Things you didn’t know about French fries

Is there anyone who doesn’t like French fries?

There are few things better in life than the wafting smell, the golden color, the crunchy first bite, and the light fluffiness of a French fry. And believe it or not, this simple fried potato has quite an interesting history.

Skinny, chunky, crinkly, cut into wedges or steaming hot from the local fast-food joint, everyone has a favorite type of French fry. America’s ongoing love affair with French fries means we just can’t get enough of the finger-licking potato delight. We devour nearly 2 million tons every year — a demonstration of their versatility, tastiness and great value.

While French fries are eaten all over the world, every culture has its own preferred condiment. Americans dunk them in ketchup, Brits eat their chips with salt and malt vinegar, mayonnaise is a popular accompaniment in Belgium, and in Vietnam they serve their fries with soft butter and a sprinkling of sugar. And fries are so versatile, they can be topped with everything from chili and cheese to foie gras, and they can even be a vessel for s’mores (check out this recipe for s’more fries).

No matter where you live, you most likely love fries. "The French fry should be the global symbol of peace,” Paul Abraham, co-owner of New York’s popular Sticky’s Finger Joint, told us. “Like fried chicken, it is found, consumed, and loved all over the world. Salt them, season them, top them, or dip them. Have them anyway you want.”

When a food product is eaten and loved all over the world, there are bound to be some interesting facts and figures that crop up that can boggle the mind, like which famous company is responsible for a full third of American French fry sales, or the fact that there is a museum in Belgium entirely devoted to the classic fast-food snack. Read on to learn a few things that you didn’t know about French fries.

Should they even be called ”French” fries? Belgians claim to have invented ”Frites” and there is an ongoing disagreement between the Belgium and France over its true origin. Some also believe that the fry may have first been introduced in Spain via Colombia.

Around seven per cent of the potatoes grown in the U.S. end up being sold by McDonald’s. They sell more than ? of all the French fries sold in restaurants in the U.S. each year.

The average American eats 30 pounds of French fries per year. You’re going to need a lot of ketchup.

The earliest known reference to French fries in English literature is in A Tale of Two Cities. Charles Dickens refers to “Husky chips of potato, fried with some reluctant drops of oil”.

Thomas Jefferson gets the credit for introducing French fries to America when he served them at a White House dinner in 1802 after reportedly requesting, "potatoes, fried in the French manner.

Check out more fun fry facts.

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In China, jar of French mountain air fetches $860

BEIJING (AP) — Beijing artist Liang Kegang returned from a business trip in southern France with well-rested lungs and a small item of protest against his home city's choking pollution: a glass jar of clean, Provence air.

He put it up for auction before a group of about 100 Chinese artists and collectors late last month, and it fetched 5,250 yuan ($860).

"Air should be the most valueless commodity, free to breathe for any vagrant or beggar," Liang said in an interview. "This is my way to question China's foul air and express my dissatisfaction."

Liang's work is part of a gust of recent artistic protest — and entrepreneurial gimmickry — reflecting widespread dissatisfaction over air quality in China, where cities often are immersed days on end in harmful pollutants at levels many times what is considered safe by the World Health Organization. The chronic problem has spurred brisk markets for dust masks and home air purifiers.

China's senior leaders have pledged to clean the country's air, partly in response to a citizenry increasingly vocal about environmental issues. But it is a daunting task that must be balanced with demands for economic development and employment crucial to maintaining stability.

In February, a group of 20 Beijing artists wearing dust masks lay on the ground and played dead in front of an altar at the city's Temple of Heaven park in a performance art protest.

In this photo taken on March 29, 2014, Beijing artist Liang Kegang collects fresh air in the commune …

In March, independent artists in the southern city of Changsha held a mock funeral for what they imagined would be the death of the city's last citizen because of smog.

"If smog cannot be effectively cleaned up, what it will leave us is death and cities of death," artist Shao Jiajun said.

Liang's contribution is a short, ordinary glass preserves jar with a rubber seal and a flip-top. It has three small, handwritten paper labels: one with the name and coordinates of the French village, Forcalquier, where he closed the jar; one saying "Air in Provence, France" in French; and one with his signature in Chinese and the date — March 29.

