Food, Glorious Food - Gastronomy in Lyon

Between our food tour on Friday and our visit to Les Halles Paul Bocuse on Saturday, we were exposed to many of the culinary delights Lyon has to offer.  

The first stop on our Food and Walking Tour was on Rue St. Jean at Le Sirop de la Rue.  This is a specialty shop selling some of the food items Lyon is famous for:  sausages, quenelles, andouillette pate, and praline syrups.  Lyon is well known for its praline – and it isn’t what you would expect it to be.  During our first evening here, one of the desserts was a praline tart.  It was bright red which we found surprising.  The following evening, I had tried a praline crème brulee and, again, it was a very bright pink colour.  We had also seen brioche loaves in the bakery windows and they are also dotted with bright pink “beads”.  The origin of the red is a bit of a mystery but said to be inspired by a chef’s rose garden.  It turns out the red actually comes from red food colouring.

We started our tasting with some drops of this syrup added to a cup of Beaujolais wine.  It was quite good.  Frederik, the owner and quite a character, then explained the different sausages in his shop.  One, quite large, is called “the Jesus” and replaces Jesus in the manger at Christmas – at least that is what Fred said.  We then headed downstairs to a tasting room in the cellar.  We tried three kinds of sausage, the andouillette pate, gherkins, and bread with a proper glass of Beaujolais.  None of us particularly cared for the pate!  The sausages though were quite tasty; for me, particularly, the jambon cru.

We continued along Rue St. Jean, occasionally going through a traboule to the river and another one to get us back on the street.  It is clear these passages are everywhere and very handy, provided you know where they are.  Our next stop was an ice cream shop where two brothers concoct unique flavours of ice cream.  We tasted two small scoops and tried to identify the flavours.  The first one was cassis and raspberry with the final ingredient being orange blossom.  While that one was more like a sorbet, the second one was creamier.  It was difficult to ascertain what it was but we finally guessed, with a lot of hints, that it was date and violet essence.  It was okay.

We continued through the Vieux Lyon quartier.  Our next stop was at Alice and Charlotte, a cheese and drink place with an art gallery in the next room.  We tried three cheeses – an unpasteurized goat cheese, a soft cheese from the Compte but I didn’t catch the exact name, and then a harder mountain cheese from the Haute Savoie.  These were served with bread and a glass of slightly petillant white wine that was crisp and tasty. 

From there, we wandered through the ruins next to the church.  The ruins of the very old church are, apparently, where the first baptism occurred.  Our next stop, not related to food, was another silk shop.  The owner showed us how the loom worked and some of the scarves in the store were absolutely fabulous.  I am tempted to go back and get one.

Our final stop was at Bonnat, a chocolaterie.  The shop itself is in a lovely space with stone walls but the displays are in modern cabinets.  It was really pretty.  There, we got to have two chocolates and a glass of Lyonnais stout.  The drink tasted really smoky to me – and smelled like an ashtray.  The guide told us it was supposed to go well with chocolate but I have to totally disagree.  Champagne would have worked so much better! 

The next day, our food-related activity was to go to Les Halles Paul Bocuse to check out the restaurants and food stalls.  There is nothing more I can say about it as it was amazing.  So, let's let the photos speak for themselves.

Tomorrow, leave Lyon and head for to Nice in the south of France where, undoubtedly, the food will be just as interesting but the weather should be warmer!