An American friend once wrote me: " At last, I'm sitting on a sidewalk terrace in Montmartre with my croissant and cafe olé.

As a french (by nature someone that likes to contradict), there is a correction I'd like to make : While brunette is not very used, it can be used, but it is not respectful. It is used sometimes to talk about a little girl (it is quite rare). But more often than not, it is used to talk ABOUT a young attractive woman behind her back when talking between friends. Our equivalent of "dude, look at that chick over there" but for women with dark hair would be "Mec, mate moi cette petite brunette là bas", and it is almost never used used outside of that context. I watch my series in english and I was shocked when I heard it in a casual discussion at the character's workplace, it is a word that would never be used in that context in France.

"I'm an American but I have a Canadian Aunt" "Oh me too, in my closet" HAS ME DEAD

Ooooh so "bien fait" is like the "bem feito" we have in portuguese! In a literal translation, it means well done, but when use directed to a person (specially using this alone) is more of a "I told you so" sort of thing, like when someone makes something that it was obvious that it was a bad idea, or that someone warned beforehand, or both. Example: Menino! Desce daí antes que você caia! (Boy! Get off there before you fall down!) *he falls down* Ta vendo? Bem feito! (You see? Told you!)

"Brunette" is sometimes possible, just to add a "cute" connotation, for example for a child. The same way "blondinette" is kind of possible for a blonde little girl, very informally and rarely though. Probably better if foreigners forget about this kind of useless vocabulary lol.

The name French window describes a window that opens inward, which is common in France but not in the UK or North America, nearly all windows opening to the outside. So in this case the use of French window seems appropriate.

Un autre faux ami incompréhensible : "entrée" aux USA est utilisé pour parler du plat principal. Contre sens total, qui peut créer des quiproquos pour un touriste américain dans un restaurant français.

This person is good for teaching French online and also ruling out the stereotypes. Merci pour votre travail.

Ahh this reminds me of my middle school days, this is literally one of the first things our French teacher taught us. I think it’s super important to put this in foundation for beginners as they learn to build a Vocabulary.

I've never heard of "French Beans" - but I have heard "French Cut Green Beans" (julienne). French Bread -> Any bread that isn't a horrible tasteless sponge.

Je me demande si notre tendance à dire "mon ami" vient de Hercule Poirot. C'est comme ça qu'il s'adresse à tous ses amis. "You need to use the little gray cells, mon ami." Il faut dire qu'il est Belge, pas Français.

For the French Bread example, as an American, I find there is a difference between what people call french bread, and what is sold as french bread. There are tons of soft breads you can buy in the stores here labeled "French bread" but when I say "french bread" or anyone else around me does, we are usually trying to specify we want bread that has a nice crispy crust, that comes in a long loaf. Most bread here in america is pretty soft, so the people i know use french bread to speak about bread that is nice and crispy, even if that is not how products are sold to us.

I once asked for a "chien chaud" in a cafe; the waiter just did not get it. More interestingly, I offered to split my "mille feuilles" by offering him "cinq cents feuilles"; after we had a laugh he said he had never thought of the cake that way.

Purée = mashed something pas forcément potato. On part du principe que c'est une purée de patates parce que c'est la plus souvent préparé mais le mot purée ne fait pas forcément référence à la purée de pommes de terre

I loved that le pain de campagne picture you showed is just what we call "pan de campo" in my country. I'm a spanish speaker from south america and work with french people remotely, and all of our conversations are in english, its quite the challenge between my poor pronunciation and their own poor pronunciation, we always get a good laugh. Only heard "sacrebleu" once in 4 years.

For most of us, no matter what we say it'll be obvious in seconds that we are not native speakers, but it's still useful to avoid saying things that are just weird or archaic. Maybe saying "sacre bleu" would be like saying "Zounds!" in English. But if "mon ami" isn't right, it would be helpful to know what to say as a friendly way to address someone, the way the British might use "mate" and Americans might say "buddy" or something similar. Didn't you also say in another video that "cafe au lait" is not usually said?

French people incorporated sarcasm into the whole language. Often we mean the opposite of what we say. Like the "Bien fait" exemple we say that to someone who fucked up or hurt themselves.

