Headline in today’s Midi Libre;

Pour les tabacs, les carottes ne sont toujours pas cuites.

This translates literally as;

The carrots are not always cooked for the tobacconists.

Ok so Mme le Tabac got her Carrotes Vichy a little too al dente last night,- tough on the tabac but hardly worthy of a headline.So I have to go to the dictionary, there under carotte is an expression; Les carottes sont cuites means in fact nothing culinary but “Its all up ” .
So we now have a headline (after a story about the decline of centre ville trading in Beziers) saying that it is not always over for the tobacconists.
Back to the dictionary where under toujours you discover that it can also mean “Yet”.
We now have a headline which makes perfect sense;

“It’s not all up yet for the tobacconists”

But there is more.

Further on the report says;

Les carottes (le nom de l’enseigne lumineuse signalant un tabac) sont-elles cuites ?

The Carotte also means the neon sign they hang over tobacco shops because of its shape.

So now we have yet a further subtlety in the article.
The phrase has yet a third meaning.

They have a way with their language these French people.