The auction closed on the night of March 30, and Chengdu-based artist and entrepreneur Li Yongzheng was the highest bidder.

"I have always been appreciative of Kegang's conceptual art, and this piece was very timely," Li said in a telephone interview. "This past year, whether it was Beijing, Chengdu or most Chinese cities, air pollution has been a serious problem. This piece of work really suits the occasion."

In this photo taken March 29, 2014, residents breath from bags of fresh air taken from a provincial  …

Liang is not the only one to make money from China's air-pollution angst. Entrepreneurs also see the potential, and so do tourism officials in parts of the country where skies are clear.

Chinese President Xi Jinping joked to Guizhou province delegates during last month's National People's Congress that the scenic southwestern province could put its air up for sale. Days later, the province's tourism bureau announced plans to sell canned air as souvenirs for tourists.

"Canned air will force us to stay committed to environmental protection," provincial tourism director Fu Yingchun said recently.

In central Henan province, local tourism authorities promoting a resort scooped up mountain air and gave away bags of it in downtown Zhengzhou, the provincial capital. City dwellers greedily inhaled the air, and some said they planned to visit the mountain resort to get more than a lungful.

Chen Guangbiao, a recycling tycoon who briefly made headlines with his abortive plan to purchase The New York Times, has been selling fresh air in cans under his "Good Person" brand.

Want one? They sell for $3 each on China's online bazaar of Taobao.

EnvironmentNature & EnvironmentChinaair qualityair purifiers

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French climber finds $332,000 worth of jewels in metal box on Mont Blanc

Stephane Dan, crystal hunting guide, and Alexandre Pittin, mountaineer and crystal hunter, look at a part of minerals found on Mont Blanc.AFP

Sept. 13, 2013: Three climbers walk at an altitude of 11,155 feet near the Dent du Geant (Giant's tooth) on Mont Blanc near France and Italy.AFP

Albertville, France –  A French climber scaling a glacier off Mont Blanc got more than satisfaction for his efforts when he stumbled across a treasure trove of emeralds, rubies and sapphires that had been buried for decades.

The jewels, estimated to be worth up to $332,000, lay hidden in a metal box that was on board an Indian plane that crashed in the desolate landscape some 50 years ago.

The climber turned the haul in to local police.

"This was an honest young man who very quickly realized that they belonged to someone who died on the glacier," local gendarmerie chief Sylvain Merly told AFP.

"He could have kept them but he preferred to give them to the police," Merly said, adding that the climber stumbled upon the box earlier this month and that some of the sachets containing the precious stones bore the stamp 'Made in India.'

French authorities are contacting their Indian counterparts to trace the owner or heirs of the jewels.

Under French law, the jewelry could be handed over to the mountaineer if these are not identified, Merly said.

Two Air India planes crashed into Mont Blanc in 1950 and in 1966. Climbers routinely find debris, baggage and human remains.

In September last year, India took possession of a bag of diplomatic mail from the Kangchenjunga, a Boeing 707 flying from Mumbai which crashed on the southwest face of Mont Blanc on January 24, 1966.

The crash killed 117 people including the pioneer of India's nuclear programme, Homi Jehangir Bhabha.

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Jewels on French mountain may be from plane crash

PARIS (AP) — Police say a French mountain climber stumbled upon a case of dozens of cut jewels, worth hundreds of thousands of dollars — believed to be debris from one of two Air India crashes decades ago.

Police commander Sylvain Merly said the Mont Blanc climber, who asked to stay anonymous, turned in the box marked "Made in India" on Sept. 9. Authorities hope to find someone connected with its owner, who is presumed to have been a passenger on one of the two jets that crashed in 1950 or 1966.

Merly said Thursday the metal box, slightly smaller than a shoe box, was filled with small bags of loose jewels, mostly emeralds and sapphires. Merly said debris from the Air India crashes regularly rises to the surface on Mont Blanc's glaciers.

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Rare French 17th-century "pocket" calculator set for London sale

By Michael Roddy

LONDON (Reuters) - It will take someone with pretty deep pockets to purchase and transport what is being described by auction house Christie's as one of four surviving 17th-century French "pocket" calculating machines, to be sold in London in October.

