Palomas

Palomas
2 rue du Colonel Chambonnet 69002 Lyon, France

04 78 37 74 60

 

Before heading up on the fornicular to visit the old part of Lyon, we stopped into Palomas to grab a few snacks. Palomas is a master chocolate and confectionary maker, which originally opened in 1917. The shop sells all kinds of sweet treats but it was the mont blanc that I spotted in the window display that really interested me.

 

 

Not everyone likes chestnut but I've kind of grown a taste for it. If you've never had a Mont Blanc before, the main ingredient is chestnuts that are sweetened and pureed. There's usually a cookie or some kind of biscuit on the bottom that is then topped with the chestnut in a vermicelli-like mound along with some whipped cream. The dessert was named after the Mont Blanc mountain top in the Alps, as it resembles a snow-capped mountain.

 



After we finished paying at Palomas, I grabbed this shot of the city square. You can see the church in the background perched on top of the hill that we later traveled up via the fornicular just minutes later.

 

Maison Rousseau

Maison Rousseau
102 Cours Lafayette, 69003 Lyon, France 
+33 4 78 62 37 65

As I previously mentioned in my post about dining at Paul Bocuse, there's a large marketplace or "les halles" located in the Part-Dieu neighborhood of Lyon that is quite simply a food lover's paradise. The marketplace is named in honor of the legendary Paul Bocuse, and under one roof you will find an array of different vendors selling some of the highest quality products and ingredients on the planet - and I don't think that that's an exaggeration. The marketplace is home to artisanal cheese makers, butchers, bread makers, pastry shops, wine shops, seafood stalls, restaurants - you name it.

We visited the marketplace in the late afternoon on the same day we were visiting Paul Bocuse's L'Auberge du Pont de Collonges. It was a bit of a shame since we didn't really take advantage of our time at the market. We didn't try much of anything since we knew we were in for a huge, multi-course meal later that night and didn't want to ruin our appetites. We couldn't go without having anything, however, so we stopped at Maison Rousseau for some oysters.

Maison Rousseau is a seafood purveyor where you can buy all kinds of fresh seafood to take home. There's also a shop keeper at the counter who will kindly shuck oysters or other crustaceans for you, which is what we opted for.

 

 

After sharing a dozen oysters, we also stopped by the shop of La Mere Richard to grab some cheese before heading back to the hotel. Lyon is most famous for its Saint-Marcellin cheese, which is a soft textured cow's milk cheese, and this is the one we bought. Funny enough, later that night we found out that cheese from La Mere Richard is served at L'Auberge du Pont de Collonges.

Le Bouchon de Carnivores

Le Bouchon de Carnivores
8 Rue des Marronniers, 69002 Lyon, France
+33 4 78 42 97 69

During our first day in Lyon, we arrived and dropped off our luggage at the hotel, which was near the Contemporary Art Museum. Lyon doesn't have a subway system, so we took a bus into the city to grab some food, stopping near Place Bellacour.

Lyon is most known for its bouchons, which are restaurants that specialize in traditional Lyonaisse dishes. Lyonaisse dishes tend to be pretty rich and hearty, featuring lots of meat. This is in contrast to nouvelle cuisine, which as mentioned in a previous post focuses on freshness of ingredients and lighter preparations. Bouchons also tend to have a more casual atmosphere compared with restaurants serving "haute cuisine".

Right near Place Bellacour, there's a street called Marronniers that is lined with bouchons. All of the bouchons appeared to offer pre-fixe menus with various choices for each course. We looked at a few menus and then picked a place we liked, which ended up being Le Bouchon de Carnivores.

To start the meal, the waitress brought over some bread and this freebie, which comprised some cured meat and fried pork fat. Yep, I said it. Fried pork fat.

For our first courses, I went with the hunter's sausage served with a red wine sauce...

...and my wife ordered the Lyonnaise salad, featuring a poached egg, bacon lardons, croutons, and frisee salad.

For our mains, we wanted to try something a bit out of the box and went with this liver cake. It came served in a tomato sauce and chunks of a soft, mild cheese. I generally like liver alot but I wasn't a huge fan of this dish.

The other main we tried was fried pork trotters. The pork trotters were coated and fried til crispy. The trotters were gelatinous as you would imagine but overall, the dish was a bit greasy.

For dessert, we ordered the chestnut cake....

...and prunes marinated in some lemon, syrup and red wine.

The chestnut cake was actually pretty good. Chestnut is served all over France and is used in alot of different pastries and desserts. The cake itself wasn't overly sweet, which I liked. The marinated prunes were nothing special.

