why don't french women get fat?

[Tabrett]

Haven't read the other posts, but I have a friend who recently move to France. She is very petite (maybe 5' tall) and very thin (guessing her weight is between 95 and 100lbs). She said she was STARVING.ALL.THE.TIME because the portions sizes served were soooooo small. If the portions sizes make a very small, thin woman feel hungry, you know they arn't eating very much. It may be very rich and fatty food, but very, very small servings!

[Parrothead]

WHAT!!!! I've lived in the South my whole life and never heard such a thing. But I live rural. Maybe in the cities?

You aren't as far south (currently) as I was. This was something I came across in both SC and GA.

[fairfarmhand]

You aren't as far south (currently) as I was. This was something I came across in both SC and GA.

 

 

I grew up in GA and FL (although FL is not the authentic South)

 

 

Sounds CRAZY!

 

 

My family is from Georgia near Chattanooga.

[justamouse]

It means to get off the American way of fat free diets and get some good, wholesome fats back into bodies. What Americans did was to take their food, strip the fat away and replace it with sugar. Hence, the obesity problem in America. It's the sugar, NOT the fat. The French eat good fats, and lots of it. Whole milk, cream in their porridge, lots of whole milk cheese, whole milk yogurt. Things like that. Oh, and lots of French bread. So much for whole carbs joke! And of course lots of fresh fruits and veggies.

 

BUT, those fats come from pastured animals, and are unpasteurized.

 

And, it's not lots, per se, it's just that they don't overconsume. When you make the whole table free, you eventually come to the conclusion that you don't have to overeat (hoard food), because you can eat whatever you want.

 

When a teeny slice of pie satisfies you, you don't need half the pie, you know?

[justamouse]

Haven't read the other posts, but I have a friend who recently move to France. She is very petite (maybe 5' tall) and very thin (guessing her weight is between 95 and 100lbs). She said she was STARVING.ALL.THE.TIME because the portions sizes served were soooooo small. If the portions sizes make a very small, thin woman feel hungry, you know they arn't eating very much. It may be very rich and fatty food, but very, very small servings!

 

My Dh HATES French restaurants because the Italian in him thinks an abundant plate is good. But if you shouldn't be eating it all, and actually the correct portion is 1/4 of the size of the plate and you really SHOULD be bringing it home in a doggie bag, the French restaurant is actually the better deal.

[Parrothead]

I grew up in GA and FL (although FL is not the authentic South)

 

 

Sounds CRAZY!

 

 

My family is from Georgia near Chattanooga.

It is crazy. I thought it was some kind of weird regional freaky thing the first time I was told I was "asking for it by walking the streets," when I walked to the store. The next time was a couple years later and decided to walk the two blocks to work. The next I came across the same attitude when my car broke down and had to walk 8 blocks to work a couple days in a row.

 

The very last time I walked anywhere in GA I hit a raccoon about 10p. It put a massive hole in the radiator of my car and I had to park it and attempted to walk to civilization. Some jerk apparently thought I was asking for it. It took me forever to get rid of him. I finally had to pull the "you don't want to screw with an off duty cop" line.

[justamouse]

My cousin recently moved to Charlotte, and she and her husband caused a scene when they arrived at a little store on foot.

 

"You walked? On purpose? Your car didn't break down?"

 

:lol:

 

:001_huh:

 

Yeah...and if you start riding your bike to work some people assume you lost your driver's license.

 

I have a relative who drives his car to the mailbox. :)

 

Wow, I had NO idea. So the weight thing down there has deep cultural roots that sabotage them.

[Retired]

Small portions.

 

 

 

Don't even get me started on the gluttony I saw when I visited a buffet in Vegas - that was when I realised that people really do eat themselves to death. You could have fed a family of 4 with what some people were piling on their massive plates (or platters really). I couldn't believe people would actually be able to eat it all and I expected them to leave half of it - but no -they finished it and then went for dessert :001_huh:

 

I'm not picking on Americans but some of you guys sure can eat :lol:

 

I agree with this too -the more whole fats you eat the longer you will stay full and the less you will eat.

 

I have volunteered with the obestity clinic at our hospiital. In Alabama we have one of the highest rates for obestity and heart disease.

 

It is very hard to get people to just eat less. We try to explain they don't need a diet just a life style change.

 

They tend to just want a magic pill or surgery. They don't want to change their food addiction

 

Also the whole idea of getting more for theiir money, they will say look much I get with a super size for only a dollar more.

 

It very sad. We try to get folks to stay away from the "heart attack" buffets. When I worked on the gulf coast I witness some massive eating at the casino buffets.

[regentrude]

My cousin recently moved to Charlotte, and she and her husband caused a scene when they arrived at a little store on foot.

 

"You walked? On purpose? Your car didn't break down?"

 

 

When my DD started school (she was attending ps elementary), I walked her the half mile to school every morning. That first fall, a number of people stopped offering us rides; they could not believe somebody would voluntarily walk that "far".

