Imagine this:
You just finished a French dinner. It’s not even Christmas or Easter with never-ending dishes. Just a normal dinner with French friends, on a Friday night. You’re probably full. And it was delicious. How do you compliment the cook, in French? How do you ask for more? How do you say in French « I’m full » without making THE classic expat mistake?
This is what you’ll discover in this episode of Comme une Française TV.
Click to watch « How to compliment your French host about the dinner »:
Et toi ?
How do you compliment your hosts in French after a great dinner?
Did you know these expressions? Which one will you use at your next dinner?
Share your story so we can discuss in the comments area below the video.
A la prochaine !
Géraldine
No true Anglo Saxon would ever dream of saying ‘I am elegantly sufficed thank-you’!!! Even King Arthur would have thought twice before uttering anything so obscure!
I have not found a good equivalent to ‘I am elegantly sufficed, thank you’ . UK English, and one of my favourite expressions as it conveys a compliment to the host for both quality and generosity of their hospitality. How would you say it without it coming across OTT? Generally I am still too Anglo Saxon to be comfortable saying superb every five words, so have a hard time with compliments – be it giving or receiving them 🙂 It seems to me that effusive compliments is de rigeur, but paradoxically you are seen as overly polite when you answer ‘avec/mon plaisir’ after you have been thanked for a small service. Am I reading that right?
After helping, when someone says “Merci”, you can say “De rien”.
On a related topic. What is the best thing to take along if you are invited to dinner in a French home?
Bonjour Helen,
Check this post: what to bring to a French dinner
Hope it helps!
They told me “je suis rassasie” or “je me regale”(with accent, which is missing on my keyboard!) works also.
Bonjour Father Utoy,
Oui, tout à fait !
“Je suis rassasié” et “Je me suis régalé” sont parfaits aussi.
Salut Géraldine et merci beaucoup pour tout les vidéo et tes conseil qui sont tous bien pratique 🙂
I remember at the the begining of my life in france, I uses to say to my hostes: j’aime bien, c’est très special, en fait I wanted to say that it’s so “special” and delicious and i used this word as a compliment to every body and every thing just like in English and so it tooks time until i realized that “special” is not at all a compliment in french 😀
Bonjour Mahsa,
Ahah, yes absolutely! It’s great you figured it out at last!
Thanks for sharing this story.
Merci pour le video! Mais quelque fois je dis “Non merci, j’ai faim non plus”. Or a variation of that I can’t remember at the moment. Is this correct?
Bonjour Karin,
Thanks for sharing!
You can say “Non merci, je n’ai plus faim.”
Great tips and very helpful when I recently joined a group of 14 French for lunch and offered more. As I made my comments, I thought, thank you Geraldine!
Super !
I have learned that if you are ‘full’ and your host offers you more food, it is polite to say, ‘non merci; j’ai bien mangé.’ Est-ce correct?
Hi Dorothy,
Yes, absolutely. You can say “Non merci; j’ai bien mangé” or “Non merci; j’ai assez mangé”.
Excellent!
Bonjour Geraldine & merci pour la leçon!
One mistake I have made is to say “je suis fini” when somebody has asked if I wanted more at a restaurant. My server laughed (nicely) and explained that this statement means “I am dead.” I am learning that sometimes direct translations from what one would say in English lead to funny mistakes in French 🙂
Hi Martha,
Thanks for sharing your experience with the community!
Yes, this is a funny mistake. 🙂
Hi thanks for this video. in the past I have used this phrase: c’était délicieux, mais pas plus merci, j’ai eu beaucoup . As it was a phrase that in could translate. Would it of been ok or could I of caused offence?
Hi Donna,
This is not offensive at all, it’s just the grammar of “j’ai eu beaucoup” is not right. 🙂
“C’était délicieux. Mais ça ira merci. (slightly more elegant than “mais pas plus merci”) J’ai déjà bien mangé.”