The Taste of Things | La passion de Dodin Bouffant

First, I want to express my gratitude to the person who told me to watch this movie! It was amazing! To savor it, I watched it in sessions, rewatching the previous scene. I loved every bit of it.

I do not watch a lot of movies. More than that, my choices are limited mostly to thrillers and superhero genres. But I love to cook, and knowing this, one day one of my friends told me to enjoy the movie.This might be the first French film I have watched. It touched my heart and I enjoyed it to the fullest!

The real name of the movie is La Passion de Dodin Bouffant which was titled The Pot-au-Feu then was renamed The Taste of Things. The fact is all the names are relatable!

The French name reflects on Dodin, who is the main character of the movie, who is a passionate chef and a renowned one. The Pot-au-Feu is a French comfort food, that was seen cooked several times in the movie. But, I can relate to the last name a lot. There were several times in the movie when characters tasted the food and talked about all the ingredients used to prepare the food.

Set in 1889, the film is about food and love. The movie began by showing Eugenie collecting fresh vegetables in the morning, and then all having breakfast together. There were four, Dodin, Eugenie, Violette and Pauline.

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They prepared the food for some of the friends of the chef Dodin. The way they enjoyed the food was amazing. One thing I did not understand though, in an eating scene, they all covered their heads with cloths! It was odd to me, but maybe that can happen to have the smell of the food only and nothing else.

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After this sequence, we come to know that there is a feeling in Dodin and Eugenie for each other. Although Dodin wanted to marry her, she refused to keep things professional. Eugenie has been a cook for Dodin for about 20 years!

Then several sequence happens. In the meantime seeing the passion of Paulina Engenie went to Paulina's parents to convince them to let her learn cooking for them. On the farm she watched a thing and asked Paulina's father the reason for it, later we see she has made those in their garden.

Eugenie had an illness, which she hid from Dodin. But her state gradually worsened and it was seen by Dodin. For her, he cooked several dishes. She was treated as a royal, which she was to him. Using one of the dishes he proposed and finally Eugenie accepted.

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The pear has an interesting scene! It is more of a message.

If you want to know what happened you would need to watch the movie for yourselves. Although I have told a fair share of the story of the movie, there are several things that are not mentioned. Especially, if you love food and are passionate about food you would love the movie.

The movie may seem slow to a lot of people and that is understandable. Because the movie has a slow pace. The movie has a darker color and yellow tint. The yellowish color is to emphasize the time of the movie. Although it bothered me a little but it can be overlooked. This movie is not to be seen but to be savored bit by bit.

One last thing, in the last sequence, the camera was shaking and it moved around the kitchen giving a pan shoot. The shakiness was not pleasant, but the color, and season in the kitchen changed. After traversing two times, we see Dodin and Eugenie, where in the last scene in response to the question of Eugenie that, was she a wife or cook, Dodin replied that she was a cook and it made her happy.

The Last Scene

This movie is a product of art. The kitchen itself is an art to me. Here you can watch the trailer in IMDb.

This YouTube video of this channel contains the cooking scenes.