I had people stop 300 ft from the school offering to drive us the rest of the way.

 

After half a year, the offers stopped; I guess they all got used to seeing the crazy lady walk her kid.

[Janie Grace]

Small portions, walking more and smoking like chimneys. ;)

[thescrappyhomeschooler]

Haven't read the other posts, but I have a friend who recently move to France. She is very petite (maybe 5' tall) and very thin (guessing her weight is between 95 and 100lbs). She said she was STARVING.ALL.THE.TIME because the portions sizes served were soooooo small. If the portions sizes make a very small, thin woman feel hungry, you know they arn't eating very much. It may be very rich and fatty food, but very, very small servings!

 

Where is she eating? My experience in French restaurants and with French families at home is that there are many more courses. So, you only eat a small portion of each course, but it all adds up. I can't imagine being starving in France, and I am not a small person or dainty eater.

[farouk]

Small portions, walking more and smoking like chimneys. ;)

 

Janie Grace:

 

...and talking and discoursing at the table a great deal. Gesticulation optional but advisable (I do it a lot myself).

[LeslieAnneLevine]

Haven't read the other posts, but I have a friend who recently move to France. She is very petite (maybe 5' tall) and very thin (guessing her weight is between 95 and 100lbs). She said she was STARVING.ALL.THE.TIME because the portions sizes served were soooooo small. If the portions sizes make a very small, thin woman feel hungry, you know they arn't eating very much. It may be very rich and fatty food, but very, very small servings!

 

I lived in France for about a dozen years and I never left a restaurant hungry. Is your friend sure she's not ordering off the "entree" menu (starters)?

 

 

This is something I noticed about the French and American women in restaurants in France. The Frenchwoman will eat her whole meal (or at least most of it) and then not eat until the next meal. The American woman will leave half of it and then will be eating something an hour or two later. If it's about an hour before it's time to eat and a Frenchwoman is getting hungry she thinks, "well we'll be eating in about an hour", but an American woman looks for something to tide her over, thinking she'll eat less at dinner if she does so. Obviously this isn't true in all cases, but it's a pattern that I've noticed.

 

Also there are many, many markets in France. When I lived in a small town, we had a huge market on Sundays and a smaller one on Thursdays, a fish market every morning, as well as all the specialty shops in town (bakeries, dairy shop, produce market). When we moved to a tiny village there was still a market every Saturday, with two produce stalls, a cheese van and a fish market. I had a car then, but it was only about 5 mins to walk down to the village and 10 mins to walk back up so we always walked.

 

My MIL is 70 and lives on the 6th floor with no elevator (in France). Each flight is long and winding. She has no car and when you take public transportation everywhere you end up walking a lot more. Sometimes it's just easier to walk 20-30 minutes than to change buses or trains. My MIL isn't stick thin, but she's not obese.

 

As far as half the French being overweight, by how much is my question. Since I've been in the U.S. I've gained a few pounds. According to a weight calculator I am, at 117 lbs, overweight by 4.8 lbs., but no one would look at me and think I'm overweight. Still, I'm back to walking again and avoiding crap food (poptarts and the like). As a PP said, she saw Frenchpeople who could (not necessarily should) drop 10 lbs, but that's very different from being 30, 40, 50 lbs or more overweight.

 

ETA: The French can have weird attitudes about weight. I am not saying they have all the answers. Any pharmacy window will have displays or ads for some sort of pill to slim down or cellulite cream. But I think overall the lifestyle tends to be pretty healthy.

Edited January 6, 2012 by LeslieAnneLevine

[justamouse]

My MIL is 70 and lives on the 6th floor with no elevator (in France). Each flight is long and winding. She has no car and when you take public transportation everywhere you end up walking a lot more. Sometimes it's just easier to walk 20-30 minutes than to change buses or trains. My MIL isn't stick thin, but she's not obese.

 

 

Now, see my MIL can't walk a block. Walking stairs exhausts her. She can't travel, her knees are shot, she can't even get up into our van. But she just doesn't see how her food choices and lack of walking are to blame.

 

But, I must say, seeing her have such trouble has had a profound impact on my kids and Dh in that we do NOT want to age that way. I want to be the 80 yo woman lifting weights. :001_smile:

[LibraryLover]

People in hip cities aren't as large as people in the suburbs, and that goes for other countries as well. As soon as one leaves the slick metro areas of NYC, Paris, London, Boston etc, people get larger. The folks in Beverly Hills are thinner than the folks in east LA. The people in the Back Bay or Beacon Hill in Boston, for instance, are much more slender than the folks of Roxbury. The upper east side of Manhattan will reflect a different BMI than Queens etc. I've seen chubby locals in Rome and in Paris, although so far, it's certainly not Georgia chubby. (I only picked Georgia because of the thread about the obesity commercials there. That issue is almost 100% tied to poverty, and the reasons are many and complex...and political.

Edited January 6, 2012 by LibraryLover

[Critterfixer]

I only picked Georgia because of the thread about the obesity commercials there.) That issue is almost 100% tied to poverty, and the reasons are many and complex.

