On 10/05/2010 06:35 PM, David Rance wrote:
On Tue, 5 Oct 2010 Emery Davis wrote:

Incidentally, David, for the first time a week ago I saw parsnips for
sale in a French supermarket (Leclerc, I think it was). They were not as
large as those we can buy in Britain but nevertheless they *were*
parsnips.

Don't think I've ever seen them before in the shops in France and my
neighbour certainly didn't know what they were.

FWIW parsnips (panais) are considered an "old folks" vegetable in
France, and indeed they went out of fashion and weren't widely
available. Most people who grew their own food during the war would
know them, though.

But that's my point. My neighbour *didn't* know what they were. He died
about four years ago at the age of 82. He was a Norman villager and did
grow his own vegetables during and after the war. And when we showed him
one a few years ago he said he'd never seen it before and certainly
didn't know what it was called. He didn't recognise the word when we
told him!


Well, our experiences appear to differ. I'm sure there are older folks
down here who don't know it either, in fact I can think of one
immediately. The point was that many do. (Perhaps most was an
overstatement).

I'm sure there's geographical variation, too.

-E