SAY CHEESE
"How can you govern a country which has two hundred and forty-six varieties of cheese?” famously asked President Charles de Gaulle.
Actually there are many more cheeses than that in France. Some recipes date back hundreds of years, some are very new and many of them come with fabulous legends like Roquefort apparently discovered when a youth, eating his lunch of bread and ewes' milk cheese, saw a beautiful girl in the distance. Abandoning his meal in a nearby cave, he ran to meet her. When he returned a few months later, the mold (Penicillium roqueforti) had transformed his plain cheese into Roquefort.
Scientists in France are working with this cheese to create new beauty products – allegedly its super anti-inflammatory qualities could delay the ageing process.
Croissant
History has it that croissants originated in Austria.
There are several stories of how it came to be from a 17th Century baker in Vienna invented them after foiling a raid by Turkish soldiers to Marie-Antoinette bringing it to France from her homeland of Austria and commanding the royal bakers to make the pastry for her.
Golden, flaky, buttery and warm, the French like to dunk them in coffee for breakfast!
Click here to find out more about croissants!