 

And maybe one of the reasons might be that even a short walk in 99 and 90 humidity isn't a pleasant experience. (In Arkansas you can add in swarms of bloodthirsty giant mosquitoes at dawn and dusk to your walk, and ticks and chiggers if you so much as set foot of the blacktop.) Sure, you could go into town and join a health club, but I'm not poor, and I couldn't afford a membership.

It does help not to run the air-conditioning to acclimate yourself to that kind of heat, but it's still a dangerous situation from about late May into early October.

 

Not offering excuses for those of us in the South, but the heat is a fact, that's for sure.

[LibraryLover]

And maybe one of the reasons might be that even a short walk in 99 and 90 humidity isn't a pleasant experience. (In Arkansas you can add in swarms of bloodthirsty giant mosquitoes at dawn and dusk to your walk, and ticks and chiggers if you so much as set foot of the blacktop.) Sure, you could go into town and join a health club, but I'm not poor, and I couldn't afford a membership.

It does help not to run the air-conditioning to acclimate yourself to that kind of heat, but it's still a dangerous situation from about late May into early October.

 

Not offering excuses for those of us in the South, but the heat is a fact, that's for sure.

 

 

That is a very interesting thought. You're right. It's crazy hot there most of the year.

[justamouse]

And maybe one of the reasons might be that even a short walk in 99 and 90 humidity isn't a pleasant experience. (In Arkansas you can add in swarms of bloodthirsty giant mosquitoes at dawn and dusk to your walk, and ticks and chiggers if you so much as set foot of the blacktop.) Sure, you could go into town and join a health club, but I'm not poor, and I couldn't afford a membership.

It does help not to run the air-conditioning to acclimate yourself to that kind of heat, but it's still a dangerous situation from about late May into early October.

 

Not offering excuses for those of us in the South, but the heat is a fact, that's for sure.

 

But NJ gets screaming hot and humid, and at dawn and dusk you will be sucked dry by mosquitoes. We still walk? Ticks are a freakin plague here, and lymes patients are everywhere. But people bike, walk, hike-it doesn't stop us.

[Amy in TX]

People in hip cities aren't as large as people in the suburbs, and that goes for other countries as well. .

 

This is a major problem with suburbs. I live in Houston, which must be one of the least walkable cities in the world--it's mostly sprawling suburbs connected by highway. Cities that have had most of their growth after the 1960s are designed for car travel, not foot travel. In my subdivision, I can walk for 15 minutes, then I am out of the subdivision. There is a four-lane highway there. This highway must be taken to any kind of shopping. You cannot walk along this highway without taking your life in your hands. There is very little shoulder, much less sidewalk. You can either walk on the shoulder two feet from the high-speed traffic, or in the drainage ditch on the side.

 

If I want to walk, I can make endless circuits around my neighborhood, or use the treadmill. :P

[Lang Syne Boardie]

In the late 70's our many friends from Alabama were all very slim. I always assumed it was because they didn't have air conditioning. It's pretty hard to overeat when you're overheated.

 

They also walked to church, to the lake, and to the little store in the community. I loved to visit, even in summer. I loved the red dirt roads.

[fairfarmhand]

In the late 70's our many friends from Alabama were all very slim. I always assumed it was because they didn't have air conditioning. It's pretty hard to overeat when you're overheated.

 

They also walked to church, to the lake, and to the little store in the community. I loved to visit, even in summer. I loved the red dirt roads.

 

I have had that thought as well. When it is hot, you really don't have an appetite. People get more acclimated to cool indoor temps and don't want to do much in the outdoors. Plus, so many work all day and by late afternoon it is HOT!

 

My grandmother and my dh's grandparents got up EARLY in the summer, worked outdoors and sat on porches in the hottest parts of the day.

[Critterfixer]

But NJ gets screaming hot and humid, and at dawn and dusk you will be sucked dry by mosquitoes. We still walk? Ticks are a freakin plague here, and lymes patients are everywhere. But people bike, walk, hike-it doesn't stop us.

 

For how long? Heat starts here in late May, although there are some pleasant days in June. July, August and the majority of September are anywhere from 95-105, and last summer we had a string of 110+ days. Usually by October 1st it starts to cool off enough in the evenings to walk.

Tick season in my neck of the woods--NEVER ends. My dogs wear tick collars year round. We have several different varieties, and while Lyme isn't a huge problem here, Ehrlichia is, and the transmission time is around 4-8 hours from bite to infection. I know of several deaths from this disease in people, and during an average summer I'll treat anywhere from 5-8 canine cases a week.

As for the Mosquitoes THAT season runs from April to October.

 

Yeah, it has a tendency to stop us from going out and working out. Not saying it should, maybe ya'll are tougher. And we should. But (see below) the air conditioning has to not be there first.

 

In the late 70's our many friends from Alabama were all very slim. I always assumed it was because they didn't have air conditioning. It's pretty hard to overeat when you're overheated.

