Tavern, gargote, harbor, boui-boui, estaminet, limonadier… The French language is full of variations to designate the French bistro. “A place where every French person, in all social classes, has a story,” underlines Alain Fontaine, chef restaurateur in Paris and president of the association which submitted, on Friday, November 15, the registration file for French bistros and cafés to UNESCO’s intangible heritage of humanity. It has given itself four years for the international institution to set in stone “social and cultural practices in bistros and cafes in France”, after having already fought to have these establishments included in French intangible heritage in June. A property that is “unique in the world”, argues Alain Fontaine, also head of the French Association of Master Restorers.
The stakes are very high at a time when this French art of living remains a vector of soft power extremely powerful in the world. The association hopes to put together a first file for the Ministry of Culture by June 2025, which will in turn present the candidates of its choice to UNESCO. Interview.
L’Express: After being rejected twice by the Ministry of Culture, you won your case to include bistros and cafés as French intangible heritage. What is this due to?
Alain Fontaine: This ranking will shine a spotlight on our bistros. This will also allow us to alert the public authorities about this precious asset in their village, in their neighborhood, to prevent them from closing and to put in place safeguard measures, as well as to promote the recovery of these places of life. and conviviality. I also hope that this will push National Education to set up an additional mention of “bistros and cafes”, including tobacconists and PMUs, within apprentice training centers and hotel high schools. The idea is also to create, with the help of the Minister of Culture Rachida Dati, with whom I will speak this Monday, November 25, a day of bistros and cafes in France.
What is the definition of a French bistro or café?
We all have a story of friendship, of love, of a family memory in a bistro… To take two film titles from an actor I really like – Jean-Pierre Bacri – that’s the meaning of celebration and the taste of others. They are places of culture, of inspiration for painters, singers, sculptors, writers and filmmakers… I am thinking of the films of Claude Sautet, among others. These are transgenerational places. You have students who have housing problems and who sometimes need an “extra room” to work. Some come just to see people, chat or read. It is also the little light at 6 or 7 a.m. for the homeless person who has spent the night on the street. The bistro is a place to break away from everyday life and solitude. People meet there because they know that there, they will find human warmth. There is a very warm welcome and there are no anonymous people in a bistro or café. You come in, you’re nobody, you leave, you’ve been somebody for a few hours. It is a catalyst for sociability.
An association led by bistro owners will request the inclusion of French bistros and cafes in the intangible heritage of humanity.
© / afp.com/Bertrand GUAY
As Laurent Bihl explains in his book A popular history of bistros (Nouveau Monde éditions, 2023), do you share the observation that these are highly political places?
There are numerous examples of politicians who started their electoral campaigns in these places. It’s always good to lean on the counter with the traders. In Balzac’s time (1799-1850), we spoke of “cabarets”. There was the “sleeping cabaret” – that was the inn –, the “dining cabaret”, a sort of restaurant, and the “drinking cabaret”. He says it very rightly, in one of his books: cabarets are “the Parliament of the people”. Napoleon III is well aware of their subversive side and will have them monitored by the prefecture, which still has authority until today, because he already believes that these are places of plots, of espionage… They are also places historic sites where deserters found refuge during the First World War and resistance fighters during the Second.
You say that the bistro is in danger. Today, is there a real risk that it will disappear?
It is endangered. Some figures: 500,000 bistros in 1900, 400,000 in 1945, 200,000 in 1960, 92,000 in 1987, and today less than 40,000… All this including tobacconists and PMUs! Nowadays, there are consumption systems and new concepts that compete with this art of living. I think of the coffee shops or fast food restaurants. Places where I am not sure that we share everything I have described to you. Some mayors have also issued orders to prohibit them. During the Covid epidemic, we realized that when our bistro was closed, it was the “smile” of the street that was missing.
Access to public services often comes up among the French’s grievances against the State. Doesn’t coffee compensate for these shortcomings?
Of course, bistros and cafes are also bread depots, they offer access to basic necessities, registered or parcel depots, money distributors, etc. They have partly replaced the services of the post office. We talk a lot about medical deserts, but sociability deserts are very important in the countryside. When you come down from your home in Paris or Lyon, you always come across a bistro. Not necessarily in the provinces.
