A vine romance
Boarding Eurostar at breakfast, we are in the plump heart of France by lunchtime.
As the TGV cuts south from Paris, Burgundy’s varied countryside comes into view, threaded with rivers, patched with woods and vineyards and peppered with castles and abbeys. Arriving at Dijon, we jump into a taxi and head straight for the Bistrot des Halles (like most French restaurants, it closes promptly at 2pm). In the city’s market square, it makes an appropriate place to start an exploration of Burgundy’s rich, earthy, cooking, much of it steeped in wine.
Rich is the word. If you want to spoil yourself, there’s a glut of gastronomic temples from which to choose (see overleaf). But despite the region’s prosperity, it is also timeless and rural, even wild in places, a fact reflected in the many humble restaurants that are just as excellent in their way as the great ones. Their menus are rooted to the terroir, with the same refrain endlessly repeated: snails, jambon persillé, Charolais beef, poulet de Bresse, freshwater trout, pain d’épices, mustard, clafoutis, cassis. Some may tire of it after a while; I don’t.
As for wine, these are places where the winemakers themselves choose to meet and eat. Their lists are generally excellent, sometimes with bottles that are hard to find elsewhere. Armed with the inside knowledge of one such Beaune négotiant, we hire a car and set off to stretch our legs on long walks, admire ducal palaces and Romanesque architecture and eat and drink simply but well.
More: telegraph.co.uk