character Othar Tryggvassen needs to get out of Paris quickly and in defiance of the city's all-powerful ruler, and so is forced to resort to desperate and unseemly measures: he goes to one of the fanciest restaurants in town, engages in elaborate and expert negotiations with the waiter, and when the resulting masterpiece is finally brought to his table in person by the head chef...

French Cuisine Is Haughty refers to the association in many works of fiction between French cooking and high class gourmet dining. For factual information about French cuisine, see '''UsefulNotes/SnailsAndSoOn''' and the Wiki/{{Wikipedia}} article on [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_cuisine French cuisine.]]

* In ''Webcomic/TheInexplicableAdventuresOfBob,'' Generictown has a French restaurant, Chez Elmo's ("Frogs and Snails! We deliver!). Monsieur Elmo (and his brother, who works at a restaurant in Paris) both seem more weary and beleaguered than snooty, though, from constantly dealing with obnoxious customers.

* During [[Comicbook/JMSSpiderMan John Michael Straczynski's run on]] ''[[Comicbook/TheAmazingSpiderMan]],'' there was a minor [[RunningGag running gag]] of Peter and MJ repeating visiting a French restaurant and Peter getting aggravated with the snooty waiter.

* During [[Comicbook/JMSSpiderMan John Minchael Straczynski's run on Spider-Man]], there was a minor [[RunningGag running gag]] of Peter and MJ repeating visiting a French restaurant and Peter getting aggravated with the snooty waiter.

* During [[Comicbook/JMSSpiderMan John Minchael Straczynski's run on Spider-Man]], there was a minor running subplot of Peter and MJ visiting a French restaurant and Peter getting aggravated with the snooty waiter.

* During [[Comicbook/JMS John Minchael Straczynski's run on Spider-Man]], there was a minor running subplot of Peter and MJ visiting a French restaurant and Peter getting aggravated with the snooty waiter.