I found this so interesting - I am part French, but grew up in England ... so help with pronunciation from a native speaker of the language is very useful! Merci!

French fries actually originated from a Parisian street, a historian recently cleared the debate, "It was born in the Parisian street, it was born in the hands of the fry sellers of the Parisian street. And they are the ones who made the fried potato the emblematic popular Parisian dish of the 19th century before this fry was exported to Belgium. So, it is clear that the French fry is of French origin".

I'm Italian but travel to France regularly for work and have several French friends. One thing I hear constantly when listening to French people speak, is "du coup". It's an ubiquitous phrase! :-D

Loved this lesson. I'm going to France in the future and it was good pronunciation practice!

"Maitre d'hotel" in full (sorry about the lack of accents) was the common phrase in non-US English until relatively recently. In Australia I grew up using the whole phrase at least until the late eighties. The influence of Americans saying "Maydr dee" on television turned the tide, and now most Australians say "Maita d' " ... although to be honest we would usually say "head waiter/waitress"... that is, if we are posh enough to be eating at a place that even HAS a head waiter!

C’est toujours intéressant de voir les différences entre le Français Européen et Canadien. Par exemple, nous disons « mon ami » et « bien fait » quotidiennement d'une manière contraire à l'Europe. Très géniale!

Dans la même veine , je suis plusieurs youtubeur U.S et je les ai entendus dire plusieurs fois : coup de GRA a la place de Coup de grâce. Coup( prononcer presqu'en Français mais de manière un peu aristocratique) de GRA (dire GRA en forçant le plus possible "l'accent Français") Ce qui est étrange puisqu'il existe le même mot en Anglais : grace , qui se prononce presque de la même manière. Au lieux d'avoir l'air très cultiver en sortant coup de GRA, ca me donne a chaque fois l'impression d'entendre Hit of Fat (coup de GRA)... .. . Ca m'a fait aussi penser a Voldemort en Fr et Voldemorte en Anglais/U.S. Merci. ;)

I'm Québecoise and we use "Portes française". It's the official word in the industry for such doors.

Curiously, the "h aspiré" of haricot became "h muet" in Louisiana (Cajun/cadien) French. There apparently was a popular Cajun musical group that called themselves "Les Haricots" (IPA: [lezarico]). Many English-speaking Americans hear the trilled (not uvular) r in Cajun French as a d; thus the term "Zydeco" came to be used for the musical style popularized by "Les Haricots" because of the mishearing of their name by English speakers.

Thank you :) this was more helpful than I would have expected !!

Actually, french joiners do use indeed the term "ouverture à la française", wich kind of means "french opening", to name the classic style opening we have for windows in France. It's sort of like the vertical openings with two panels you have on the american continent, but it instead opens toward the interior.

It works in reverse too. The French use many English words weirdly too :)

If I ever make it to France or even the French part of Canada, I'm going to try my best at parroting you and compliment the food a lot. Maybe then, they'll like me, as they did Julia Childs. You can bet I'm going to try to ingratiate myself and learn some cooking while I'm there!

Bravo! I have just found your channel. You are wonderful. I shall subscribe and follow. Thank you. Xxx

I'm new to your channel and love it!

Adding to your collection…. There is the French braid, a way to braid hair, and the French Defense, a series of opening moves in a chess game. I found this lesson very interesting! I only know a little French. But having grown up in Germany, I know of a lot of cringe worthy expressions that Germans made up that sound English but are virtually unknown here in the US. (A „Handy“ is a cell phone). And vice versa. Americans are quite fond of German chocolate cake, a cake that’s unknown in Germany! Don’t even get me going on Der Wienerschnitzel! As for haricot vert…. I thought French beans refers to the way they are cut, not straight, but at an angle. Some packages or cans even say „French cut beans“. In the last decade or so packaged fresh veggies have been labeled in English and in French. I picked up a lot of French words that way!

Here in Canada, there is a verb that the Québécois use, called "frencher."

Un grand merci. Excellent topic

Some of these I wasn't aware of. Touché.

