European epicures had a similar reaction to American fast food when it started showing up after the war. McDonald's, et al, had distilled food down to it's most basic taste components (salty, umami, sweet, sour etc.) and rebuilt into assembly line products -burgers, pizza, fries and sandwiches.

The epicures found it ghastly and alien, a sort of culi... See more

I have a great fondness for boudin noir, which I think of as one of the aristocrats of the sausage family—a blood sausage made with pork, usually served on a warm bed of thinly sliced cooked apples. Smooth and rich and dark, it is a dish to be eaten in front of the fire on a day when there is frost on the ground and an icy wind butting against the

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