 

They also walked to church, to the lake, and to the little store in the community. I loved to visit, even in summer. I loved the red dirt roads.

 

According to my FIL (who is one of the smartest and most stubborn people I know) air conditioning is a cause of obesity in the south. He claims that growing up without it, he had no reason to lay around--too hot. He'd head out for the woods, and go hunting when he wasn't working. I do think that without the air people would get out more, if only to go find a pool of cool water to sit in.

(He also swears that there were not as many ticks when he was young, and I think he's right, based on the fact that he also says that spotting a deer track was a matter of great excitement. Now the things are as thick as rabbits, and just loaded with ticks.)

[Ester Maria]

If it's about an hour before it's time to eat and a Frenchwoman is getting hungry she thinks, "well we'll be eating in about an hour", but an American woman looks for something to tide her over, thinking she'll eat less at dinner if she does so. Obviously this isn't true in all cases, but it's a pattern that I've noticed.

I think you are definitely on to something here. Americans have developed this habit of "snacking" all. the. time. to an extent that has NOT been traditionally present in Europe (with the lifestyle changes, switching to 9-5 working days and overall "americanization" of the lifestyle, it has crept into Europe... and so it happens that obesity rates went up about that time too, LOL).

 

I honestly do not recall that we regularly snacked as kids, except maybe a quick snack at school (which was for many kids instead of breakfast at home, LOL) - we typically ate something in the morning, then a lunch after school in early to mid afternoon, then a LATE evening meal ("family dinners" often started at 8-9 PM). If we were hungry in between meals, we typically thought "oh well, the dinner is in about an hour anyway" and let it go. Our parents did the same, and we mostly ate the standard three meals only.

 

Our kids do snack, and later we got into habit of snacking ourselves, but our "snacking" typically means that we will take a few bites of a salad from the fridge (and I do mean this quite literally: I take a plate and pick out a few 'bites' of the salad with the fork, put that on the plate and that is a "snack").

 

Other than snacking, it is definitely in portions. A few examples:

 

1. The standard Italian restaurant measure for a serving of pasta per meal per person is 80 g. For a family of four, that would in theory mean 320 g of pasta for a meal. So, I can loosely round it to 300 or loosely round it to 350. However, if I round it to 350, tbe chances are that I will have leftovers. So I tend to round it to 300, and nobody complains.

Most Americans I know when asked about their norms of pasta for four people would answer 1 lb as a general rule of the thumb - which is cca 450 g, so they may as well cook the whole 500 g package of Barilla if they have it. That is a BIG difference - even if I were to round to 350 g! That is a difference of an additional person or two!

 

2. I love crepes, but when we "make crepes" at home for four people as a special desert, I typically count with making ten small crepes. Why? Because a normal serving for a person is two crepes (this depends on the size of your pan, too - I make thin small ones), and kids will sometimes have a third one or whoever is the most hungry, especially if the previous meal was not very elaborate (and if we are going to have a dessert in the first place, we tend to eat a little less than normally).

I *cannot*, physically cannot, eat more than three small crepes. Three crepes is a LOT in my mind, 3-4 of them is like a complete meal to my eyes, not a dessert or a post-meal.

You know those street vendors of those BIG crepes? My kids can hardly finish ONE in one sitting, and even for that they have to be moderately hungry (they could not finish it right after a meal). The Americans I know will often buy DOUBLE. With extra chocolate. And bananas. And nuts.

 

3. I like Nutella. I always buy those medium size glass jars that are... not sure, 350-400 g?

Anyhow, that "always" means about twice a year? For crepes AND random "I need chocolate!" moments, AND random "Okay, kids, have an unhealthy breakfast, here is Nutella and bread!" moments. Granted, we may eat less sugar than an average family, but the fact is, this household uses about two medium size glass jars of Nutella a year.

I know families of four or five who not only buy those HUGE packages of Nutella, but buy them double as many times a year as we buy our cute glass jars.

 

4. Those random "I need chocolate!" moments? I take a teaspoon of that Nutella in those moments, and sometimes even that is too intense. :lol:

For many Americans I know, random "I need chocolate!" moments include 50-80 g of chocolate. On rare occasions when as a family we take an 80-100 g chocolate, we sometimes do not "finish" that. Yeah, the four of us. When the baby grows up we will get some help, but still, what many people eat alone in one sitting is for us a family size dessert.

 

So see, "we" eat carbs just as "you" do - it is just that, traditionally, in our diet, the portions are much smaller and sugar is a lot less frequent (an occasional dessert, more like on a weekly / bi-weekly basis than a daily one... sometimes we go entire weeks without it and do not "miss" it, because our bodies are simply not accustomed to those quantities of sugar that our American friends consider normal).

[Rebecca VA]

Back in the 1970s there was sort of a perma-recession going on, and food was expensive. Plus, everyone wanted to be thin. Girls talked all the time about their diets and how they needed to lose two or three pounds (nowadays it would be 20 or 30). It was very uncommon for young people to get fat.

