What Marie Antoinette Ate In A Day, According To Historians

Marie Antoinette is an enduring historical figure, and one whose story is uniquely connected to food, perhaps due to the (falsely attributed) "let them eat cake" quote. There are also rumors of her having a sweet tooth and being known to overeat with little consideration. Then there's the iconic, Sofia Coppola-directed film rendition of Antoinette's life, "Marie Antoinette," which is full of lavish cakes, macarons, and other iconic desserts from the venerable bakery Ladurée — an appetite that seems to cling to her legacy. But what did French royalty actually eat during her time? And was she really as much of a sugar fiend as history paints her to be? 

Despite her fame and history, we don't know have many concrete details about the last queen of France, including what she ate every day. It seems that fictitious biographies and inaccurate facts have clouded the facts of Antoinette's real story, and it's possible that this very air of mystery makes her such a compelling historical figure worth of continued conversation and research. 

Marie Antoinette ruled as queen of France from 1774 until 1792, when the monarchy was overthrown during the French Revolution. At the height of her rule, Antoinette basked in unimaginable wealth and luxury, which included food. As queen, she had access to the finest ingredients and spoils the world had to offer. This included rare foreign treats like chocolate, tropical fruits, and rich pastries and breads from other countries.

Though it can be hard to pin down the queen's exact diet, there are some verifiable accounts in the memoirs of Antoinette's chambermaids and ladies-in-waiting. One lady-in-waiting, Madame Campan, noted that the queen didn't eat very much at all and preferred privacy during mealtimes. Campan's memoirs recall the queen starting the day with a breakfast of hot chocolate and pastries or bread, and then only consuming water and small portions of poultry throughout the rest of the day. This stands in high contrast to the notion of an overindulgent Marie Antoinette.

Some of this negative image may be linked to the tradition of the "Royal Tables," where the king and queen would eat ornate dinners before an audience as a way to display their wealth that also humanized them in front of the court. Antoinette famously disliked this practice, which was only undertaken once a week during her husband's reign rather than as a nightly cadence by his predecessors. Typical dinners for French royals at the time began with starter dishes and soups, then move on to opulent platters of roasted meats like boar and rabbit with stewed vegetables and ornate pastries. If this was your only impression of the queen's dining habits, you might also conclude that she ate exorbitantly on a regular basis.

One item frequently mentioned in regard to Antoinette's diet is chocolate. It was a delicacy during her time and a staple ingredient in the Versailles palace. When she married Louis XVI, Antoinette even brought her very own chocolatier from Austria to invent delicious chocolate dishes scented with almonds, orange blossoms, and anything else the queen desired. One such recipe mixed chocolate pastilles with medicine as a clever way to make daily doses taste better. There's no recipe for these pastilles, but it's unlikely anything you'd want to recreate anyways. Bitter chocolate sans cocoa butter and 18^th century medicine? No, thanks.

One chocolate recipe that did survive is the famous Versailles hot chocolate, which the queen was said to enjoy daily at breakfast. Chocolate was already popular at the palace — over a century before Marie's arrival at the French Court, Louis XIV was himself a chocolate lover, and Louis XV was known for an obsession with drinkable hot chocolate, specifically. The exact recipe has been preserved and sounds genuinely delicious. Simply melt equal parts chocolate and water in a double boiler. Before serving, keep at a low heat and add one egg yolk, stirring until fully incorporated.