“Meals are extremely significant moments in forming a family’s values.”
In Dijon (Eastern France) – the city where I teach – I’ve already had the opportunity to organize a number of themed meals (seventies style meals, crackers-only meals, all-blue, all-red or all-black meals, reversed dish order meals and so on). People are keen on finding themes and treating themselves once in a while. This should not be seen as a luxury activity for the rich or as a necessity for the poor, but rather merely as a way to express the freedom of each and every one of us to have fun and to produce meaning and signs when seated around a table.
Eating needs and habits are currently undergoing great transformations (they are becoming less and less formal). Why are these changes occurring? Where are they taking us?
J.J.B: More than ever people are now infused with the need to stage their everyday life. A glance at the link between meal-sharing space and interior design suffices to prove this point. In times past, rooms were built for a function: the kitchen to eat in, the living-room for occasional get-togethers, always being careful not to put finger marks on the table your mother had polished compulsively – and the bedroom to sleep in. This whole structure has drastically evolved over time: kitchens have become rooms to live in, rooms where people exchange and share, often carefully designed. We spend more time in our kitchens than in our living rooms, which have now been transformed into home cinemas where it is also possible to eat. The wide-ranging panel of rules governing the the art of eating can be associated to all rooms of the house: you can eat perched upon a stool in the kitchen or prepare a tray to eat with your spouse in the bedroom or in front of the TV. This way of staging interior space is a way for people to experience new sensations. Moreover, twenty-first century citizens are no longer locked up within rigidly separated sets of rules. Thanks to easier access to mobility, they have had the opportunity to travel around the world and discover new cultures and eating habits. They have already tried tex-mex, Italian and Chinese cuisine, to name but a few. Even without traveling you just need to look in the exotic produce sections of the major supermarket chains to broaden your culinary horizons and enjoy new and exciting flavors. This has contributed to considerably enrich eating habits. For instance, the general mistrust of Asian food has gradually retreated. Meal home delivery has greatly evolved over the years and is becoming more sophisticated. The “deconstruction” of the dining scene has led to more freedom and more new experiences. Despite social evolutions, when asked, most French people say that “eating together” still stands as one of the main pillars of family unity. Meals are extremely significant moments in forming a family’s values.
CADI: As a specialist in the art of eating what do you think about eating habits becoming less and less formal?
J.J.B: Once people experience certain sensations, they will increasingly seek to make them deeper and more meaningful. Even if they pick and choose, in no particular order initially, they always revert to their fundamental values. At some point they feel like heightening their sensations. In a study on the wine growing industry in Burgundy, we realized that an increasing number of people are trying to discover new wines and are turning their backs on cheap wine. Tea also typifies this trend quite significantly. Still a few years ago, people simply bought tin boxes of Earl Grey or Lipton Yellow tea. Now, when invited for tea you are required to pick from at least fifteen different flavors. The same applies to coffee: since a new generation of coffee machines has come onto the market, consumers can now choose from a ridiculously wide range of coffee blends in the form of capsules, which vary in strength, origin etc. At this pace, people will soon have the choice of over thirty different types of coffee capsules. At first people select their capsules randomly and then when a flavor or blend appeals to them they are spurred on to explore other taste dimensions. The future of culinary circles relies on this desire for new experiences that each and every one of us has when it comes to brands of oil, tea or coffee, for example. Food professionals will then have to work on other types of food products such as meat, for instance. Today, when you buy a joint of beef it shows no information as to the meat’s origin. Does the meat come from an old stray cow or from a sturdy ox? One day, I’m sure we’ll be able to buy sirloins or prime ribs doted with the quality label “Grand cru”, like on wines. We are currently veering towards a more and more subtle segmentation of food products.
CADI: But does this segmentation mirror a true consumer need or is it rather a new territory that marketing is set to conquer?
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