French Food Vocabulary

with illustrated vocabulary, word definitions and example sentences

Photo: Preparing crêpes and other French dishes

French food and French cooking took hundreds of years to develop, and like food everywhere it reflects the history of the country in which it developed. By the 17th century the French class system had created great inequality, and this meant rich, upper-class people could employ chefs and eat expensive delicacies and fancy dishes, while poor lower-class people had to eat very cheap, low-quality food.

By the 19th century the high-quality food of the rich was called haute cuisine or "high cooking", and the low-quality food of the poor was called peasant food. But a lot of these peasant dishes, including hundreds of soups and stews, had gradually become part of haute cuisine after chefs began making them with better ingredients and cooking techniques, and these dishes are still an important part of haute cuisine today.

In the 1960s, a new cooking style called nouvelle cuisine or "new cooking" developed. It modernized French cooking by using fewer of haute cuisine's basic stocks and sauces like the rich and creamy Hollandaise sauce. It also introduced regional cooking styles with more natural flavours and healthier ingredients. As a result, French restaurants now serve a greater range of cooking styles than ever before. Some serve traditional haute cuisine, others serve nouvelle cuisine, and some focus on regional or home-style cooking. You can also find many French restaurants and bistros that offer a mix of these styles.

French meals

Most French people eat a light breakfast of French bread or croissants with honey or jam, and tea or coffee. For a bigger breakfast, they might have bread with ham and cheese or a savoury paste called pâté, or a grilled ham and cheese sandwich called croque monsieur. Breakfast is often a small meal, but lunch and dinner are much bigger meals that can last for two hours or more. Both are usually three-course meals taken with wine and cheese plus tea or coffee. The three courses are an entrée consisting of soup or savoury foods, a main course including meat and vegetable dishes, and a dessert or pastries.

Entrée dishes

Entrée choices can include clear soups like French onion soup, thick soups like lobster bisque, and small savoury dishes known as hors d'oeuvre. Popular hors d'oeuvre include meat, fish or vegetable-filled vol-au-vents and a dish called crudités in which raw vegetables like carrot, cucumber and celery sticks are dipped in a vinaigrette sauce. Some hors d'oeuvre are made with expensive delicacies such as caviar, truffle, or a kind of oversized liver made by force-feeding ducks or geese called foie gras. Another dish often served as an entrée is escargot, or cooked snails. Even though snails were peasant food at first, they became a delicacy when haute cuisine chefs began removing the flesh and flavouring it before returning it to the shells.

Main course dishes

The second course is usually the main course in which a meat, fish or poultry dish is served with side dishes of vegetables. Like escargot, many haute cuisine and nouvelle cuisine main course dishes originated from lower-class dishes. For example, a spicy fish and vegetable stew called bouillabaisse was first invented by poor fishermen in Provence as a way of using bony fish they couldn't sell in the market. A peasant dish that's also from Provence is a beef or lamb stew cooked in wine called daube. Beef bourguignon from the eastern region of Burgundy is another famous stew. It's made by slowly cooking pieces of beef in red wine before adding garlic, onions and mushrooms. Burgundy is also where the famous chicken dish coq au vin is from. Another peasant dish that later became a haute cuisine favourite is cassoulet, a casserole of pork sausages and pork skin, duck or goose meat and haricot beans.

As well as meat dishes, main course options can include vegetarian dishes like ratatouille, a popular vegetable stew. Vegetables are also prepared in various ways as side dishes. They can be fried, as in French fries, or sliced and baked in milk as in dauphinois dishes like gratin dauphinois. Many other vegetables like eggplant, carrot, zucchini, leek and mushrooms are also important in French cooking.

Desserts

The third course in a French lunch or dinner is usually dessert, and some of the most popular of all French foods are desserts and pastries. They're made by a special chef called a pâtissier and sold in bakeries called pâtisseries. The most well-known French desserts include the custard-like crême brûlée and the light and creamy mousse. Favourite pastries include the éclair, a long, cream-filled pastry, and the profiterole, a small ball-shaped pastry sometimes called a cream puff. There are many other delicious French desserts, all worth trying if you have the chance.

Other dishes

One of the most versatile of French dishes is the quiche, a savoury flan with a filling made of eggs and cream plus other ingredients like cheese, spinach, mushrooms, ham or bacon. Quiches can be served hot or cold as entrées or as main course dishes. Another versatile French dish is the crêpe, a thin pancake that can be served with savoury fillings as an entrée or as a dessert in dishes like crêpes Suzette. The soufflé is another versatile food that can be both savoury as in a cheese soufflé, or a sweet dessert like chocolate soufflé served with cream or ice-cream.

baguette

bouillabaisse

beef bourguignon

cassoulet

chocolate mousse

coq au vin

crême brûlée

crêpes

croissant

croque monsieur

daube provençale

éclairs

escargot

foie gras

French onion soup

gratin dauphinois

lobster bisque

pâté

profiteroles

quiche Lorraine

ratatouille

soufflé

vinaigrette

vol-au-vent