I'm French and still love her videos.

Amateur du café, j'ai pensé tout de suite au "French press", c'est-à-dire, une "cafetière à piston". C'est vrai que je n'ai quasiment jamais entendu dire "maître d'hôtel". Cependant, "maître d'œuvre" et "maître d'ouvrage" m'ont posé toujours des soucis pendant mes études.

You mentioned "French press" for the way to make coffee, but never had a chance to explain it. I once took out my "French press" coffee maker, showed it to a French visitor, and asked him what French people called it. He said, "Italian."

Great lesson!

I think most of these aren’t all just french in origin.. especially seeing as dutch also uses alot of french “loan words” however we also use the word brunette so i think words like those are just labeled as french when even though they sound french they aren’t or at least are old

Growing up, I've always wondered where did we get the name "french fries". I guess it's the same case with "Hawaiian pizza", it was not made on Hawaii, nor was it made by a Hawaiian person. It actually originated on Canada, and was made b ay Greek immigrant, who for some reasons unknown to me, tried to make an Italian dish. Very nice video. It was very accurate tho I'd also like to mention that "brunette" can sometimes be use to refer to a cute young girl. Also, me and a couple of friends still sometimes uses "sacrebleu", mostly on in-game chat logs as a means of exaggerating something.

As a belgian with both english and french as birth languages, I find your videos very intesteresting to watch, especially for tips on how to inform and advise non-native speakers. And I once again really agree with your video! There is one part however that I found myself intrigued by ; I actually use "mon ami" ( 4:18 in the video) fairly often when adressing either friends or acquaintances, and sometimes "mon frère" (my brother) as well with friends, and I know some other people which use "mon ami" fairly commonly as well. I wonder, is this more generational? I am in my twenties, and I do believe it is more used among people of my age range than others (without certainty tho). Is it more regional to Belgium? I dont feel like it is, because I'm pretty sure I've heard similar in France and Switzerland. Anyway, sorry for the sidetrack, and thanks for your work!

Je viens de découvrir ta chaîne ! Alors je n'ai pas besoin d'apprendre le français mais il faut absolument que je vois tes autres vidéos parce que celle-ci est géniale ! Et aussi que je sache si dans l'une d'entre elles tu parles de ce truc bizarre qui fait qu'en anglais on écrit aussi "lingerie" mais qu'on prononce ça "laungerie", parce que ça me rend folle depuis longtemps 🤣

So fun hearing what things other people name with nations such as "American kitchen."

Une porte française est également utilisé ici, au Québec, pour désigner une porte-fenêtre. J'ai jamais entendu le terme porte-fenêtre. Mais, mon ami, on est entouré d'anglo-saxons ici 😉

In Sweden we jokingly call haricots vertes "herr kuvert" meaning "mr envelope" :)

Wonderful channel, I will brush up on my French... such a wonderful language!

"mon ami" ... alone, as an address... is also used, although rarely... and tends to say a bit of the opposite, in a condescending tone! Having said this, I am a French-speaking Swiss (although living in France), and in Switzerland, older French words and expressions, which have almost totally disappeared from "hexagonal" French, are sometimes still in use.This is also true (but for different words and expressions) in Belgium and in. Canada. I guess it is because those French speakers have been less submitted to the "gravit pull" of Paris. TBD

Moi aussi je suis américain et j'ai une tante canadienne qui habite au Québec. Quelle coïncidence 😂🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

You should tackle some Cajun french, that's a trip right there! I find it very fascinating how different how accents are My Cajun French accent and our pronunciations compared to Standard France French accent and pronunciations.

Your description of bien fait is quite accurate. I grew up and still live in Montreal and have never used it on its own. It is like a taunt. In Portuguese, another Latin based language like French, bem feito (bien fait) is what people say, especially to children, when they are told to listen, continue to misbehave, and get hurt. Your parent will not run over and make sure youre ok, but say bem feito/bien fait first, rather annoyed, like my mother. :D

There is also " un maître d'oeuvre" ( general or prime contractor, or project manager), un maître-nageur (swimming manager or teacher or coach). Btw, as far as I am concerned, I don't hear any difference between " brun" ( brown) and " brin" ( balade, esprit, strand). There is also the problem of the local word, the most famous being "chocolatine" (southern France) vs "pain au chocolat (northen France). Still worse un sac en plastique is called " un pochon" in Brittany "une poche" in the South-west at lest near Bordeaux and " un cornet" in Lorraine.

