French cuisine

Perhaps more than any other country, France best captured the imagination of ‘grand cuisine.’ France is romance. It is the Eiffel Tower, floodlit and rising dream-like up into the night sky. It is the rolling, vineyard-covered hills of Burgundy, and the exotic, almost tropical toast of the French Riviera. For many France is also the gastronomic centre of good food.

The French are independent, in love with colour and life. They consider the serving of food to be almost as important as the food itself. A typical meal begins with hors d'oeuvres made from a number of delectable ingredients, served either hot or cold and meant to excite the taste buds. The entree could be either meat, fish, or fowl accompanied by a portion of vegetables. Cheese follows, usually served with fruit. Dessert may consist of apple tart or strawberries and cream. Paris is the heart of the country. Known the world over for its fashions, art galleries and museums, the City of Light is also the home of Haute Cuisine. Here the art of cooking has reached its zenith and chefs are treated as national heroes. Subtle sauces are the core of this tradition, meant to appeal to the sense of sight as well as of taste. These sauces should never overwhelm the ingredients but should complementthem, allowing their flavours to mingle in a delightful bouquet. Each dish is a creation inspired by love of food. In this same tradition French Haute Cuisine desserts are almost decadent in their sensual appeal.

Escoffier, perhaps the greatest French chef, believed that good cooking was the basis of happiness. Who knows? Perhaps he was right. The variety of tastes found in French cooking certainly does have the power to evoke smiles of pleasure.

ASIAN FOOD

From a visit to three Asian countries, one thing is clear: the Asian diet is now more Westernised. The traditional Asian food - eaten three times a day - is rice. But now there are also meals of wheat products, such as toast for breakfast and milk products.

Asian supermarkets now have along list of Western foods such as breads, cakes and biscuits, snack foods, tinned goods and fizzy soft-drinks, pasta (wheat noodles), breakfast cereals, butter, cheese, lamb and beef.

But most striking is the large number of milk products. Milk products traditionally aren't part of an Asian diet - many Asians are actually allergic to milk. But there are now ads on television for milk. Milk, according to the ads, is ‘modern’, middle class and healthy. At a supermarket in Ampang Park, Kuala Lumpur, there is a shelf, four metres long, for milk in tins.

In one Bangkok supermarket there are more than a dozen different brands of milk drinks, from strawberry to pineapple flavour. Ina typical supermarket in Chiang Mai in northern Thailand (population 1.2 million), there isfresh milk, and flavoured long-life milk in mini cartons. There are also fruit yoghurts with pineapple, orange and lychee flavours.

Unfortunately, there are now more Western diet-related diseases.