French weekly magazines review

The horsemeat-for-beef scandal continues to make headlines, while one of Dominique Strauss-Kahn's former lovers spills the beans on their relationship.

This weekend the annual agricultural fair opens in Paris and the satirical newspaper Le Canard enchaîné seems to find it amusing in light of recent food scandals involving horsemeat being passed off as beef.

The paper is also rather critical of François Hollande in an article entitled: "From one war to another".

The first war refers to the French military intervention in Mali. The second is the war against the lack of economic growth in France. Le Canard enchaîné writes that Hollande will have to seriously consider cutting public spending in order to guide the economy back on track.

Le Nouvel Observateur has gone for a scandalous front page featuring a photo of Argentinian writer Marcela Iacub. In an exclusive interview, the novelist spills the beans on her relationship with Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the former International Monetary Fund chief accused of sexual impropriety. Her new novel, Belle et Bête, is set to be released next week; she writes taht she had fallen in love with one of the country's most hated figures. The author tells the magazine that Strauss-Kahn, also known as DSK, is a "sublime and irrational pig". Interestingly, she has defended DSK in a previous essay.

According to her, we all have internal pigs. She compares her liaison to investigative journalism. She says one has to "love and hate someone in order to know them."

She adds she used him as much as he used her. In her book, she used her imagination for all the sexy stuff while using actual discussion or rendezvous sites which entertained her and DSK's relationship.

Le Figaro magazines has a special dossier on organic foods investigating whether they are actually good for your health, and why they are so expensive. It has aksed several top chefs to carry out a taste test to see whether they can spot the difference.

Marianne meanwhile looks at how Sarkozy and Hollande have both contributed to squeezing cash and hope through France's middle classes and Le Parisien has dedicated its main story to the musical prowess of Jane Birkin's daughter Lou Doillon, who has just received a French music award for her singing.