You can find them at every corner and on every plate in a restaurant: our beloved french fries. Belgians - and this shouldn’t be a suprise - are considered to be the inventors. So where do they do come frome and what’s with the confusion?

In 1781 Joseph Gérard wrote: “The inhabitants of Namur, Huy and Dinant have the habit of fishing in the Maas and to frie their fishes to expand their menu, especially the poor. In winter, when the river freezes and fishing is hardly possible anymore, they cut potatoes into the form of fish and frie them instead. This procedure is more than 100 years old.”

This was the birth of the predecessor of todays fries. They spread to the european neighborcountries rapidly.

After the First World War american soldiers brought them to the US. Because of some difficulties with the European geography and all of its comparebly small countries, the fried potatos were wrongly named “French fries” and this name got its way parallel to the raising familarity and popularity of the potatosticks.

But not everywhere. Actually, there are some more or less spectacular exeptions: In Great Britan they are called pommes chips or chips crisps and in France itself they are untypically unpatriotic named “frites“.

The story becomes much more exiting in the US from March 2003 onwards, when the former chairman of the Committee on House Administration of the house of representatives, Robert Ney, instructed the cafeterias to sell „French Fries“ as „Freedom Fries“. Several restaurants in USA followed the example during the war in iraq in 2003.The reason was the rejection of France concerning the US- leaded war in iraq. During a very short time the good old fries rised from dubious junk food to a political symbol of loyality and love to independance. „ We want to stress our displeasure with our so called ally France.“, gave the representative Ney reason for their decision.

Lead a simple side dish a the political disaster? Well, that would really be overkill. The spokeswoman of the french government pointed to the fact that “French Fries” come from Belgium and added: “We are in a very serious situation dealing with very serious problems. Thats why we dont deal with the name of potatos right now.“

In the meantime the label „ freedom frites“ is not up to date anymore. Quietly and secretly it disappers from the menus. This time there were no comments on the „Re-designation“ by any of the former leading politicians. |