In bed, the French have salt on the board

• The editorial staff of

  20 Minutes

  accompanies you during the summer.

  Because this period is often that of big nonsense on the heart and on the ass side, the "club of 4" at your service gives you some "hot stuff" to spend two months "tchatchatcha", every Monday.

  So if you don't know what to chat at aperitif time, we're here and, in the headset, we talk to you about nudes, Tinder vacations, skin and hot sand.

• In this seventh episode of our series "And more so affinities", we look at the sweet and salty flavors of our wild antics.

• If strawberries, whipped cream and chocolate are acclaimed under the duvet, a whole universe of gustatory pleasure is shunned...

"Eye devour", "give a treat", "be chewable", etc.

The pleasures of the table and those of bed often meet on our lips.

In our expressions, these are two worlds that continually brush against each other.

To the point of intertwining?

"Listening to erotic podcasts, I realized that the vocabulary of literature of the genre was quite similar to that of wine and gastronomy," recalls Leslie Brochot, wine expert and founder of Maîtres d'accords.

"We will say of a wine that it is tender, fleshy, luscious, sensual or even enticing", she illustrates.

Not surprising, then, that 53% of French people are ready to invite food to their jamb(ons) in the air parties, according to a study by the Ifop institute for Just Eat in 2020. “Since our childhood, and the famous oral pleasure described by Freud, food but also the way of consuming it - aspiration, suction, bird's beak or gargantuan spoonfuls - have been eroticized", explains Magali Croset-Calisto, sexologist and author of the book

.

The triumph of whipped cream over sushi

“Eating food or tasting wine is a sensory and sensual act,” adds Leslie Brochot, for whom the worlds of gustatory and sexual pleasure “come together”.

Many French open to the pleasures of the mouth even on the pillow, but between the pear and the cheese, they seem categorical.

A single savory dish is sufficiently cited by Ifop respondents to earn its place on the podium – which still has ten.

It's sushi.

Note here the probable influence of the film

and its memorable scene in which one of the protagonists, Samantha, waits for her partner lying naked on the living room table, covered with maki and sushi.

An overview of nyotaimori, the Japanese practice of tasting these dishes on the body of a naked woman.

But even these little balls of vinegared rice with raw fish pale in comparison to the sweet sacrosanct.

“Enjoy your dish” and “enjoy someone”

Only 3% of respondents interested in mixing flavors under the duvet have already tried nyotaimori compared to 58% for whipped cream or 30% for chocolate.

Would we therefore be a country of sweet tooth?

Is culinary art reserved for lovers of pastries?

“Sugar is one of the most addictive substances that exists.

It instantly triggers our reward circuit, the pleasure system of our brain,” says Magali Croset-Calisto.

In her book

, Amélie Nothomb writes: “It was then that I was born, at the age of two and a half (…) by the grace of white chocolate”.

She notes that "piece by piece" the chocolate "entered" into her.

"When you eat, when you drink, you bring something into yourself, you savor your dish as you can savor someone", slips Leslie Brochot.

Culinary sweet and savory orgasms

And, for some, the pleasure culminates more in a fork than a good doggy style.

"From a neurobiological point of view, the culinary orgasm has characteristics identical to those of the sexual orgasm: release of dopamine, endorphins and oxytocins, which are the neurotransmitters of desire, pleasure, feelings of well-being and attachment," recalls Magali Croset-Calisto.

For the sexologist, it is the “quintessence of oral pleasure” where the “oral sphere experiences maximum eroticization”.

In its special issue on female pleasure,  

recounts the culinary orgasms of three chefs.

And there, the sweet looks gloomy.

Julia Sedefdjian cites the pig with salsify and the "poupeton", a flower of male zucchini, Marie-Victorine Manoa a chuck of beef and Julie Basset oysters.

Leslie Brochot has also experienced culinary orgasm and remembers in particular a wine that “upset” her so much that she cried.

“All foods that are indulgent can become sensual,” she says.

Delicacies which therefore also go well with savory, such as “salmon flesh” which is “soft, smooth, soft and therefore very sensual” for the wine expert.

From sow vulva to chocolate strawberries

Leslie Brochot also created in 2018 Liaisons gourmandes (on hold since the Covid-19 pandemic), a tasting experience during which participants listen to erotic texts while eating and drinking blindfolded.

“Most of the products that I work with for Liaisons Gourmands are savory,” she points out, citing pell-mell fresh goat cheese, truffles or tapenade.

Eating and sex have been associated for centuries.

"Roman orgies already mixed food, eroticism and sexuality", recalls Magali Croset-Calisto, even if these splendor celebrations were reserved for a tiny part of the Romans, members of high society.

The dishes then competed in exoticism and originality and the savory had nothing to be ashamed of.

Pink flamingo brains, peacock tongues and sow vulvas were tasted directly with the fingers.

Today, exoticism is hidden in the cupboard thanks to the strawberries, whipped cream and chocolate triptych.

Will you pass me the truffle lube?

But if, in summer, we more easily eroticize an ice cube that runs along our body, is cheese really impossible to sexualize?

And the forbidden pleasure for those who wish to spread Fourme de Montbrison on their partner?

“The smell can block some people but if we focus on the material, the texture, it can be sensual.

A mount of gold baked in the oven that you pour into someone's mouth, there can be something sexy, ”says Leslie Brochot.

But no Mont d'Or or Tomme de Savoie in the products designed for the bedroom.

Banana-flavoured lubricant, chocolate-flavoured condom, massage oil with hints of cotton candy… Jealously crammed into our secret drawer, the products intended to spice up our sex lives are often sweet and chemical.

"It's very disgusting", regrets Leslie Brochot who would be more tempted by a "truffle lubricant".

More consensual than truffles or cheese, she also mentions cucumber, iodized smells or even tomatoes.

Bacon-flavored condom "for your meat"

The offer of savory products in the field of eroticism remains a “niche” world reserved for “insiders” who must “seek to find them”, admits Magali Croset-Calisto.

However, in 2013 the American company J & D's Food launched condoms that taste… Bacon.

Designed to give a publicity stunt to the company specializing in bacon-flavoured seasonings, these latex condoms then sold like hot cakes under the particularly distinguished slogan: “To make your meat look like meat”.

Smell and taste are more carnal senses than sight.

They can act like a Proust madeleine.

These reminiscences could be more stimulated if the products were more varied.

“Each human being has a personal erotic imagination that oscillates between excess and frugality,” recalls Magali Croset-Calisto.

At a time when food porn is swiped indefinitely on social networks, the stalls of our sex shops remain resolutely classic.

So while you wait for a company to launch a quirky new product, the perfect ingredients may be within reach in the kitchen.

Enjoy your lunch !

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