G is for Goûter
Goûter: To taste; to try for the first time; a light afternoon snack
Breakfast, elevenses, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner, supper. I think if we try hard enough we can squeeze in nearly 10 meals into an average day, affording the opportunity to eat well and prosper every couple of hours. We’ve all read the articles or seen the studies: Eat 2 large meals a day to lower your cholesterol; Lightly graze every hour for the best metabolism boost; No solid food and green juice twice a week will make you glow. The advice waves more than the Royal Family over the Jubilee weekend meaning that none of these tips are substantiated, so the best thing to do is to ignore the noise and eat as, when, and what you want. For me, this means making the most of every opportunity to make/buy/eat a delicious bite and so the introduction of the French ‘goûter’ was a welcome addition to my day.
The verb goûter means to taste or to try but as a noun it refers to an afternoon snack. It was introduced as an official part of the school day in France in 1941, usually consisting of a little cake or a tartine au beurre. Similarly to an English afternoon tea, the goûter has been depicted and immortalised through the ages in the form of literature and art.
Though the French tradition of bread and jam or a pain au chocolat at 16h still prevails, I am of the opinion that one can eat absolutely whatever they desire for their goûter. A snack between meals feels on the illicit side so you can make your goûter as naughty and anachronistic as possible. A bowl of cereal in the mid-afternoon slump or a back-of-the-freezer ice lolly. Anything is possible.
There is a freedom that comes with growing up that is emphasised at meal times, when you are cooking for yourself you can technically eat whatever you want. The parental white-noise may be causing static in your brain asking if you’ve eaten your five-a-day but if you really wanted to eat a Twix for breakfast and a Mars Bar for lunch, there is no-one stopping you. This freedom is quite scary. I’ve written about it before but the idea of learning to live independently is one that which I find hard to shake, a letting go of childhood and adolescence and accepting forms of responsibility, for me, is terrifying. I’m working through a personality foible that was accurately summed up in the most recent novel I’ve read and that foible is “a fatal hunger for permanence”. In Evelyn Waugh’s Vile Bodies, Father Rothschild speaks of young people as being discontent with muddling through life and this struck a chord. Despite my lazy procrastination habits, I crave perpetuity and continuity, I like things to last, perhaps this explains my delight at pantry cupboard ingredients with long expiry dates, baked beans will always endure. This predisposition for security makes the sticky transitions through my twenties all the more adhesive, we are programmed to keep moving forward, chasing the prey, growing up, so any moves that are slower than usual feel degenerative.
When I moved to Paris in 2019, I started working in an office and it felt very grown-up very quickly and so after a year of this adult charade, the idea of returning to university and to the arrested development felt unthinkable. Luckily there was a way in which I could finish my degree and continue my advancement intentions. I am now, however, back to school, a more applied and appetising school, but a school nonetheless. My first week at Ducasse has been classroom and theory based, making the scholastic transition even more pronounced. Our class of 5 students have been sitting for a week, donned in full chef’s whites, learning about proper hygiene practices and the business of running a restaurant and the experience has been quite cathartic. It has been a little while since I’ve been in a classroom or even in a learning environment and it is nice to be back to it, it is serving as a hot reminder not to rush through life moments. The act of growing up has to be done in manageable bites, small morsels of maturing, the goûter of life can be varied and incongruous but is always a nice pause for reflection. I’ve tried before to rush it and it becomes far too easy to skip over important moments, two steps forward and one step back.
It is much easier said than done to put down our metaphorical fork between mouthfuls of life but it is becoming my new goal in order to savour the process. Whether it’s a slice of cake or a babybel that you’re eating for your goûter, relish it like you’re tasting it for the first time.
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G is for Goûter
Brilliantly written and thought provoking for someone "picking" at her 50s or more pushing them around the plate!
Yet another interesting read. Well done again Tori.👏👏😘😘