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What 150 world leaders will eat for lunch in Paris

The Local France/AFP
The Local France/AFP - [email protected]
What 150 world leaders will eat for lunch in Paris
Performers wearing effigies of world leaders (From L) German Chancellor Angela Merkel, China's President Xi Jinping, US President Barack Obama, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and French President

So what do you cook when you're feeding 150 presidents, prime ministers, and kings at an environmental conference? We take a look at the menu on the table for Monday afternoon at the COP21 climate summit.

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France will be seeking to titillate the tastebuds of its world leader guests on Monday with a 75-minute lunch it hopes will put them in the mood for making history.
   
The meal will break what is set to be 12 hours or more of back-to-back, three-minute speeches by heads of state and government tasked with injecting a sense of mission into the conference meant to stave off disastrous global warming.
   
The four-course menu will be prepared by five top-notch chefs, all volunteering their services to show off local, organic produce.
 
Some Reblochon, a semi-soft mountain cheese, will be on the table. Photo: AFP   
 
Accompanied, of course, by the finest French wines.
   
"A lunch reflecting France's environmental and gastronomic excellence... but without ostentation," Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, the president of the conference, told reporters on Sunday.
   
Digging into the French offering will be the likes of Barack Obama, Xi Jinping and Narendra Modi - even rivals Vladimir Putin and Recep Tayyip Erdogan have been invited to break bread together, as have Israel's Benjamin Netanhayu and Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas.
 

A picture of all the world leaders in Paris in Monday. Photo: AFP
   
The feasting will start with a "Modern Freneuse turnip soup with scallops cooked in floral steam", followed by "Free-range poultry from Licques, stuffed celery preserve with truffles and parsleyed creamed spinach," according to the menu.
   
The cheese course will be an organic Reblochon from France's Mont Blanc region, and for dessert, a traditional Paris Brest cake with stewed citrus fruit and a "light praline cream".
   
The wine selection includes a white Meursault 1er Cru "Santenots" 2011, a red Domaine Marquis d'Angerville Chateau Beychevelle 2009, and the Champagne a Philipponnat Cuvee 1522 (all of which retails for between €50 and €60) - with a fruit juice option for those averse to alcohol.
 
As well as red and white wine, there will be Champagne a Philipponnat Cuvee 1522. Photo: WikiCommons   
 
The venue will be a hall at Le Bourget airport in Paris' northern outskirts, hosting the marathon conference.
   
The chefs are Yannick Alleno, Alexandre Gauthier, Nicolas Masse, Marc Veyrat and Christelle Brua (pictured below).
 
   
"There are no ostentatious or very expensive ingredients," said Alleno.   
 
"We will aim to impress with our cooking instead... it is going to be a beautiful feast."
   
The heads of state and government are in Paris only for the first day of the conference, which runs until December 11th.
   
Rank-and-file bureaucrats will take over from Tuesday with negotiations for the new pact to limit climate change by curbing greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel use.
 
Dessert - a Paris Brest cake. Photo: Stéphanie Kilgast/Flickr

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