#2 - Gourmand

The French word gourmand was first presented to me (by a French person, I should add) as being kind of opposite to gourmet.  "If gourmet is quality, gourmand is quantity," he said.  A gourmand person likes to eat a lot.  Gourmand food is rich, heavy, and/or sugary.

Put the word in another form and you have one of the Seven Deadly Sins: la gourmandise or "gluttony."

If all of these words are putting an image in your head of a stereotypical obese American downing hamburgers by the dozen and washing it all down with soda and chips, I don't blame you.  However, in French culture, this is not at all the image associated with the word gourmand.  After years of hearing and seeing it all over the place, I've come to attach a much more nuanced, playful--and in fact, positive--meaning to it.

If you look up gourmand on WordReference.com (my favorite English-French dictionary on the net), you'll see that the site doesn't even bother offering an English equivalent for gourmand as an adjective, instead simply defining it as "fond of good food, fond of eating well."  As a noun, it lists: "gourmand, big eater, food lover, foodie."

Of all of these, I think the word "foodie" comes closest to gourmand when you're talking about a person.  If you say, "I'm really gourmand," it means that you really love to eat, and perhaps that you have an inclination towards rich or sweet foods as well.   However, since that describes pretty much every French person on the planet, and French culture in general, it's not surprising that French people have adapted their word for glutton to mean something much more fun and light-hearted.  There might be a certain amount of self-deprecation involved in calling yourself a gourmand, but I've heard many a lost soul avow to this Deadly Sin--and most French people just smile to hear it. 

In advertising, in particular, the word gourmand is commonly used to denote something really delectable.  You see it everywhere, from bill-boards, to grocery stores, to restaurants, and even brand names.  La Cure Gourmande is popular cake, candy, and chocolate chain that you see all over France.  And just look at what's at the top of their website!

"Fête de la gourmandise!"--or in English, "Celebration of gourmandise!"

Seriously, do you not want to rush over to France right now and sink your teeth into some of that stuff?  It's like Candy Land over here!   Or at least it is in the touristy places....  :-P  

Very often the word gourmand will also be inserted into the name of a dish, usually a dessert, the most common example being the café gourmand: an after-dinner coffee accompanied by three mini-desserts.

I could list endless examples of the French love of gourmandise, but really, the easiest way to see the difference is to do a Google search.  Look up the English word gluttony and you get tons of images like this:

And my personal favorite:

So clearly, we anglophones think of it as something disgusting and even down-right horrific.

On the other hand, do a Google search for gourmandise, and you get:

And a whole lot of ones likes this:

Yeah.  Just a slightly different cultural concept there.  Just slightly.

So there you go!  One of my very favorite French words, and one that I sorely miss in English.  Now, go and have yourself something yumptious to eat.  You must be hungry after reading this.  ;-P

"La gourmandise is a lovely vice."