As a proud Belgian, I thank you for addressing the fact that 'french fries' are from Belgium. Some people think that it got lost in translation. They think that it was named 'fresh fries' and that it accidentally turned into 'french fries'. I'm from the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium, and I learn French in school, and I must say that this very much helped. Merci pour cette leçon instructive. :)

I just randomly discovered your channel today (thank you YT algorithm!)...have you ever done a video on the pronunciation of the French r? I've been learning/speaking French for a while and my r is still trash. :D

I had never heard of French beans. I live in Texas, USA and would call those green beans or string beans. After some googling, it looks like this refers to a variety of green beans that are thinner than regular green beans. Thanks for making the video. It was very informative.

I think "double entendre" is never used in France. (The word "double" is also mispronounced in the English version.)

I was always under the impression that "French doors" referred to two doors that swing open. Nothing to do with having windows. Interesting that all the examples you showed fit both criteria.

C est amusant de vous écouter! Merci pour ces précisions D une Canadienne du Québec!

I love cuisses de grenouilles, escargots (to the point that I have a wine tasting group called Les Escargots), andouilles, andouillettes, ris de veau, langue de boeuf, cervelle d'agneau and more. What I find more challenging (although I will try it occasionally) is tripes, especially tripes à la mode de Caen, which contains stomach from all four chambers.

Bravo pour cette intéressante vidéo! Ça m’étonne combien les nasales françaises diffèrent des nasales québécoises. Le son « un » français est très près du son « in » et le son « an » s’apparente au son « on » chez certains Français. Chez nous, les quatre nasales sont très différentes les unes des autres.

In the same vein, some other "French expressions" that only exist in English and really puzzled me at first, as a native French speaker: - "Plus ça change...". - "Vive la différence !" Not that people would never happen to use it, of course, but these are certainly not what we can call common expressions such as "C'est la vie !".

Super Bonne continuation

. The french baguette was in Germany called often ,Franzosenbrot' ( frenchman' s bread) up to 1970s. The word Baquette was mostly unknown in Germany, and a Croissant was a ,Hörnchen' . Many french words had been used by elderly people ( from the time, French was international language) , but in a strange way. For example Plafond became Blaffo, Pot de Chambre became Boddschamber, Sousterrain became Suttrai. One of the few cases, in which a french word in written german survived in germanised version is Büro - Bureau.

Been living in France for 12 years now. I've never heard a French person say "zut"

Très intéressant! Merci. Brunette est beaucoup utilisée au Québec.

I don't speak French and it's funny this was recommended. But some of these words a loan words in russian (thanks to Peter 1 and history stuff I guess) and people use them on daily basis without even realizing. There are actually a ton of French loan words in russian and they mostly kept the pronunciation as is too. French sounds beautiful and i even did some lessons on duolingo. Alizee is very loved in russia and I also love milene farmer too. Visited France like fifteen years ago or so. Loved the castles and cuisine.

As a Canadian, I didn't know "Canadian Tent" was a thing! Never heard of that before. Quite amusing. I think we used to say "pup tent" years ago and now we would just call it a tent or a two-person tent etc.

I noticed that when you used "les haricots verts..." in a phrase you made no "liaison " between end of "les" and beginning of "haricots..." I am an English speaker who has spoken French for a very long time and have always made a liaison there. Is this mistaken? Now 5 minutes later and I just heard your explanation. It's bizarre because I've never pronounced the "n" at the end of "un" and before "haricot" (apparently correct) but HAVE always made the liaison between "les" and "haricots." (apparently incorrect). Thanks.

