Mais oui, c’est normal...

I know, I know, I do not need another excuse to give a nod of admiration toward the French and their eating habits. I wont go on for too long. My paper of choice (when I get around to exercising that choice, which, unfortunately, is not daily), the International Herald Tribune, poses the following question (here) from its comfortable French seat: why do Americans neglect communal eating?

The French love their food, we know that, but what they also love is the company of others during meals. We’ve read in the past that even in the urban climate of frenetic Paris, French people will take on the average at least an hour a day for lunch. The article today points out that the same holds true for evening family meals and the school lunch, which in all schools is an hour, followed by some more social time. In some schools it runs even longer.

Compare this to our own wolfing down of food: only one out of three American families sits down to dinner together, and school lunches have 15 minutes allocated to them, including time spent in the cafeteria line (I guess our experience in this was unique, since I believe the local high school extended the eating period to a hefty 17.5 minutes, or thereabouts).

At least I know now why the offspring from this household skipped happily from one grade to the next and why their parents kept their sanity throughout. The article says the following:

"Yet study after study shows that having meals together as a family is good for both adults and children. A University of Michigan study found that mealtime at home was the single strongest predictor of better achievement scores and fewer behavioral problems for children. Mealtime was far more powerful than time spent in school, studying, worshiping, playing sports or arts activities."

There is no doubt in my mind that communal eating has benefits for the soul as well as for the body. It’s worth taking the time for, n’est pas?