 

I spent many summers in Mississippi growing up, and I promise you that almost everyone had air conditioning. Even if it was just a window unit in one or two rooms, they had it.

[PeacefulChaos]

Yeah...and if you start riding your bike to work some people assume you lost your driver's license.

 

Funny story... My grandparents brought my bike out here (like, my old bike. That I got for my birthday in 5th grade. :lol: ) because they were cleaning out their garage and we now had more space to put it. DH started riding it to work. :lol: It was one of the girls 10 speed bikes, and it was white and purple. It was hysterical. The guys at work teased him about it so much, and once they hid it on the roof of the building and he had to go get it when he got off that day.

It ended up getting stolen when we were away for a week, but it was just hilarious, him riding the 2-3 blocks to work on my old bike... :lol: (Hey, at least he's secure in his manhood...)

[regentrude]

I think you are definitely on to something here. Americans have developed this habit of "snacking" all. the. time. to an extent that has NOT been traditionally present in Europe (with the lifestyle changes, switching to 9-5 working days and overall "americanization" of the lifestyle, it has crept into Europe... and so it happens that obesity rates went up about that time too, LOL).

 

I honestly do not recall that we regularly snacked as kids, except maybe a quick snack at school (which was for many kids instead of breakfast at home, LOL) - we typically ate something in the morning, then a lunch after school in early to mid afternoon, then a LATE evening meal ("family dinners" often started at 8-9 PM). If we were hungry in between meals, we typically thought "oh well, the dinner is in about an hour anyway" and let it go. Our parents did the same, and we mostly ate the standard three meals only..

 

Growing up in Germany, we had five meals, four small one and a large one.

1. Breakfast at 6:30am before going to school -oatmeal or bread with jam.

2. 2nd breakfast at school (around 9am), brought from home. Typically, you brought a whole grain sandwich with cheese or meat (just two slices of bread, maybe with a bit of butter, and the cheese, no sauces, mayo, salad leaves etc) and an apple. You got milk at the school.

3. Lunch. Either at school or, for kids who had parents/grandparents home, at home. Fully cooked meal.

4. Afternoon "vesper". Usually sweet. A roll with jam, or cake. This is a typical meal to invite people for coffee, around 3 or 4pm.

5. Dinner around 7pm. Bread and cheese, salad or veggies. (If lucky, there might be lunch leftovers.)

There was no snacking in between, and no food after dinner.

Most people I know still eat like this.

[Danestress]

I had a French friend tell me (but he's a man, so take it with a grain of salt) that French women just care more how they look. He said they take more care with their personal appearance than American women, invest more money in better clothes rather than having lots of cheap junk, and are relentless in watching their weight. He said French mothers have no problems telling their daughters not to eat too much or they will get fat - that they are just really committed to not gaining weight and have a stronger bias against the overweight.

 

He visited my apartment and commented that only in America would a single woman have an apartment with no mirrors save a small one over the bathroom sink, lol. He said a French woman would have a large one at the door so that she could check her hair, makeup, and appearance before she left the apartment.

[regentrude]

1. The standard Italian restaurant measure for a serving of pasta per meal per person is 80 g. For a family of four, that would in theory mean 320 g of pasta for a meal. So, I can loosely round it to 300 or loosely round it to 350. However, if I round it to 350, tbe chances are that I will have leftovers. So I tend to round it to 300, and nobody complains.

Most Americans I know when asked about their norms of pasta for four people would answer 1 lb as a general rule of the thumb - which is cca 450 g, so they may as well cook the whole 500 g package of Barilla if they have it. That is a BIG difference - even if I were to round to 350 g! That is a difference of an additional person or two!

 

Question about this:

If I understand it correctly, pasta is just one of two main dishes served as an Italian meal, right? So, wouldn't you have a Secondo Piatto after the amount of pasta you described above?

 

When we eat pasta, it is the whole one course meal. With a teen and a preteen, we easily eat a pound among the four of us, (we used to have leftovers from it, but not anymore... DS is growing)

 

Btw, when we were in Italy this summer, we were shocked by the huge portions of pasta! We really wanted to eat a full multi-course meal, the way you're supposed to, but the pasta servings must have been adjusted to suit American visitors. There was no way we could have managed the Secondo. So, we ended up being barbarians and eating only one course - but anything else would have been completely impossible. It was Venice, so I assume this was "tourist sizing"?

[thescrappyhomeschooler]

I had a French friend tell me (but he's a man, so take it with a grain of salt) that French women just care more how they look. He said they take more care with their personal appearance than American women, invest more money in better clothes rather than having lots of cheap junk, and are relentless in watching their weight. He said French mothers have no problems telling their daughters not to eat too much or they will get fat - that they are just really committed to not gaining weight and have a stronger bias against the overweight.

 

He visited my apartment and commented that only in America would a single woman have an apartment with no mirrors save a small one over the bathroom sink, lol. He said a French woman would have a large one at the door so that she could check her hair, makeup, and appearance before she left the apartment.