Actually French fries were invented in Paris!!!! In the 19th century r stands used to sell them to warm people us and the Belgian tourists took to it and went home to made it popular!!! Et oui! Les frites are définitivement French! ☺️

Here's another one: le chef. It means "boss" in French (and German), but English-speakers seemed to have picked up "le chef de cuisine" and now they use it to mean "cook". (They use it to mean any cook, not just the boss cook)

Ça, c'est vrai ! Les mot complexe sont pas souvent utilisé, sauf dans certains contexte ^^

“French fries” is a fairly modern misspelling of “frenched fries”, similar to donut instead of doughnut. ‘Frenched’ being a proper, long-standing culinary term meaning to “cut into strips, often square”. French [style] green beans are the same - they’re ‘frenched’ into strips. These errors make the whole “Freedom Fries” movement even _more_ embarrassing for Americans with half a clue. Where the culinary term originated, I do not know.

Tu m'as fait penser à tous les steaks-frites que je mangeais en France.

Fascinating! I discovered that les haricots comes from the word "harigoter" (couper en morceaux)! Yet they are often shown to be full length if you buy them canned in the USA. Les haricots verts are often called "Green Jews" in Spanish: Las judías verdes!

Great Video!!

Sacrebleu was created by Louis XIV, who got tired of hearing his courtiers saying "Sacre Dieu!" He said, "If you are going to invoke something, invoke my dog Bleu." So, "Sacrebleu!" and "Parbleu!" arose. But like any slang, it fell out of favor...

I do use "Sacrebleu" every once in a while, but more as a joke than anything else.

Maitre d' is usually pronounced "maytruh dee" and refers to the person in charge of seating at a restaurant. In French "le smoking" has nothing to do with the English word "tuxedo", so it works both ways

On that matter, I once read a story where the character, a french maid, interjected a lovely " Victor Hugo !" when surprised x)

Do normal people really say “mince” and “purée” or is it better to just use “merde” and “putain”?

As an American, I would never minimize someone's attempt to learn English. If a person is attempting to use a new language in a foreign land, they're trying, and that takes bravery, especially since there's no shortage of eye-rolling, judgemental twats. 🤷‍♀️

I’m enjoying teaching my french friends how to speak French like an Englishman. One is really enjoying the sarcasm.

oh punaise il y avait des lunes que je n avais pas entendu le mot sacrebleu lol très intéressant pour apprendre l anglais. magnifique travail

in my experience : Brunette existe toujours, mais c'est considéré comme vulgaire, voire graveleux ou mysogine.

Je suis française et j'ai appris des trucs, pas de la langue française mais de la langue anglaise que j'avais déjà entendus et qui m'avaientt interpellée : - brunette : j'ai toujours été surprise d'entendre ce mot, déjà parce que ce n'est pas ce qu'on apprenait à l'école (Brown hair), mais aussi parce que ça sonnait très français alors que ce n'était pas français. On aurait pu cependant imaginer un français inventer un petit surnom/diminutif pour une petite brune ou une brune mignonne, mais ça resterait une invention/surnom. Je suis surprise d'apprendre que les anglo-saxons peuvent penser que c'est un mot français. Est ce une transformation a partir du français ? - French Windows : j'avais déjà entendu ce terme dans des films ou des séries sans vraiment comprendre de quoi il s'agissait. Je voyais bien que les fenêtres avaient l'air grandes, mais je n'avais pas compris que ça désignait tout simplement des portes fenêtres dans leur ensemble - French bread : ça je ne connaissais pas. Sur la photo ça ressemble à une brioche bas de gamme 😂 - French bean : je connaissais bean pour haricot mais j'avais jamais entendu l'expression "French bean" Pour les mots désués comme "sacrebleu", c'est dommage de pas les laisser le dire en français ça donnerait un style particulier, un certain charme du vieillot. Quand je vois que des mots banals comme "béguin" disparaissent de la langue française pour être remplacés par des mots anglais "crush", ce serait peut être pas mal de laisser quelques anglo-saxons nous réapprendre dans l'autre sens quelques vieux mots français ^^ Bref vidéo informative dans l'autre sens !

Great video. As a French-speaking person who lived in the US for 33 years I've never heard of French beans. Where I lived Americans said green beans. And when I was a child we called them haricots princesses or just princesses.