With an estimated price of between 70,000 pounds and 100,000 pounds, and with dimensions of 14.5 cm by 32.5 cm (5.7 by 12.8 inches), the "pocket" description is pretty much a euphemism.

But the compact size of the paper-and-wood box with a fascinating array of 24 dials embedded in the lid was one of its main selling points, James Hyslop, head of Christie's science department, said.

It was the invention of Rouen inventor and watchmaker Rene Grillet, who marketed his smaller and lighter device as a competitor to the sturdy but heavier brass machine invented by Blaise Pascal in 1642.

"I'd love to be able to tell you whose this was, but basically those stories never survive and if they did we'd be crowing about it from the rooftops," Hyslop told Reuters in a telephone interview.

"But we do know the creator went around to the equivalent of world's fairs, in Paris and Amsterdam, advertising the new calculating device. He was a canny businessman and he was very canny about how these things worked."

The calculator used a logarithm called "Napier's bones", a type of abacus named for the Scottish mathematician John Napier, and was capable of performing addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.

But 17th-century proto computers and calculating machines were not true computers, Hyslop said. The user could not enter a number, choose an operation and get a result.

"There's still a manual step needed, and with this one, you have to physically carry the 10s yourself," he said.

The calculating machine is being given pride of place in Christie's bi-annual "Travel, Science and Natural History" auction on Oct 10.

It will also feature art, books and other scientific artefacts of the 16th through 19th centuries, including, Hyslop said, a first edition of "Napier's Bones".

(Editing by Paul Casciato)

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Being rude to French president no longer an offense

PARIS (Reuters) - Being rude to the French president is no longer an offence after parliament agreed on Thursday to amend legislation dating back to 1881 in favor of freedom of speech.

Whereas before any rude remark risked an automatic fine for "offending the head of state," the president is now reduced to the same category as ministers and parliamentarians and would need to have a judge prove there had been slander or defamation.

The change came after the European Court of Human Rights ruled in March that France violated a demonstrator's right to freedom of expression when it fined him for holding a banner up to former President Nicolas Sarkozy reading: "Get lost, jerk."

That slogan has been infamous in France since Sarkozy used the same words in 2008 to insult a man in a crowd who refused to shake his hand, and the court judged that left-wing activist Herve Eon was being satirical with his protest banner.

It said his conviction and 30-euro ($40) fine were out of proportion to his protest and that his right to freedom of expression had been violated.

Anyone found by a judge to have slandered the president still runs the risk of a fine of up to 45,000 euros.

President Francois Hollande has so far shown a thick skin, however, as critics have given him a string of unkind nicknames like "Flanby", a brand of wobbly caramel pudding or "Mr. Little Jokes".

($1 = 0.7555 euros)

(Reporting by Emile Picy; Writing by Catherine Bremer; editing by Mark John)

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"French kiss" finally enters French dictionary

PARIS (AP) — For centuries, there's been no official French word for the sloppy Gallic export "to French kiss" — though that certainly hasn't stopped any citizen from doing so.

Now the oversight has been rectified.

The one-word verb "galocher" — to kiss with tongues — is among new entries added to the "Petit Robert" 2014 French dictionary, which hit the shops Thursday.

It may surprise many that France — a country famed for its amorous exploits and which gave the world sex-symbol Brigitte Bardot, romantic photographer Robert Doiseau and even scandal-hit former IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn — is only just linguistically embracing the popular pastime.

Yet Laurence Laporte of the Robert publishing house says that it's just the way language evolves.

"We always had many expressions to describe 'French-kissing,' like 'kissing at length in the mouth,' but it's true, we've never had one single word," she said.

The term "French kiss" — once also called a "Florentine kiss" — is popularly considered to have been brought back to the English-speaking world by soldiers returning from Europe after World War I. At the time, the French had a reputation for more adventurous sexual practices.

Laporte said "galocher" was a slang term that's been around for a while "but only now is it being officially recognized in a French dictionary."

"La galoche" is an ice-skating boot, so the new term riffs evocatively on the idea of sliding around the ice.

The word expert added a caveat about the power of language. The lack of a specific term "never stopped us from doing it," Laporte noted.

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