In Paris, a kerfuffle. Late last month, under pressure from the health ministry, the salt content in the city’s baguettes was cut from 1.5g per 100g of bread to 1.4g. It seems that the morning baguette currently accounts for 18% of the average French adult’s salt intake of 7.7g a day, which is somewhat distant from the World Health Organization’s recommended 5g, and so – zut, alors! – things had to change. Needless to say, some people are unhappy about this. Bakers, who have already cut the salt content of their baguettes (by 20% since 2015), believe the taste of the bread may suffer, and so do some customers. The word “insipid” has been uttered.
I love it. French tiffs about food are so much more chic than British ones, and never more so than now. In the land of Chanel and anchoïade, people are worrying about blandness and possibly inappreciable differences in the taste of a traditional product. Meanwhile, we’re busy trying to persuade ourselves that ultra-processed food really isn’t as bad for us as we were told it was only last month (the average daily intake of salt in the UK, incidentally, is 8.1g). I find myself thinking back to 2020, when Bernard Matthews announced it was reviving the Turkey Twizzler, a decision it celebrated by placing a gargantuan statue of one on a plinth outside its Norfolk HQ. Eat your heart out Auguste Rodin, Camille Claudel and Niki de Saint Phalle, as I may have muttered at the time. (The Twizzler has, it seems, since disappeared once again. But with Halloween ahead, why not try the company’s turkey Spooky Shapes instead?)