We use "purée" or "punaise", like "mince" in the same manner English speakers use "fudge", "shoot" or "dang it". They just replace expletives with a similar first syllable.

Don't worry we have some in french too.. in french we wear "baskets" on our feet, not "sneakers". The only thing we do with "sneakers" is eating them. A station wagon is called a "break". In any case if you come to France and use "Brunette" or "Maitre d'" people will most-likely know you're not a native french speaker from your accent, not from the words you use. Just like the US or the UK France is full of non-native speakers anyway, and it's a good thing, one should not have the obsession to appear like a native speaker, leave that for spies.

Another mangling of a French root is the word centre, which you will see spelled CENTER on signs everywhere in Europe except in Britain, France and Ireland.

Geraldine, a quick thought on the French Beans/ Haricots Verts, since you mention no one knowing how Americans came to call them French Beans. I believe they are more popular in the southern part of the US than they are in the rest of the country. They are also one of the main components of Cajun cuisine, from Louisiana. In fact the music of this French region is called Zydeco, which is an early attempt to spell "'s haricots, or les haricots" by people who had only heard the word. A very, very common lyric in many cajun songs is " 's haricots sont pas sallé" describing that times are so hard there's no salt for the green beans.Since the lyric was so iconic, the whole style of music was named for it. If people throughout the South of the US began to associate those beans with the French Louisiana culture, it would be possible that the whole region began to think of them as French beans. I have nothing but my own thinking to blame for this idea, and would not quote it as fact.

Je ne connaissais pas cette youtubeuse.. C'est pas mal, a part, qu'il va falloir travailler l'accent anglais ;) Je suis bilingue (accent parigot à deux balles et accent amerloque SAE à couper au couteau).. Mais c'est sympa ces clips, des émissions qui permettent aux anglophones d'avoir une introspection dans la culture française et sa langue si particulière (parce que c'est clairement orienté du côté français et pas d'une manière francophone en général).. I wasn't aware of that youtuber.. It's actually pretty good although you are going to have to work on that English accent. I'm bilingual (rough Parisian accent and a deep southern 'murican' accent when I speak English). But I have to admit it's pretty neat to have those snippets, those YT broadcasts that allow English speakers to have an insight into French culture and its all so peculiar language (because its obviously geared towards the French part of it rather than the global French speaking community at large). Bon - et bien madame, vous avez un nouvel abonné ! Well - ma'am You got yourself another subscriber ! PS : Il me semble que selon l'académie française, la liaison est maintenant autorisée même avec un h... on peu dire : un naricot, les zaricots... (même si, mais je ne suis qu'un vieux tromblon, ça m'écorche les oreilles à chaque fois).. Ou voir écrire nénufar.. Oh.. P.... Punaise ! ça me f... met en rogne, ça me fait saigner des yeux !

your accent is as thick as mine... i lived in a totally non-french-speaking environment in Greater London area for 25 years and i could not get rid of my french high school english lessons accent... it is so weird.... How lucky we are (french people) that english speakers find french accent irresistibly sexy (lol) Great video, nom d;un chien! A topic that needed to be poked fun at for sooo loooong! thank you @Comme une Francaise (desole , j'ai toujours mon clavier qwerty quoique de retour en france depuis 5 ou 6 ans...) bises!

My neighbour in Adelaide a french speaker from Mauritius used to say "sacred bleu".

😂😂😂 trop bien ta vidéo!!

I cracked up at the "tente canadienne" / "tante canadienne" part

We have French CUT green beans. In cans they come out sliced diagonally in about 1 inch pieces. While I see French cut often, I have never seen French beans. I am eating loads of green beans because they are low in carbs and I am getting ready for my trip to Paris.

I'm french and I use sacrebleu, but I'm an old soul and fan of medieval history :)

concernant l'expression "purée", souvent les parents corrigent les enfants/ado quand ils disent "putain" pour le corriger en "purée" ça commence pareil mais c'est quand même bien plus propre comme expression

Wasn’t able to check all the comments to see if I’m repeating, but a former employer from France mocked me for weeks, after i referred to my writing pseudonyms as “nom de plume” in conversation with him.