 

I had a male French doctor tell me and a friend something similar (we were not really overweight at that point, just not skeletal!) when we went for our physicals for our green cards. I told him that I was "bien dans ma peau" (literal translation "well in my skin") regardless of my weight, and that I was fortunate not to have to be subject to his opinions of me, unlike his skinny girlfriend that he kept comparing us to. My friend who was with me just got upset and cried. We told one of our female French teachers about what he said, and she was infuriated. She actually wrote that doctor a letter and basically ripped him a new one!

[Ester Maria]

Growing up in Germany, we had five meals, four small one and a large one.

1. Breakfast at 6:30am before going to school -oatmeal or bread with jam.

2. 2nd breakfast at school (around 9am), brought from home. Typically, you brought a whole grain sandwich with cheese or meat (just two slices of bread, maybe with a bit of butter, and the cheese, no sauces, mayo, salad leaves etc) and an apple. You got milk at the school.

3. Lunch. Either at school or, for kids who had parents/grandparents home, at home. Fully cooked meal.

4. Afternoon "vesper". Usually sweet. A roll with jam, or cake. This is a typical meal to invite people for coffee, around 3 or 4pm.

5. Dinner around 7pm. Bread and cheese, salad or veggies. (If lucky, there might be lunch leftovers.)

There was no snacking in between, and no food after dinner.

Most people I know still eat like this.

Fleshing it out over five meals is preferable than over three meals, yes.

For many kids I know, your #1 and #2 would be combined into one meal before school (overall smaller though), an apple would sometimes be taken to school, lunch would be the same, no vesper (typically - though I can imagine coffee with something sweet, especially if the dinner would be later than usual), dinner would be typically around 8. There are huge personal and family oscillations, of course, but this is the basic fleshing out I recall - however, I was not much of an eater.

 

Overall, there are some differences. Breakfasts are similar, lunch / dinner would be cooked (we ate in a way that was later called "Mediterranean diet" - little to none red meat, fish was replacing a lot of meat, lots of combinations of vegetables and salad, some Mid-Eastern meals). Salads were very common.

[Thea]

Something I didn't see mentioned was what a friend of mine said after visiting France. Everything is small. The stairs, the bathroom stalls, the chairs---a few extra pounds and you will receive a 'cue' from everything around you that you need to slim down. Just another possible component. Here, everything is huge--our cars, our aisles, our bathrooms.........

[justamouse]

In the late 70's our many friends from Alabama were all very slim. I always assumed it was because they didn't have air conditioning. It's pretty hard to overeat when you're overheated.

 

They also walked to church, to the lake, and to the little store in the community. I loved to visit, even in summer. I loved the red dirt roads.

 

You know, I think there is a lot of merit in this. We stopped using air conditioning when we moved here two years ago (we have a pool) and when it's in the 80s and above, you just cannot eat. You want cool, watery food like fruits and veggies. You don't want to turn on the stove and heat up the house. Air conditioning changed all of that.

 

I think you also loose the ability to adapt to the summer heat. Now I really don't like air conditioning.

Edited January 6, 2012 by justamouse

[Ester Maria]

Question about this:

If I understand it correctly, pasta is just one of two main dishes served as an Italian meal, right? So, wouldn't you have a Secondo Piatto after the amount of pasta you described above?

Well, I would certainly add something to that pasta, I would not eat pasta alone! :lol: There are thousands of things that go with pasta - one can make it with meat pieces / sauce, with tuna, with vegetables, with tomatoes, with dairy stuff, then there are mixes of several of those, etc. So, that pasta meal would certainly include other things too, plus there would be salad on the table! But nope, there would not be an actual secondo - not on a day to day basis. Pasta with whatever goes with it, and with an accompanying salad plate from which to add salad to one's plate, would be all there is.

 

Sometimes there would be (instead of salad) a minestra as primo and something else as secondo, but in that case, small portions of minestra would be eaten. And sometimes minestra - especially a more "elaborated" one - IS a meal. In the latter case, however, we sometimes take two servings.

Btw, when we were in Italy this summer, we were shocked by the huge portions of pasta! We really wanted to eat a full multi-course meal, the way you're supposed to, but the pasta servings must have been adjusted to suit American visitors. There was no way we could have managed the Secondo. So, we ended up being barbarians and eating only one course - but anything else would have been completely impossible. It was Venice, so I assume this was "tourist sizing"?

In most restaurants you only order one course (assuming it is a typical restaurant where eating is primary, not a "social stuff" thing where eating is secondary and the point is to spend many hours chatting); this is a matter of classification. So, pastas are classified as primi, but in many restaurants they are adjusted to be the meal, because full multi-course meals are rarely done (some fancy dinners, maybe, but as a typical thing you would eat on a typical day in a restaurant, no).

I do not know anyone who seriously does the whole primi - secondi thing on a day to day basis by separating them properly (way too lazy for that :lol:), except when liquid foods are the primo, because liquids are rarely stand-alone meals.

