I doubt it comes from Belgium. After all, the first country in Europe that grew potatoes is Spain (the conquest of Peru being undertaken by Spaniards). Where we have 2 main ways to prepare food: roasting and deep-frying.

Actually, the "French" in French fries doesn't come from France, but from the act of "frenching", or slicing foodstuffs longitudinally.

The poor man's Ferrari 456. But prettier.

Most of its success is due to Jean Ragnotti, who took to the Maxi 5 like a fish takes to water. A perfect symbiosis of man and machine.

Actually, most of them were made in... Spain. Anyway few things say more "70s France" than this car. Maybe Georges Pompidou.

The French Mercedes... back when Mercedes meant something.

Architecture that, by the way, the Dyna Z eschewed (it was FWD).

Designed by an Italian... just like the 2CV and the DS.

Or when you were trying to get used to the brakes... the "pedal-button" is hyper-sensitive.

Over a plowed field, a 2CV is the most fun car you can drive. Screw AWD: Citroën suspension and light weight are the way to go.

Anyway, more than a single model, I think that the quintaessentially French car is a whole subtype: the fairly small, fairly simple FWD car. The 2CV and derivatives, the Renaults 4, 5 and Clio, the Peugeots 104, 106, 205 and 206. To quote James May, that's due to France being "a country of Communists and peasants, so…

Italian body! It's the Carla Bruni of cars.

It would be my favourite too if it had saved my life (the Petit-Clamart shooting). Heck, it's one of my favourite cars still.

But the engine is Italian and the electrics are Lucas! A Trifecta of Doom. Still, I WILL own one.

It's actually quite intuitive once you forget "on the floor" setup. The driving position is also quite weird.

All right, soldat van Oranje, maybe you could also put bikes on the list...

Actually you could talk about Antwerp-made Opels...

By an Italian...

It was made by Peugeot, the most French of French automakers. Jean Todt made his career thanks to it. It won the real Dakar (back when it actually finished in Senegal) and brought Group B to a glorious end. It is absolutely bonkers and it's a French specialty: take a FWD supermini, strip it and put the biggest,…

WRONG!