15 Old-School French Recipes Your Grandma Used to Make (2024)

FAQs

What is the first recorded French recipe book? ›

Haute cuisine (pronounced [ot kɥizin], "high cuisine") has foundations during the 17th century with a chef named La Varenne. As an author of works such as Le Cuisinier françois, he is credited with publishing the first true French cookbook. His book includes the earliest known reference to roux using pork fat.

Moules à la Marinière is perhaps Julia Child's best known recipes. But, when you flip through her famous book – Mastering the Art of French Cooking, you come across another masterpiece - Moules à la …

The first recorded cookbook that is still in print today is Of Culinary Matters (originally, De Re Coquinaria), written by Apicius, in fourth century AD Rome. It contains more than 500 recipes, including many with Indian spices.

Yale Culinary Tablets (1700 BC)

Three clay tablets dating back to 1700 BC may just be the oldest cookbooks in the world. Known as the Yale culinary tablets and part of the Yale's Babylonian collection, these Mesopotamian tablets display the oldest recipes.

The 1,000 year old recipes included meat samosa, fried pumpkin bites, tamarind fish, shredded jackfruit and millet bread. Ingredients that are staples of modern Indian food - tomatoes, chilis, potatoes, cauliflower, cabbage, beans and peas - weren't available. They hadn't been introduced to the country yet.

Bread is considered to be first prepared probably some 30000+ years back and is one of the very first foods made by mankind. The earliest proof of making bread loaf occurred with the Natufian hunter-gatherers that lived in the Levant.

Le déjeuner (lunch)

The French give a lot of importance to their meals and they spend a lot of time at the table. On average, they spend 2 hours 13 minutes at the table per day, compared to 1 hour 02 minutes for Americans.

Butter – The Soul of French Cooking:

In French cooking, butter reigns supreme. Its creamy richness adds a luxurious touch to sauces, pastries, and pan-seared delights. From the celebrated beurre blanc to the flaky layers of croissants, butter sets French cuisine apart and elevates its flavors to new heights.

The general rule [...] is that three major [emphasis added] changes are required to make a recipe "yours." However, even if you make such changes, it is a professional courtesy to acknowledge the source of or inspiration for the recipe.

Chefs don't (usually) own them, either

While they may create an incredible recipe, when they make it at work, it becomes the restaurant's property. However, nothing can stop the same chef from altering the recipe later on and claiming the new version as their own.

What was the first printed book in French? ›

MS M. 672-5 III, fol. 310r. de Vignay's translation was the one printed in the first book printed in French in 1476. sanctorum, sive Lombardica historia (The Golden Legend) edited by Jean Battalier.

The first recorded cookbook is said to be four clay tablets from 1700 BC in Ancient Mesopotamia, but by the 1300s, cookbooks were a norm for kings and nobles. In 1390, Forme of Cury (The Rules of Cookery) was published for–but not by–King Richard II.

“Mastering the Art of French Cooking” by Julia Child, Louisette Bertholle, and Simone Beck.

The book was written for the American market and published by Knopf in 1961 (Volume 1) and 1970 (Volume 2). The success of Volume 1 resulted in Julia Child being given her own television show, The French Chef, one of the first cooking programs on American television.