Apparently, the French really love their butter. So much so that they’re the largest butter-consuming country in the world, per capita. Much of that consumption is happening in the north, as olive oil plays a relatively more prominent role in the south. Which means people in Northern France must be just shoveling sticks of butter into their mouthes in order to make up for that Southern slack. (Also means I may be from Northern France).
Sadly, France is going through a butter shortage at the moment. The New York Times today reports that butter stocks are alarmingly low. Not so much that people can’t get their butter, but enough so they may have to go to different grocery stores to find some. Or settle for something other than their favorite brand.
This isn’t France’s first butter shortage, either. An excerpt from the NYT article:
My grandmother also confirmed that there was something of a butter craze after the Second World War, which Professor Pitte had mentioned in our interview.
“At the beginning of the war we didn’t have ration cards yet and I had to wait in line for two hours just to get an eighth of butter,” she said, recalling how her father and uncle would travel to Normandy to get some directly from dairy farmers. “Because it was illegal, they had pockets made on the insides of their jackets and hid the butter in there.”
Getting custom clothes so you can eat fatty foods is very PTO-approved.
You can read the rest of the NYT story here.
(via Lesli Larson)
