Beyond Baguettes

“We eat more bread in France because we make the best bread in the world.” In 1767, Paul-Jacques Malouin, a member of the French Academy of Sciences, was unshakable in his opinion, and today, more than two centuries later, most Frenchmen probably would still agree with him.

But would the savant from the court of Louis XV recognize what his late 20th century countrymen now believe to be bread and, further, would he relish eating it?

The baguette--the familiar long loaf whose name literally means “rod” or “wand”--still accounts for 80% of France’s bread sales, with 10 billion being crunched every year. But a good bakery in Paris or Perigueux these days also offers the choice of dozens of other loaves, made of different grains, flavored with different ingredients and sometimes even decorated like cakes.

Just as with wine, some breads are especially prized for how they accompany a particular food: corn bread for foie gras, walnut-and-grape bread for soft cheese, olive bread for mousse de canard.

Throughout the 1990s, gourmands across France have also assiduously been developing what they call a culture du gou^t, meaning an emphasis on distinct tastes and flavors to counterbalance the growing standardization imposed by the food industry. Bread has been a key part of this movement.

More and more of the French these days are eating brown breads made not from refined wheat flour, as the baguette is, but from rye, bran or whole wheat. Nutritionists in France have also dropped the “bread equals fat” theory still popular in Hollywood and have started to recommend breads as part of a daily well-balanced diet.

“Diversity in bread is part of a celebration of gastronomy. People will choose their bread as they choose their wine,” says Herve Robert, a doctor who is co-author of “Le Pain,” a recent book feting the proliferation of breads.

In a strange way, the French government’s social policy helped spawn a multitude of choices. Over the centuries, bread shortages in this country have led to unrest and rioting and, most famously, may have cost Marie Antoinette her head.

Absorbing that lesson, the French state for most of this century kept a ceiling on the price of a baguette and its heavier cousin, known simply as a pain, to guarantee that even people with the most modest incomes could afford bread.

The paradoxical result was that the baguette, the sort of bread that once graced only the tables of France’s well-to-do, became a staple that everybody could buy. To make money, bakers were forced to branch out into products whose prices were not fixed by decree.

Since 1978, the price of a baguette has been decontrolled (in a typical bakery on the rue Mademoiselle in Paris’ 15th arrondissement, a loaf costs 4.20 francs, or 66 cents). But tastes have changed, spurred by the mass-produced loaves baked from frozen dough that, more likely than not, are what consumers get when they buy baguettes.

Dissatisfied, many of the French now want something else. Even in supermarkets, the leading retailers of the assembly-line baguette, the selection has been greatly widened to embrace exotic products such as walnut bread, soybean bread and organic boules, or round breads.

“The average baguette is not good,” says Katherine Khodorowsky, president of a club of Parisian gourmands and Robert’s co-author. “More than its quality, it is its image that matters, like any symbol.”

The baguette is easy to transport (it even fits nicely onto a bicycle’s rear-wheel luggage rack). A French child’s first real rite of responsibility as he or she grows up is to buy a freshly baked loaf for dinner on the way home from school.

“I easily identify with the image of the French citizen going home with a baguette under his arm,” Khodorowsky says. She confesses that when she buys a baguette, “I love to break an end off and eat it on my way home.”

This loaf is the symbol of a French golden age, and its popularity reached its acme in the years after World War II, when many of the French banned brown bread from their tables as an unwelcome reminder of the privations of the Occupation.

“The phenomenon was mainly urban, because rural regions had not been so harshly subject to shortages,” Robert says. “They managed to keep bread of good quality, contrary to cities like Paris.”

The slender, perishable classic of the French table also may be at odds with the rhythms of modern life. With Frenchwomen increasingly working, and maids and cooks the lot of a privileged few, it is more difficult for many families to get to the bakery daily. Hence the popularity of boules, rustic-style breads that keep for up to five days.

“It is easier to buy a round loaf that will last the week than to go to your bakery every day to buy your baguette,” Khodorowsky says.

As a result of the rising arc in the national standard of living, daily bread consumption by the average Frenchman has dropped by half since 1950. Nevertheless, attachment to bread remains emotional, even mystical.

“Bread is more than bread. It is no coincidence [that] bread is in every religion,” says Lionel Poilane, one of Paris’ most famous bakers and a proponent of returning to 19th century methods of baking. “It is a symbol of life and has brought mankind to where it is today.”

One recent poll found that 83% of the French are very attached to bread made by an artisan baker who kneads his dough on the premises rather than having it delivered frozen. The poll, conducted by the Sofres social research institute, also found that 86% of people in France would walk 500 more yards to buy a good baguette.

“Bread is universal. It is half of any meal,” says Jean-Luc Poujauran, whose bakery, on the rue Jean Nicot near the Eiffel Tower, is one of the most highly rated in Paris. Among his offerings: bread flavored with garlic or with jelly made of shallots.

To keep bakers in this country up to par, the Paris City Hall has for the last six years organized the “Grand Prix of the Baguette.” This year’s winner of the 20,000-franc [$3,147] check for first place was Stephane Pouget, 34, baker and pastry maker at 104 rue Bobillot, near Charlety Stadium.

Being an artisan baker is hard work. To serve morning customers, he (only a few women have entered the trade) must start his day at 4 a.m., while the rest of the city is fast asleep. “It takes six hours to make a good baguette, only two to make a bad one,” he explains.

“It is a very difficult job, and it takes a lot of courage to do it,” Poujauran says. “One of the greatest satisfactions of the day often is when I go to bed.”

Although what they sell may be changing, bakeries from Parisian quarters to isolated villages in the Auvergne region of central France remain both the source of a daily foodstuff and de facto social centers. Graduate students trying to make ends meet by giving private tutoring in English, baby-sitters and people wanting to rent vacation homes all advertise by posting slips of paper at the local bakery.

In large cities, running into your neighbors in the bread line on Sundays is a way to catch up on the news of the week. Even Parisians seem to shed their weekday reserve and anonymity when served by a counter clerk who has come to know them.

The French enjoy discussing bread almost as much as eating it.

As part of France’s culinary wealth, each region has its own specialties, and an identical loaf can change names based on where one bakes it or buys it. There is even a running debate on the baguette. Some like it crisp and toasted on the outside, others prefer it slightly underdone so it melts on the palate.