Those of you who follow this blogspot regularly are familiar with my addiction to poutine [poo-TEEN], that wondrous concoction of French fries smothered in melted cheese curds and gravy; a comfort food and a meal in itself. It’s origins can be traced back to 1950s Québec, and since then it has spread far and wide and in many specialty guises. . . even to Mother France. Of course, there are those who find this combination revolting . . . a heart attack waiting to happen . . . and so there is no accounting for tastes. The debate lives on.
Yet now, to my wonderment, there is a new reason to reject poutine . . . the belief that the dish is named in honor of the authoritarian Russian president Vladimir Putin [POO-tin]. A couple days ago I ran across a number of media stories reporting that a Parisian restaurant, La Maison de la Poutine, has been receiving insults and threats as a result. According to some reports, the confusion is attributed to a recent tweet by French President Emmanuel Macron which described his conversation with “Président Poutine.”
According to one of the reports, “calling Mr. Putin ‘Poutine’ in French may be a matter of diplomacy to avoid the pejorative connotation, though there are disagreements in some linguistic quarters over the origin of the pronunciation.” There is the claim that the English spelling “Putin” is pronounced in French the same way as “putain” [poo-TAIN = whore]. Perhaps this is why the French use the spelling “poutine” to closer approximate the correct pronunciation of the president’s name in Russian. This report also indicates that several French linguistic scholars have discounted the insult theory, suggesting that the president’s name is written and pronounced “poutine” since the transliteration of the Russian from Cyrillic into French is different from its transliteration into English. All of this may be true, but why the confusion? I just don’t get it.
Frankly, this is something I might expect in this country, but in France? As a result, the restaurant, which has three location in Paris and one in Toulouse, sent a tweet to its customers explaining the origins of poutine created by passionate chefs to bring “joy and comfort,” and reassuring them that its signature dish is in no way associated with the Russian leader. Furthermore, the restaurant’s ownership, who was introduced to poutine while working at the venerable restaurant Leméac in the Outremont neighborhood in Montréal, expressed its desire to perpetuate these values, and its “most sincere respect to the Ukrainian people who are courageously fighting for their freedom against a tyrannical Russian regime.” They did not rename their offering.
A related story reports that a Canadian eatery, Le Roy Jucep, located in Drummondville, Québec, has also been a similar target of those who can’t seem to differentiate between “Putin” and “poutine.” This restaurant has long claimed to have invented poutine. It’s founder, Jean-Paul Roy, returned home to Drummondville, after having worked as a cook for several years at the Hotel Mont-Royal in Montréal.
[See for more on this: http://lookingtowardportugal.blogspot.com/2009/06/une-maudite-poutine.html]
One of the owners, a veteran of the war in Afghanistan, announced on social media on February 24, the day Russia invaded Ukraine, that it was temporarily renaming its most famous offering “la frite fromage sauce” [French fries cheese gravy] to demonstrate its “dismay” at the invasion of Ukraine. “I wanted to make this little gesture to show Ukrainians we are thinking of them.” This story goes on to say that a research fellow at the Modern Art Research Institute in Kyiv, told Radio Canada, that she applauded the restaurant and its decision to “DePoutineize poutine.” I don’t understand this since the two were never associated in the first place. The restaurant’s announcement has since been rescinded after this owner claims to have been berated by “pro-Russian activists.” So much for one’s belief in one’s principles.
I am reminded of the 2003 US-led war against Iraq when so-called US “patriots” renamed French fries “Freedom Fries” when France chose not to join the coalition forces during the invasion. Such efforts prove and accomplish nothing. I applaud La Maison de la Poutine for sticking to its guns and refusing to surrender to the insults and threats from the ignorant. There. I said it.
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