Paris has chosen. It will be the baguette, the famous loaf of bread symbol of France, to compete for registration in the intangible heritage of Unesco, the highly coveted recognition awarded each year by the UN body for Science, Education and Culture. The baguette was preferred over two other options put on the table by the transalpine authorities: the zinc roofs of Paris and a wine festival in the Arbois department.
To opt for the baguette was the Minister of Culture, Roselyne Bachelot, currently hospitalized after testing positive for coronavirus. If approved, the inscription of the famous French parade «will make us aware that a food practice that is part of everyday life and spontaneously shared by most, it represents a heritage in all respects “, said the minister, but sounded the alarm: the number of bakers is” constantly decreasing, in particular, in rural municipalities “.
In 1970 there were 55,000 artisanal boulangeries (one for every 790 inhabitants) against 35,000 today (one for every 2,000 inhabitants), “often for the benefit of the sale of industrially produced baguettes”. The final decision is now up to Unesco, which will not decide before autumn 2022. Symbol of the daily life of the French and also present in our country – as if to sanction the depth of the gastronomic ties between France and Italy -, the baguette is deeply rooted in the collective imagination of France, immortalized and told in many films, novels, poems or advertisements.
The name dates back to the early 20th century and starting from the nineties began to distinguish between the normal baguette and ‘baguette tradition’, more crunchy and more valuable, but also more expensive than the first. The French loaf, which the genuine Parisians carry under their arm, at least in legend, was therefore preferred to the marvelous zinc roofs of Paris and the Bou d’Arbois, a religious festival of medieval origins in the Jura, in the east of the country. transformed into a republican holiday. Annually about a hundred intangible assets pass the selection of the UN body based in Paris, where the rooftops patiently wait for a second chance, perhaps at the next batch of candidates.