Culinary Exchange Program Between Columbia, French Town Aims to Prove American Food Est Délicieuse

Over petit dejeneur, or breakfast, Columbia Association President Phil Nelson cracked a joke in front of his esteemed French visitors:

“I see we’re serving one of our delicacies,” Nelson said. “The Egg McMuffin.”

They weren’t actually having the famed McDonald’s breakfast sandwich; they were at a reception Monday morning at Oakland Manor in Columbia. But the point was a pertinent one – contrary to stereotype, not all American food is drive-thru establishments and greasy entrees.

The nine French citizens were in Maryland as part of a “culinary exchange program,” part of the relationship between Columbia and its sister city in France, the Paris suburb of Cergy-Pontoise.

There have been past exchanges involving students and based on business and the arts. This culinary exchange began this past October with five from Columbia flying across the Atlantic, taking cooking classes and savoring French food.

“It’s the kind of things adult love,” said Laura Smit, Columbia Association’s fittingly multilingual manager of international exchange and multicultural programs.

“France is famous for it,” Smit said. “Americans, on the other hand, have a reputation for eating fast food.”

The French contingent arrived in the United States on Saturday, April 16, paying their own airfare plus a $400 fee that covers their activities. They stay with host families while here; they return home on Saturday, April 23.

They traveled this past weekend to Baltimore. Their visit including stops in several restaurants in Fell’s Point – though, interestingly, they didn’t drop in at that neighborhood’s French bakery, Bonaparte Bread.

Michelle Miller, director of Columbia Association’s division of community services, recapped their weekend while speaking at Monday morning’s welcome party.

“You have already tried a culinary delight,” Miller said. “Barbecue.”

Laughter.

There was much more planned to come, of course.

“My favorite is blue crabs,” Miller said. There was a knowing “mmmmmm” from someone in the room.

Their itinerary has included cooking lessons at the Elkridge Furnace Inn on Monday and eating Native American food on Tuesday in Washington, D.C. Among other things, they are also slated to have cooking lessons and lunch at Donna’s Café in Columbia; to go in town, not-too-coincidentally, to ; and to go to Kent Island for a meal at Harris’ Crabs.

Some of the dishes could be out of their comfort zone, Smit said. Crabs, in particular, could provide for an interesting moment.

“The French don’t normally like to get their hands dirty, so we’ll see,” Smit said jokingly. “They might get into it. They had pizza at one place and sliders [small hamburgers] at another and were fine.”

Two of the French visitors are Didier Lemaitre and Christian Laporte, both of whom work on the Cergy-Pontoise side of the exchange program.

“I don’t think we have a real good idea” of what American food is like, Lemaitre said. “For us it is McDonald’s.”

This is just Lemaitre’s first trip to America, though. Laporte had come here before and had some expectations.

“I went once in Florida. I know that you’re able to cook,” he said with a laugh.

Lemaitre’s first review days after arriving: “The food is in fact very good, and not what I say – only McDonald’s.”

This trip will also strengthen the exchange program, he said.

“It’s important for me to come here and to see Columbia and to understand Columbia in order to explain to the parents and the teenagers in Cergy-Pontoise what it is,” he said.

This article has been corrected to note that the group visited Cafe de Paris in Columbia but did not eat there.