Paris might be known as the city of lights but France is known as the country of food! There are so many foods from France that you should try when visiting this beautiful country. You’ve probably heard of at least 5 of the foods from France listed below. From croissants to steak frites, to escargots to tarte Tatin, nobody can resist these French food staples! We made a list of the 22 foods from France you must try but we’ll be honest, it could be a list of the 100 foods you must try.
The list of foods from France is divided into categories: breakfast, lunch, snack, dinner, and dessert. Without further ado, let’s check out this list of foods from France. Hope you’re hungry!
French Food from France You Should Try
Crêpe
Crêpes are French pancakes, except instead of being thick and small they are extremely thin and quite big. You can have these for breakfast or dessert, you decide! They can be savoury or sweet: you can add fruits, Nutella, whipped cream, cheese, onions, leeks, and meat. They are easy to make. You only need a few ingredients: flour, sugar, salt, milk, butter and vanilla. You can easily make some at home, just make sure that when you flip them, they don’t end up on the ceiling.
Croissant & pain au chocolat
Bonjour! Croissants and pains au chocolat are breakfast staples in France. In fact, it might be one of the most well-known foods from France! These pastries are buttery, flaky, and airy. Croissants are known for their crescent shape (croissant means crescent in French) and pain au chocolat is made with the same kind of dough but it has pieces of chocolate in the centre and are rectangular. When you travel to France, pop into a patisserie, grab a few croissants and pains au chocolat, some butter and jam and you’ve got yourself a delicious breakfast!
Croque-monsieur
This is a type of grilled cheese sandwich that is very popular in France. The main ingredients are bread, eggs, boiled ham, and cheese (usually they use Emmental or Gruyère). This sandwich is quite hearty. It will fill you up quickly and you’ll be stuffed until dinnertime. You can also order a croque-madame, a version of this sandwich with a fried egg on top.
Soupe à l’oignon
Soupe à l’oignon (French onion soup) is the perfect meal during the colder months. This hearty soup is made with beef stock, onions (tons of them), gruyère cheese, and some nice crisp baguette. You put them bits of baguette on top of your soup dish, add tons of cheese and plop it in the oven. The crusty layer is delicious, but we must warn you, it’s really hot so wait a few minutes before diving in. This is what you would call real comfort food. Nobody is ever unsatisfied after having a big bowl of onion soup.
Baguette
Baguette is the quintessential French bread. If you ever see a caricature of a French person they will be bicycling, wearing a striped shirt, have a beret on and will be holding a baguette. Baguettes are a huge part of French cooking. This long and thin bread is delicious warm, with some salty butter, or jam, marmalade, Nutella, cheese, pâté, etc. The crust is crunchy and inside you get a delicious dough. It’s a snack you can have morning, afternoon, and night.
Cheese
The French know all about cheese. It’s in their blood, the talk about it constantly, they even dream about it! French cheese is gooey, stinky, flavourful, and creamy. Did you know that cheese can be aged for 24 to 36 months? French people love cheese, they have it as a snack, they always try to include it in their meals and they often also have some after their meal. You cannot go to France without trying Brie, Roquefort, Bleu, Gruyère, Livarot, etc. You know what they say, the stinkier the better!
Steak frites
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Steak frites is a classic French dish. This dish is served in brasseries, a type of restaurant with a relaxed setting. Brasserie means brewery in French. If you’re going to a real brasserie in France, you will find steak frites on the menu. So even say that this dish is France’s national dish…but Belgium says the same thing. Brasseries usually use an entrecôte (ribeye), and deep fry the potatoes to make fries since frites means fries in French. If you’re a meat lover, you’ll love this French classic.
Moules-frites
Another classic French meal. Moule means mussel in French. The mussels are cooked in various broths. You can try moules marinière, cooked in white wine, shallots, parsley, and butter broth. You can also try moules à la crème, cooked with white wine stock, cream and flour to thicken it. Another great variant is moules à la bière, mussels cooked in beer instead of white wine. Even if it is considered one of the national dishes of Belgium, this dish is very popular in France.
Ratatouille
We bet you’ve already watched the hit Disney movie with the same name! Ratatouille, the food, is a vegetable stew-type dish: you usually find zucchini, eggplant, tomatoes, garlic, onions, bell peppers, fennel, thyme, bay leaves, basil, herbes de Provence, etc. This dish is originally from Nice, in the South of France. Ratatouille has existed since 1877 and has many variants. You can either have it on its own or serve it as a side dish, accompanying meat. Foods from France are often heavy and fat. But this dish is super healthy!
Coquilles Saint-Jacques
Coquilles Saint-Jacques is usually served as an appetizer. It consists of scallops mixed in a white wine and cream sauce topped with grated cheese and then broiled to melt the cheese. They can also be made with mashed potatoes. Fun fact: Saint-Jacques scallops have about 200 eyes! Now that’s a great conversation starter if you’re in France and you’re eating this dish.
