French fries or Belgian fries???

Five years ago I was in Paris for the first time with a list of questions, Is Eiffel Tower a romantic place like on the movies? Are parisians really fashionable? Do they eating french fries like crazy?

Well, the answer for the last question made me surprised since unlike in Belgium where we can find 'frituren' of 'frieteries' growing everywhere like mushrooms, in Paris we just find french fries in Mc D's of KFC's. And tell the truth, if you are the loyal customer of a 'frituur' and 'well trained' already for what we say as an 'echt GOEIE friet', then you'll easily be dissapointed with what you get in those francises.

Coming from Indonesia, Belgian fries is the first beloved food that I can say Hmmm.... Yummy! crispy like 'krupuk' and soft like 'pergedel'.  The rest of foods here are kinds that I've to learn to eat, except chocolate, ice cream, and home-made spaghetti bolognaise :)

Belgian says that they invented fries. They have 'friet revolutie' and fries is one of major national exports. In book Dag Vlaanderen!  written by RTBF journalist Christophe Deborsu, we can find an argument of the fries invention. Based on the story that he quoted from  a Flemish art historian Paul Ilegems, fries was invented by people in Dinant, Andenne and Namen arround 1680. Since they had no fish to eat during winter, they cut the potato in a form of small fish and fried them in the oil.

Further we can link this story to what some people believe that the name of french fries given by American armies that arrived here during the 1st World War. When they tasted the fries, they supposedly called them FRENCH fries since at the time french was the official language of Belgian army.

However, some people doubt about this story. The first story about the invention was not relevant with the historical background that potatos just arrived the areas in 1735. Another argument said that it was almost impossible during the economy crisis in that century to find  oil to fry the potato.

Well... which one is true and untrue, the truth is that here is Belgium we find the world best quality fries. Crispy from outside and soft from inside.... with mayonaise and a bit salt... hmmm... 'hemels' (paradise).