Purists may frown, but chocolate foie gras and kiwi liquor are just two examples of how French farmers are evolving their offerings in order to lure new customers in a competitive food market.
Six times a year, small farmers from across France meet in the Paris region to sell their wares directly to city customers. This past weekend, about 200 of them gathered in a massive hall in the north of Paris to meet an expected 20 000 clients over four days.
”Nowadays, people have less confidence in food products,” said Etienne Godart, a poultry farmer from the southern Dordogne region. ”But the image of a farm producer is generally good.”
Tradition is key in the bid to keep loyal customers, who in Paris are prepared to pay up to 30% more than French villagers, but many turn to innovation to attract new clients, especially in the city.
”We like to taste new products. They attract us to the stalls,” said Beatrice Boucher (49) after buying some paté laced with ginger.
Among typical French gastronomic delights, from cheeses to chestnuts, fish paté to foie gras, jars of blackcurrant mustard and ketchup stood next to familiar jams on a colourful stand near the entrance.
”People come to look because they think it seems strange,” said Isabelle Olivier, who works with her husband, Sylvain, the fourth generation in a family of fruit farmers from Burgundy, central France.
”It tastes similar to tomato ketchup because it contains cinnamon and other spices,” she said, adding that the recipe is adapted from an 18th-century invention.
”I think it’s a fabulous idea,” said customer Camille Collin (58), after tasting the thick blue liquid. ”It would go well with duck.”
Evolution is the key to survival in an increasingly competitive world, according to farmers at the fair, with some adjusting packaging to smaller sizes for single households and others looking further afield for inspiration.
”Several years ago we read that cocoa was a condiment in South America, replacing salt and pepper, so we started using it that way in our foie gras,” said Cedric Alban, manning a busy stall of duck- and goose-liver delicacies with his family from south-west France.
Regular customers appeared unconvinced, however.
”There’s a bitter aftertaste. It’s a little different,” said 60-year-old Francoise Boulot, adding she preferred chocolate and foie gras separately.
Alban shrugged his shoulders and said the aim is simply to intrigue new clients, with the majority of regular customers buying traditional foie gras. A secret new product is to be released in December, he added.
But other farmers said innovation and quality are not enough, and that their base of customers is ageing, with stricter rules in recent years making it a struggle to survive.
”It’s too difficult now; there’s too much official paperwork,” said Philippe Garros, a 46-year-old farmer, also from south-west France.
Garros turned to kiwi-fruit production when sales of his Armagnac, or distilled grape brandy, declined dramatically 20 years ago, due to changing cultural habits.
He later used Armagnac-producing techniques to use up waste left over from kiwi production to create kiwi liquor. He said he survives by selling a range of products and he dreams of retirement. ”I’ve advised my three children not to follow in the family business.”
Although France, with its rich gastronomic tradition, maintains many food lovers attracted to natural products, there is also a profusion of suburban hypermarkets selling processed and packaged food.
”The French public is now split in its attitude to good food,” according to Eric Watiez, director of the Paris farm show. ”I think there are those who have lost their taste and those who still like to eat good food.”
Fruit farmer Isabelle Olivier said she is concerned for the future. ”Children eat so much processed food that they won’t be able to recognise the taste of a real strawberry soon,” she said. — AFP
