Unesco recognises French gastronomy as a world treasure

French cuisine really IS the best in the world.

Mousseline de patates douces à l'orange , coquilles Saint Jacques poêlées

If anyone really needed confirmation of that, they need look no further than the decision on Tuesday by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco) to add it to a list "aiming to protect intangible slices of a nation's heritage."

That's the somewhat formal and convoluted way of saying it has been given the official seal of approval and it's the first time a country's gastronomy has been included.

All right so "intangible heritage" might seem a slightly highfaluting term at first glance, but as Cécile Duvelle, Secretary of the Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (there's a mouthful-and-a-half of an official title) says on the organisations website, it's intended to protect and recognise traditions that are threatened by increasing globalisation (see video).



The perhaps extraordinary idea of applying to Unesco first took shape in 2006 when a group of leading French chefs, with not of course the merest hint of gastronomic prejudice, launched a campaign trumpeting that (French) "cuisine was their culture".

The French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, took up the cudgels so to speak when he gave his backing to the official application when it was slapped in last year.

And when experts met in the Kenyan capital Nairobi this week, it was thumbs up for French grub and the whole ritual of presenting, serving and eating it deciding (among other things) that it "plays an active social role within its community and is transmitted from generation to generation as part of its identity."

In short it tastes good and the French like to eat!

Catherine Colonna, France's ambassador to Unesco, was naturally delighted by the decision and said, perhaps a little unnecessarily, how much her fellow countrymen and women enjoyed a meal.

"The French love getting together to eat and drink well and enjoy good times in such a manner," she's quoted as saying.

"It's part of our tradition -- a quite active tradition," she added.

She's not kidding.

As anyone who has ever had the pleasure of being invited to a family meal in France and experienced the delight of tucking into deliciously and lovingly prepared dishes, food still plays an important part in everyday life.

The traditional weekend spread stretching on for hours might be something of a tired cliché, but it does exist, and there is of course a wealth of mouth watering regional gastronomic specialities.

And let's not forget the fascination or almost social obsession the French seem to have with food and chattering about other dishes virtually to the exclusion of the one they're currently "enjoying" as mealtime conversation revolves around - what else, but food.

Bon appétit.