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Comment by BugsJustFindMe | Hacker News Reader

I lived in France for a long time, and tacos is my definitely favorite French food. You have to understand that the fantasy of food in France being all fancy shit is extremely wrong. In accord with the vast European street food tradition, the most French of French foods is a ham and butter sandwich on white bread with nothing else on it. And French people go nuts for stuff like that, because the other thing that France is exceptionally good at is saying "Get the fuck outta here. We're closed because it's 3pm and humans don't eat between 2pm and 6. Bye, good afternoon, see you later." So when you can get a meat, cheese, and french fries (on the inside!) burrito by a wrong-but-hilariously-adjacent name that's as big as your face for a few euros, it's a real blessing that instills one with great national pride.

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""Get the fuck outta here. We're closed because it's 3pm and humans don't eat between 2pm and 6. Bye, good afternoon, see you later.""

So true! As a tourist in France, it was a great time to practise some intermittent fasting skills.

Except for the "quatre-heures", of course -- a small snack enjoyed at 4PM. My grandmother would have a brioche, and I would have a croissant or something. If hungry, go inside a boulangerie and get yourself a baguette bien cuite (well cooked) -- nothing is as divine as that.

I respectfully disagree, bread is best enjoyed "pas trop cuit"

> the most French of French foods is a ham and butter sandwich on white bread with nothing else on it

100% correct. It's not even any fancy bread with grains etc like you'd get in most of EU; just a poor piece of (often so-so) baguette.

Something I found amusing is that it's been almost impossible to find typical "international" quick foods like hot dogs where I live (south-east); however, since restaurants can't function normally due to pandemic, suddenly takeaway hot dogs started appearing in recent months in many places.

But the rare canonical jambon-beurre sandwich, made of quality fresh baguette, normandy salted butter and good ham is really really good.

I feel like a so-so French baguette would be miles better than any baguette in the US

Eh, it's not. The US also has good bakeries, just not on every street corner. In Paris, walk 5 blocks and you'll pass at least one bakery and 37 pharmacies[1]. Cities in the US just aren't built that way.

[1] - No joke, standing in the street outside my apartment in Paris I could see green cross signs from 7(!) different pharmacies without moving just by looking in different directions.

With the corresponding 37 real estate agencies.

Yep pharmacies are everywhere in FR just behind a corner (as well as immobiliers). I was in shock when I went to Amsterdam and after walking around for half an hour didn't come across any and had to look up on Google Maps.

Unlike other countries, in FR only pharmacies can sell drugs, no regular shops / supermarkets (even basic stuff like paracetamol), and I guess that's the reason why there are so many of them.

In Italy it's the same, but we don't have so many pharmacies. I think it's quite a French thing.

When did they start appearing? I can't remember seeing them at all from my visits which I think were around 2005.

I only first started noticing them around Lyon/Grenoble in 2014, on the menus of various kebab places in Paris maybe a year or two later.

I don't know when they started exactly, but Wikipedia says that the founders of the O'Tacos chain started their first tacos restaurant in Grenoble in 2007.

While I agree with the 3-pm food in France sentiment. As a french person returning to France after 15 years away the "french tacos" seem like the most vile cultural mashup and taste made into a log of soggy fries and cheese sauce.

In general my rule of thumb is : stick to french food in France. Culturally imported dishes are often a very poor adaptation and I am often disappointed.

well, currently most option for fancy food in France are closed because of Covid-19. Though having tried French tacos once, I think I'll still choose McDo/Burger King if I'm hungry and on the move at an odd hour

>I lived in France for a long time, and tacos is my definitely favorite French food. You have to understand that the fantasy of food in France being all fancy shit is extremely wrong. In accord with the vast European street food tradition,

French tacos are being written about in the New Yorker and discussed positively on HN. If that doesn't make them pretentious yuppie food then nothing does.

> If that doesn't make them pretentious yuppie food then nothing does.

So maybe nothing does.

One culture's working class food is another culture's insufferably fancy food. It's all relative.

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