Tracing Terroir(s): the role of maps, guidebooks, and regional products in constructing the French gastronomic imaginary

ABSTRACT

Before French cuisine emerged as the global benchmark for gastronomic excellence, tempting tourists both near and far, a tradition of culinary travel, largely linked with the valorization of regional cuisines and products, had already been established among French citizens themselves, having notably arisen during the inter-war period. Stimulating a sense of cultural unity and shared values, inspiring imaginations, and boosting commerce alike, the idea of a national cuisine, encompassing France’s diverse regions, offered a sense of continuity, comfort, and rootedness in a time of socio-economic upheaval. Beyond this, the expansion of food certification labels, linking products with places, and the integration of the concept of terroir grew in importance and scope. This paper seeks to explore the roots of the inter-war boom of culinary tourism within France and to trace the representative power of regional cuisines and products through analyzing three inter-related factors: culinary guidebooks and literature, gastronomic maps, and authenticity labels, all of which facilitate a sense of belonging, whether symbolic or literal for the citizen or foreign tourist. I will identify contributions of these three components in constructing a collective culinary identity, and will propose how concepts of terroir are now being adapted and employed today to address a changing nation.

KEYWORDS:

• culinary tourism
• gastronomic maps
• terroir
• culinary heritage

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Research Foundation-Flanders (FWO) of Belgium under Grant Mandate: 11H9422N. With gratitude to the BnF and the KBR for access to the guidebook series, maps, and images consulted for this research, and with thanks to Raúl Matta for his support and encouragement.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Figures

Figures 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 (identifiers included below images in text): These images were all sourced from the collections of the Bibliotheque Nationale de France (BnF) which has granted permission for their reproduction for nonprofit use in an academic publication.

Figure 1. Poster 1890. BnF. http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b530158811.

Late 19th century poster advertising olive oil from Nice, France, depicting two large oval lithographs, one on top of the other, each with a separate scene. The top shows several women and a young boy harvesting olives from trees. The bottom scene shows several boys or young men working the olive presses in a farmhouse.

Figure 2. La France À Table. Janvier 1935. p.9. BnF.

A black and white photograph of an outdoor food market scene in Provence, France (from 1935). Several men, all wearing either caps or sunhats, look at produce displays, which prominently feature baskets of melons, grapes, and bunches of lavender.

Figure 3. La France a Table “Touraine” 1949. https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k30519078.

The cover of a gastronomic magazine, an issue on the Touraine region of France, consisting of a large black and white photo of a table, covered in a checkered cloth and set with a torn baguette, a small plate with a log of goat cheese, a small jar of conserved meat, a dark bottle of wine (with dirt on it), and two glasses, one with what appears to be red wine, and a smaller with white.

Figure 4. La France a Table. Janvier 1950. p. 50.

A full page advertisement of a gastronomic map from a culinary magazine (1950) featuring the shape of France, and railway lines (the ad comes from the French train company SNCF). Each region is illustrated with various food items or agricultural features such as cows, cheese, oysters, fish, wine bottles, chickens, fruits, with a text underneath reading “64 gastronomic adventures await you”. (translated from French).

Figure 5. Detail of Carte Gastronomique de la France. A. Bourguignon 1929. https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b52504043q.

A colored selection of a 1929 gastronomic map, showing the Burgundy region, stretching from Dijon to Beaujolais. The wine production areas are shown in pink, while regional borders are outlined in green, waterways in blue. Written over the map are words of food items, corresponding to each area, such as beef in Charolais or wines in Beaune.

Notes

1. From Brillat Savarin’s Physiologie du Goût (1825), this quote inspired the cliché “you are what you eat.” Literal translation: Tell me what you eat and I’ll tell you who you are.

2. In Accounting for Taste: The Triumph of French Cuisine (Chicago UP, 2004), Priscilla Parkhurst-Ferguson notes (p.5) the 19^th century emergence of national cuisine, and the postwar proliferation of gastronomic regionalist writings (pp. 29–30).

3. For intriguing studies on the way in which the concepts of terroir and origin labels have been applied in international contexts, and their translatability/movability as such, see various works of Geneviève Tiel, Xiangchun Zheng and Sarah Cappeliez.

4. It is also worth mentioning that many copies of this publication are available for purchase online throughout France on either French bookshop websites or eBay, suggesting a widespread readership interested in regional cuisine.

5. Among the growing scholarship on terroir, I have selected these scholars as their work looks closely at France and the development of its gastronomic identity, which are central to this paper.

6. For all French texts in this paper, unless a specific translator is listed, the translations are my own.

7. The Institut National des Appellations d’Origine (INAO) is the EU governing body for products of origin, the Appellation d’origine controlée (AOC) is an origin label for French wines, and the Apellation d’origine protégée (AOP) labels food products from a protected origin at EU level.

8. Point of interest, Eluard-Valette is the daughter of French writer Paul Eluard and surrealist muse Gala.

9. The aim of this inquiry, however, is not the history of regional cuisines nor of the development of their marketing. For more-detailed reading on those subjects, see the works of Julia Csergo such as La gastronomie est-elle une marchandise culturelle comme une autre? (2016).

10. On the featured Saint Maure de Touraine cheese, in 1965 the French Ministry of Agriculture commissioned videos explaining the importance of establishing milk cooperatives to certify the authenticity of the product against fraud, and to establish fairer prices for the farmers, as Bowen points out of Comté cheese. For a clip, see https://youtu.be/EsC2Q2LXdHo

11. L’Inventoire du patrimoine culinaire, “Alsace : produits du terroir et recettes traditionnelles,” [sous la dir. de J. Froc, M. Hyman, Ph. Hyman… et al.]; préf. par le président du Conseil régional d’Alsace, (Paris : A. Michel : Conseil national des arts culinaires), 1998.

12. Dalí, Vins de Gala (Paris: Draeger, 1977), pp. 59–70. Although not on the bibliographic information the texts from pp. 16–129 are written by Max Gérard and the texts from pp. 145–290 are by Louis Orizet. For the purpose of these citations I will use Dalí/Orizet when quoting Orizet.

13. Orizet also penned the slogan “Le Beaujolais Nouveau est arrivée!” and created a marketing campaign which helped launch the flagging wine region into international fame.

14. These claims are reinforced with a map of France’s wine regions at the end of the book and a guide to its appellations.

15. “Vous le mangez comment votre terroir?” An alternate version asks “Vous reprendrez bien un morceau de savoir-faire”? displaying a different cheese.

16. Le Un. Le goût du Fromage (19 Août, 2020); Le goût du Vin (12 Août, 2020); Le goût du Pain (5 Août, 2020).

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek [11H9422N].