Affinage, Affineur, and Amandine
Pardon My French
Extra Muros continues the serialization of Pardon My French, a light-hearted look at some of the French expressions that have taken up residence in the Anglosphere.
An affineur is someone who practices affinage, the art of storing banal fresh cheese in suitable cellars until it becomes gourmet aged cheese. Though this sometimes requires such things as spicing, washing, and salting, the essence of affinage is the periodic rotation of each cheese wheel. That is to say, an affineur is someone who, quite literally, “turns” fresh cheese into gourmet cheese.
Many years ago, having left his Larousse at home, a designer of boxes for frozen vegetables translated haricots verts amandine as “green beans almondine.” Since then, he has embarked upon a quest to make amandes for his mistake by correcting, chalk in hand, every bistrot menu in the English-speaking world that employs his highly mnemonic, but far from properly Gallic, spelling.
The links appended to the titles will take you to Google Translate, where you will find an icon similar to the one used with many volume controls. When you click that button, an authentic French robot will pronounce the word or phrase in question.
Affinage is one of those words that lacks a direct English translation, the closest approximation being “public school teaching.”