The Angers website whets inhabitants appetite before the English "Big Lunch"

One of the most scheming moments of the next Accroche-Coeurs event, planned in Angers on September 7th, 8th and 9th, could be "The big lunch". This idea is unusual because many French people have a condescending opinion of British cuisine and culinary traditions (the opposite doesn't exist). Moreover, while British people are considered by French as reserved and even cold (English people scarecely shake hands and never kiss each others) "The big lunch" planned in Angers on September 9th near "Verdun bridge" (written in English on the city website) in order to have fun clearly refers to a British tradition.

Initiated in 2009, "The Big Lunch" idea consists in "getting as many people as possible across the whole of the UK to have lunch with their neighbours once a year in a simple act of community, friendship and fun". In 2012, "The Big Lunch" fell on the same weekend as The Queen's Diamond Jubilee celebrations on June 3rd (a Sunday) and gathered 8,5 millions people across the UK. A "Big Lunch can be anything from a few neighbours getting together in a garden or a street, to a full blown street party with food, music and decoration that quite literally stops the traffic".

What looks fun in the advertisement published on the city website is "The (Angers) Big Lunch" is said to be "à la bonne franquette" as if having fun was not possible beyond the Channel. This may not be true. There are also informal meals and lunches without any fuss in UK. And there, the weather is more rainy. So English are more deserving.