Gratin Dauphinois
If you love cream, you’ll love gratin Dauphinois, a French side-dish made with thinly sliced potatoes, cream, garlic, and cheese that you cook in the oven. This dish gets its name from the region it’s from Dauphiné, in the south-east of France. This dish is delicious and is a great accompaniment to lamb, beef, chicken. If you’re on a diet, this will probably set you back a few days but honestly, no one should visit France while on a diet. There is too much good food out there to stop oneself.
Boeuf Bourguignon
This dish originates from Burgundy (hence the name, Bourguignon) in the east of France. This stew is the perfect comfort food during the colder months. The mix of braised beef, garlic, pearl onions, mushrooms, and bacon with the red wine is exquisite. Like all stews, this used to be the poor man’s food but slowly, it gained recognition and became a very sophisticated dish. You can also easily make this at home to impress your guests!
Duck confit
Well yes, duck is a very popular animal to cook in France. For duck confit, you use the whole duck so every part has its own use. This is a specialty from Gascony, in the southwestern part of France. This is a really special dish since you need to marinate the duck for 36 hours with salt, garlic, and herbs, then you cook it in its own fat. You get very crispy, lightly salted duck. A delicious option if you love duck.
Coq au vin
Coq au vin is similar to boeuf bourguignon except instead of having braised beef, you make this dish with chicken. You use braised chicken, red Burgundy wine, bacon, mushrooms, etc. There are many variants, depending on which kind of wine you use: you can make coq au vin jaune (with Jura wine), Coq au Riesling (from the Alsace region), Coq au violet (with Beaujolais) or Coq au Champagne (made of course, with Champagne). If you know the American chef Julia Child, you know she was a big fan of this dish.
Escargots (snails)
Snails! Yes, the French love to eat these slippery and slimy mollusks. If you are a true foodie you will have to try these once you arrive in France. Served as a starter dish, snails are usually mixed with butter, garlic and shallots. They contain a lot of protein and have little fat (if you don’t have them with butter), so they are really healthy too!
Foie gras
Foie gras… One of the most controversial French foods. If you’re a vegetarian or don’t eat animals that have been mistreated, you might want to skip this one. Foie gras means to essentially force feed a duck through a tube so their liver (foie means liver in French) becomes very fatty. This is a process called gavage or force-feeding. It is a very luxurious product that French people don’t eat every day but they love it. It is very rich, has a buttery texture and is usually accompanied with steak. You might be surprised that gavage has been used since Ancient Egypt.
Tartare (steak, tuna, salmon)
Steak, tuna and salmon tartare is a raw meat or fish dish. You cannot use any old grocery meat or fish to make this dish. You need the freshest meat and fish or else you can get extremely sick. You might find it weird to have raw meat, but it is very popular with the French. Steak tartare usually comes with an egg yolk and is served with rye bread. Tuna and salmon tartare usually have spices and herbs and all three are served with fries. Make sure you trust the restaurant that serves tartare. You don’t want to spend your night in the toilet, or worse, at the hospital.
Tarte Tatin
This delicious dessert gets its name from a hotel in the south of Paris. Apparently, one of the sisters who owned the hotel cooked an apple pie but made a mistake and ended up serving this upside-down dish to her guests who loved it. This dessert is an upside-down pie, usually made with caramelized apples. You bake the pie then flip it so the pastry is on the bottom and the caramelized fruit is on top. It is great served warm with some vanilla bean ice cream. You can also make tarte Tatin with pears, pineapple or peaches.
Macaron
Macarons are a very light French dessert and one of the most famous foods from France. These colourful bites are filled with meringue and come in a very large range of flavours: you can have chocolate meringues, raspberry ones, vanilla, caramel, pistachio, etc. Everyone loves these because there are so many different kinds. Macarons are so popular that if you’ve been to Canada, England, or the United States, you’ve probably already tasted on or seen them at the popular Ladurée mint-green store.
Crème brûlée
Crème brulée or burnt cream is a scrumptious dessert made with vanilla custard and a hard layer of caramel on top. You bake in a water bath a mixture of cream, vanilla, egg yolks and sugar. Once it’s cooled, you add sugar to the dish and quickly torch the top to create a caramel. Not many people have a crème brûlée iron or a cooking torch so people enjoy eating this meal at the restaurant.
Soufflé
It’s not a cliché : foods from France can be complicated to cook. For example, soufflé is one of the hardest French desserts to make. So many people try to make this dish but can’t make it rise. Soufflé means to puff up or expand. A soufflé can be savoury or sweet. They are usually cooked in ramekins and are made with egg whites, egg yolks, sugar, etc.
Madeleine
Have you ever read Marcel Proust’s novel In Search of Lost Time? If you remember, the narrator recalls a moment in his childhood when he ate madeleines dipped in tea. This French cake is also famous because it is delicious and simple. This spongy cake is not too sweet so it is a great afternoon snack or a light dessert after a big meal, What makes them really unique is the shell-like shape of the baking pan. You will usually taste almonds and lemon zest in these marvellous cakes.
Would you recommend other foods from France? If you’re a foodie, you should also try these foods from Québec.
