Local favourites need not be burgered

When the world’s best-known burger chain craftily puts out aMcBaguette option, it must be assumed that it sees a juicy opportunity to make more dough.

For at least the last four years, there have been apprehensions that America’s dreaded culinary bulldozer would flatten local completion from the traditional baguette-jambon-beurre (ham and butter baguette), and finally it has. With 1.5 billion units sold last year, “Le Burger” has outstripped the baguette sandwich by 300 million in France.

Of course, French epicures can console themselves that the fast-food versions of the burgers only comprise 30% of the sales, so the nation’s famously sophisticated palates cannot be deemed to have copped out. But the fact remains that 85% of France’s restaurants now offer this very American dish, even if they use Roquefort instead of plasticky American cheddar, and Dijon mustard instead of the misleadingly named French’s yellow version.


India’s taste buds are proving to far more resilient as indigenous stuffed bun snack options like vada-pav show no signs of yielding to any faux burger versions.

It may be the perfect time to take the battle into the other camp by inundating the US market with French, Indian and other variants of the American staple. Given the sushi revolution worldwide, why not make a chaat push too?