Is this UNESCO classification part of this sanctification of the bistro as part of the French cultural tourist landscape?
Let’s not be arrogant or pretentious, but it’s unique in the world! I totally see the connection between the bistros and our motto: liberty-equality-fraternity. The idea is to say how special this art of living together in France is. The whole world needs to say that there is a model of conviviality and sociability that exists here. When foreigners come to Paris, it would be good to tell them: you can visit the Louvre, but there is also this living heritage that exists. The only mode of consumption that comes close to bistros and cafes abroad would be the pub, particularly that of Ireland, which is also currently suffering. But unlike the Bonne Mère in Marseille, the climats of Burgundy [NDLR : parcelles de vignes] or Champagne vineyards which are material inscriptions and which will remain for eternity, cafes and bistros are living heritage. French coffee is as important as the Louvre, Mont-Saint-Michel or Notre-Dame!
It has always been said that the Frenchman is a lover of his bistros. But inflation has changed behavior. The Edenred 2024 barometer states that more than 9 out of 10 French people anticipate a reduction in their spending in restaurants. In the future, will international customers be the best ambassadors of the French art of living?
When we launched the association in 2018, I had a press conference in my restaurant and I saw Americans, English, Germans, Australians, and even Indians arrive… It’s proof that the bistro remains one of our international references. When Notre-Dame de Paris burned or when the Palace of Versailles was hit by the storm of 1999, American funds arrived very quickly. Which shows that sometimes, it’s true, foreigners value what France represents better than we do. See also the worldwide success ofEmily in Paris ! So I actually believe that foreigners have a fundamental role in safeguarding this heritage.
Will the UNESCO classification not also promote the work of farmers, while mobilizations are increasing in the profession?
Of course in cafes, you promote the independent who effectively highlights agriculture. The owners are the first locavores and help themselves to their farmer friends with whom they went to school, or played football or rugby. The bistro actually belongs to a sort of fairly transparent chain from the fork to the customer’s plate.
And yet, Stéphane Manigold, one of your restaurateur colleagues, recently denounced the explosion of “microwave restaurants which serve ready-made products in 30 seconds saying that they are homemade”…
I know that there are sometimes French people or foreigners who leave the place where they ate disappointed. But we must understand that junk food is found more in fast food restaurants or in certain establishments that prioritize profit over quality, rather than in bistros and cafes. There, we find a tradition of family cooking, because they are primarily the workers’ canteens. There is the idea of “homemade” because it had to be inexpensive, therefore made on site. Beef bourguignon, stew, andouillette, blanquette de veau, tripe products, onion soup, egg mayonnaise…
But actually, we really need to speed up on homemade products. Unfortunately, certain restaurant or hotel chains have put pressure on professional organizations so that the “non-homemade” label, as Olivia Grégoire, the Minister for SMEs and Commerce between 2022 and 2024, had thought. withdrawn in 2024.
Hasn’t France fallen asleep on its laurels for too long?
We wanted French gastronomy to be first on the podium and we shouted it, using the Coué method. That said, it remains one of the richest in the world and the most diverse. For what ? In addition to our exceptional terroir, we very quickly, unlike other countries, formalized and codified the cuisine and recipes with Rabelais, Brillat-Savarin and Escoffier. We then absorbed numerous foreign cuisines, which allowed us to evolve our recipes. On the other hand, to make French cuisine known, we sent many great chefs all over the world and there was a loss of skills. I’m going to do a football demonstration. If we send Kylian Mbappé to play in Tokyo or the United States, not only are we sending our best player but also, some will believe that what he sees reflects the reality of French football. However, it is a distorting mirror. When a great French chef has been established in a country for a very long time, these foreigners come to think that French gastronomy is the same as what they have there and some may be disappointed.
We don’t have to claim first place in anything. We do not have to claim our superiority. We just have to exist. Was gastronomy in danger when the French meal was listed on UNESCO in 2010? No ! Was the wand in danger when it was listed by UNESCO in 2022? No ! It’s just an art of living that must be preserved.
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