 

Seriously, that pasta primo IS the meal for many families. An "elaborate" salad (with some meat arrangements, etc.) IS a stand-alone meal in many families too. The portions really are smaller, at least the way we do it in our family. Many people when they eat multi-course fancy stuff in some fancy circumstances do not actually finish each course (those arrangements can often be huge and if the whole point is socializing...). It is an overkill. :lol: (Though again, it all depends, there is no uniform custom among everyone.)

 

ETA: Just for the sake of clarification, I use minestra not in a generic sense, but as a liquid meal, in accordance with the common use of the term. (Just not to confuse you if you use it in a generic primo sense.)

Edited January 6, 2012 by Ester Maria

[LeslieAnneLevine]

I had a French friend tell me (but he's a man, so take it with a grain of salt) that French women just care more how they look. He said they take more care with their personal appearance than American women, invest more money in better clothes rather than having lots of cheap junk, and are relentless in watching their weight. He said French mothers have no problems telling their daughters not to eat too much or they will get fat - that they are just really committed to not gaining weight and have a stronger bias against the overweight.

 

 

I had a male French doctor tell me and a friend something similar (we were not really overweight at that point, just not skeletal!) when we went for our physicals for our green cards. I told him that I was "bien dans ma peau" (literal translation "well in my skin") regardless of my weight, and that I was fortunate not to have to be subject to his opinions of me, unlike his skinny girlfriend that he kept comparing us to. My friend who was with me just got upset and cried. We told one of our female French teachers about what he said, and she was infuriated. She actually wrote that doctor a letter and basically ripped him a new one!

 

 

These are some of the things I had in mind when I wrote earlier that some Frenchpeople have weird attitudes about weight. I found people just made way too much mention of people's appearance in general--especially my in-laws! So, the lifestyle tends to be healthy, but the attitudes can be harmful, IMO.

Edited January 7, 2012 by LeslieAnneLevine

[farouk]

Well, I would certainly add something to that pasta, I would not eat pasta alone! :lol: There are thousands of things that go with pasta - one can make it with meat pieces / sauce, with tuna, with vegetables, with tomatoes, with dairy stuff, then there are mixes of several of those, etc. So, that pasta meal would certainly include other things too, plus there would be salad on the table! But nope, there would not be an actual secondo - not on a day to day basis. Pasta with whatever goes with it, and with an accompanying salad plate from which to add salad to one's plate, would be all there is.

 

Sometimes there would be (instead of salad) a minestra as primo and something else as secondo, but in that case, small portions of minestra would be eaten. And sometimes minestra - especially a more "elaborated" one - IS a meal. In the latter case, however, we sometimes take two servings.

 

In most restaurants you only order one course (assuming it is a typical restaurant where eating is primary, not a "social stuff" thing where eating is secondary and the point is to spend many hours chatting); this is a matter of classification. So, pastas are classified as primi, but in many restaurants they are adjusted to be the meal, because full multi-course meals are rarely done (some fancy dinners, maybe, but as a typical thing you would eat on a typical day in a restaurant, no).

I do not know anyone who seriously does the whole primi - secondi thing on a day to day basis by separating them properly (way too lazy for that :lol:), except when liquid foods are the primo, because liquids are rarely stand-alone meals.

 

Seriously, that pasta primo IS the meal for many families. An "elaborate" salad (with some meat arrangements, etc.) IS a stand-alone meal in many families too. The portions really are smaller, at least the way we do it in our family. Many people when they eat multi-course fancy stuff in some fancy circumstances do not actually finish each course (those arrangements can often be huge and if the whole point is socializing...). It is an overkill. :lol: (Though again, it all depends, there is no uniform custom among everyone.)

 

ETA: Just for the sake of clarification, I use minestra not in a generic sense, but as a liquid meal, in accordance with the common use of the term. (Just not to confuse you if you use it in a generic primo sense.)

 

Ester Maria:

 

You're right about the prevalence of pasta in Europe.

 

Kind of built into the culture, I guess.

 

I guess the thin variety of pizza can contain less fat, so it's good to bear this in mind, I reckon.

 

(Delicious, mind ... )

Edited January 6, 2012 by farouk
words missed out

[Negin]

Just saw this.

[justamouse]

Just saw this.

 

Awesome article and awesome blog. Thanks for linking!

[HappyCrazyMama]

Just saw this.

Love this part, "Eating a delicious, perfectly crispy/chewy croissant while sitting in a lovely cafe and chatting with a friend or a lover is much more soul-satisfying than gobbling up greasy chicken fingers and washing it down a diet soda while chauffeuring your kids to and from soccer in your car."

So true, :iagree:.

[Elinor Everywhere]

The first time we took our kids to France, my daughter noted, "Hey, they're not all skinny!" And what I've noticed in my travels is that people in big cities, whether it be Paris, London, Rome, Kiev, or New York, tend to be thinner. Once you get out in the country, they beef up a bit. NOT to the incredibly obeseness that you find in the U.S., but still...not skinny. Must be the walking.

