This French word might come up right before you ask for a glass of water.
Why do I need to know étouffe-chrétien?
Because this might come up after a trip to the boulangerie.
What does it mean?
Étouffe-chrétien – roughly pronounced uhn ay-toof kreh-tee-ehn (listen here)- technically translates as a ‘Christian suffocate’ or a ‘Christian choke’.
If you put it in a French translator, it might come out as ‘suffocatingly Christian’, but these days the phrase does not have anything to do with one’s religious beliefs.
An étouffe-chrétien can be used to describe a pastry or meal that is too dry or too heavy that it is impossible to swallow. You would use this if the food gives the sensation of choking – it’s essentially one of those untranslatable phrases as the English language doesn’t really have an equivalent.
As for the Christian part – this goes back several centuries to when Christians observed periods of fasting, as well as periods, such as Lent, when eating certain types of food was forbidden. As a result, people developed simple and often dry dishes for these periods. They were tasteless and hard to swallow, which gave rise to the term étouffe-chrétien.
Later, in 1856, it was added to the Glossaire du centre de la France (Central France glossary) as an ‘indigestible pastry, a thick and heavy galette’.
While the expression is old-fashioned and colloquial, most people see it as amusing. If you want to make a joke about dry food (in an informal context where you are not worried about offending the cook), then you might use étouffe-chrétien.
Use it like this
Ma tante nous a servi un dessert étouffe-chrétien à Noël l’année dernière. Il était impossible de le terminer sans un verre d’eau. – My aunt served us an overly dry dessert at Christmas last year. It was impossible to finish without a glass of water.
Sa pâtisserie n’était pas mauvaise, mais elle était un peu étouffe-chrétien. – Her pastry was not bad, but it was a bit too dry.
Le dîner était trop sec ! Étouffe-chrétien même. Je n’arrive pas à croire que nous ayons payé ce repas si cher ! – The dinner was too dry! To the point of choking… I can’t believe we paid so much for it!
