Bouillon: The story of stock

The Food Chain

BBC

Arts, Society & Culture, Food

4.7 • 545 Ratings

🗓️ 27 February 2025

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

John Laurenson explores the enduring appeal of stock. A century and a half ago, a butcher at the big Parisian food market Les Halles started selling beef broth – ‘bouillon’ in French - to the people who worked there. In a few years this had developed into what was perhaps the world’s first restaurant chain. By the end of the Nineteenth Century there were hundreds of ‘bouillons’ in Paris.

Today, with inflation making traditional French restaurants too expensive for many people, these big, affordable eateries are making a comeback.

The French aren’t, of course, the only people to discover the delights of this simple, warming, nourishing food. John learns how bouillon influenced Vietnam’s iconic dish, pho, as a result of the French colonial presence in the region in the 1800 and 1900s.

Producer/presenter: John Laurenson

(Image: A dish of stock with chicken and herbs with a ladle sticking out of it. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)

Transcript

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0:00.0	I'm no longer ravenous. I'll no longer eat until I fall asleep. The Hunger Game,
0:05.9	a new five-part series exploring the meteoric rise of weight loss drugs. It's been an incredible
0:10.7	story with these drugs. The uptake, the amount of product that's been sold, the amounts of money
0:15.1	is cost. What the drugs do, how they work, and the knock-on effects of their widespread use.
0:20.5	We'll be sitting here in three years' time going, oh, it caused problems that we're now going to have to fix.
0:26.2	The Hunger Game with me, Professor Gilesio.
0:29.1	Listen first on BBC Sounds.
0:35.0	Bion, French noun.
0:37.4	Definition 1, stock. Liquid obtained by boiling meat, bones, etc. and used for making soup, etc.
0:45.3	As is the long process, commonly you will invite a lot of people, but you can also eat it over several days.
0:53.2	And the broth will be more and more savoury.
0:56.9	Bouillon, definition two, large, working class French restaurant.
1:01.7	The first ones opened in the 1880s,
1:03.7	selling bowls of beef broth to people with not much money.
1:07.2	Now they're back with new bouillon's opening all the time.
1:10.9	How much weight do you reckon you got?
1:13.3	I think it's like one hour.
1:14.8	That's okay?
1:16.3	That's okay, yeah.
1:17.6	We can't wait for the boulogons.
1:19.3	There's something inside this restaurant.
1:21.6	We cannot describe it.
	...

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