[Vida Winter]

Surrendering is fairly good aerobic exercise. Throwing your hands high in the air....being marched around the place....Oh....wait a second that is the guys who do that.

 

 

 

It was a joke ladies, a joke.

 

:lol:

 

I agree about the diet and walking that others have mentioned. They also dress up a bit to go out - definitely a sense of style present in makeup and wardrobe.

[KnitWit]

We have family members who live in France on the Mediterranean. It is not practical to maneuver their city in a vehicle as the streets are quite narrow and parking is a joke, so they walk. Their apartment is tiny, as well as the elevator. So, they walk up and down and they do not *store* foods like Americans. Of course, they do not have to. They can walk down and pick up fresh ingredients for their meal every single day. And yes, meals are extended. First of all, when you invite people over and give them a time, they may show up several hours later and then you enjoy a long evening of conversation over many courses of food and glasses of wine. When you are done, more than your stomach is satisfied.

 

My dh's grandmother was a Parisian all her life. She never owned a car. She passed away just before turning 100 and was still practicing midwifery full-time up until her death...a very healthy and full life. :)

[Negin]

Interesting article

 

and I really like her stuff.

[momto2Cs]

Interesting article

 

and I really like her stuff.

 

i love the French McD's breakfast! Why don't they offer that here? :tongue_smilie:

[Sputterduck]

Growing up in Germany, we had five meals, four small one and a large one.

1. Breakfast at 6:30am before going to school -oatmeal or bread with jam.

2. 2nd breakfast at school (around 9am), brought from home. Typically, you brought a whole grain sandwich with cheese or meat (just two slices of bread, maybe with a bit of butter, and the cheese, no sauces, mayo, salad leaves etc) and an apple. You got milk at the school.

3. Lunch. Either at school or, for kids who had parents/grandparents home, at home. Fully cooked meal.

4. Afternoon "vesper". Usually sweet. A roll with jam, or cake. This is a typical meal to invite people for coffee, around 3 or 4pm.

5. Dinner around 7pm. Bread and cheese, salad or veggies. (If lucky, there might be lunch leftovers.)

There was no snacking in between, and no food after dinner.

Most people I know still eat like this.

 

No way!!! Germans are Hobbits?

[EKS]

Exercise as a part of daily life and small portions of satisfying food.

[regentrude]

No way!!! Germans are Hobbits?

 

In that sense, yes.

2nd breakfast is still done nowadays; kids are supposed to bring food to school to eat in the breakfast break around 9 or 9:30, and in elementary the whole class will sit and eat together. (They will have eaten breakfast at home at 7am before leaving, and they will get lunch at the school around 12 noon.)

[Sputterduck]

In that sense, yes.

2nd breakfast is still done nowadays; kids are supposed to bring food to school to eat in the breakfast break around 9 or 9:30, and in elementary the whole class will sit and eat together. (They will have eaten breakfast at home at 7am before leaving, and they will get lunch at the school around 12 noon.)

 

I thought that J. R. R. Tolkien made up second breakfast. :001_huh: :D

 

Do you ever have elevensies? :tongue_smilie:

[Alphabetika]

I am reading this thread with interest. I haven't read the "French Women" book, but here is a book I read recently that gives some interesting hard data about why eating real fats/grains/veggies/meat/dairy/generally unprocessed food is better for weight loss (and general health, of course) than the typical American sugary/fake fat/low-carb/low-fat/pretend food diet promoted in the US. If you've read anything related to Weston Price, this won't be new information, but I found it an excellent read.

 

 

http://www.amazon.com/Real-Food-What-Eat-Why/dp/1596913428/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1329791636&sr=8-1

[SunnyDays]

I love that book, and Mireille Guiliano. And between the walking and the fresh market eating habits, they're obviously onto something. I so dearly wish we lived in a place where it would be practical to walk everywhere.

[Negin]

i love the French McD's breakfast! Why don't they offer that here? :tongue_smilie:

I know. Seriously.

 

Exercise as a part of daily life and small portions of satisfying food.

These two are so true, particularly portion sizes.

 

I am reading this thread with interest. I haven't read the "French Women" book, but here is a book I read recently that gives some interesting hard data about why eating real fats/grains/veggies/meat/dairy/generally unprocessed food is better for weight loss (and general health, of course) than the typical American sugary/fake fat/low-carb/low-fat/pretend food diet promoted in the US. If you've read anything related to Weston Price, this won't be new information, but I found it an excellent read.

http://www.amazon.com/Real-Food-What-Eat-Why/dp/1596913428/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1329791636&sr=8-1

I've heard this mentioned here before. It's been on my wish list for some time. Thank you for the reminder. Makes so much sense to me. Obviously, all the diet, low-carb, processed stuff is just not working.

 

I so dearly wish we lived in a place where it would be practical to walk everywhere.

Me too. I was made to live in the city - places like Paris, London, NY, etc. Not too crazy about the weather, but I do so love all that walking.