As a whole, the lunch was enjoyable but nothing incredibly memorable. The amuse bouche of the fried pork fat was the highlight for me, followed by the starter courses of the sausage and Lyonnaise salad. If I recall correctly, the pre-set menu wasn't more than 15-20 euro a person, so it was decent value overall for lunch.

Paul Bocuse, L'Auberge du Pont De Collonges

After about a week in Paris, my wife and I headed south by train to Lyon to spend a few days in what is considered France's food capital. Lyon isn't a large city but there is enough to see and do for about a day or two but not more than that. The highlights were probably visiting the La Parc de Tet D'or, Fourviere Basilica, and the old city. To be honest, the part I enjoyed most about Lyon was the food. Lyon is most known for its bouchons, which are these small restaurants that serve traditional Lyonnaise cuisine, but I'll write a separate post about them. This post is dedicated to our meal at Paul Bocuse, the three star Michelin restaurant named after and owned by the legend himself.

If you've never heard of Paul Bocuse, he's one of the most prominent chefs in French gastronomy and is most often associated with the nouvelle cuisine movement. Modernist Cuisine actually has a good overview of the history of French gastronomy, which talks about the era of Careme and Escoffier and then the rise of the nouvelle cuisine movement in the 50's and 60's. Nouvelle cuisine emphasized fresher ingredients, lighter preparations, and vegetable purees instead of lots of fats and heavy roux-based sauces that were hallmarks of Escoffier's age. Followers of nouvelle cuisine also plated dishes in the kitchen as opposed to at the dinner table by the waiter. I found this particularly interesting since everyone nowadays assumes dishes are plated by the chef in the kitchen, but this wasn't always the case.

Bocuse has won many awards over the course of his career, and since 1987, the Bocuse d'Or has been regarded as the most prestigious award for chefs in the world. It is sometimes seen as the unofficial world championship for chefs. In the recent 2013 Bocuse d'Or, France took gold while the USA team, coached and mentored by Achatz, Keller, and Boulud, placed seventh. USA has never placed higher than sixth.

There's even a huge marketplace in the center of the city named after him with all kinds of artisan cheese makers, oyster stands, butcher shops, pastry makers - you name it. Given the man's place in history, to say that we were looking forward to the meal at Bocuse would be an understatement. We didn't end up booking reservations until a few weeks before our trip since we were so busy from wedding planning, so I was worried we wouldn't be able to get in. As luck would have it though, my wife found us a spot.

Paul Bocuse, also known as L'Auberge du Pont de Collonges, is located in Collonges-au-Mont-d'Or, which is just outside of Lyon. It was roughly a 15-20 minute cab ride from our hotel in Lyon and getting there, while for the most part uneventful, had a few interesting memories. The streets were incredibly narrow, and there was one point where the road was so narrow that two cars going in the opposite direction could not pass. Our taxi driver had to back up and let a few cars go before proceeding.

Once you arrive, the actual building looks like a small inn but has a very colorful exterior with ornate decoration in tones of green, red, and gold. On the top of the building illuminated in bright white lights stands a sign with Paul Bocuse's name on it.

When we sat down, we were presented with a menu with two different options. We decided to go with the menu bourgeois, featuring roughly 6 different courses. It was the cheaper of the two tasting menus. Even so, it was 190 euros per person! We decided to go with this menu since we could choose the items for each course while the other menu was pre-set. We figured we could try more dishes this way.

To start the meal, we were presented with the amuse bouche, which was a squash soup with a buttery cheese puff.

Next up, I ordered the scallop of foie gras, pan cooked and served with verjus sauce. Really rich, luxurious foie - need I say more?

 



My wife ordered the Maine lobster salad "a la francaise" for her first course. It's a bit absurd to think that they fly in Maine lobsters to Lyon every day, but this is apparently what they do and part of the reason why this meal is so damn expensive. It was served cold with a lobstery mayo and a fresh herb oil. 

 

Next up was the red mullet dressed in crusty potato scales, served with a butter sauce. Again, really rich. Where are all the light, fresh preparations that I was told nouvelle cuisine was all about? ha!

For her course, my wife got the pan-seared scallops with beurre blanc, soufleed potatoes, and black truffle sauce. This was another really delicious, albeit rich and over-the-top dish.

To freshen up the palette, we got this sherbet made from Beaujolais wine. After eating all the butter-laden, rich dishes, this was welcomed.

For our third course, my wife got the rack of lamb served with vegetables and a puff pastry filled with caramelized fennel. This was carved and plated tableside. This was not on the menu and something the waiter offered up to her. Score!

 

For my third course, I got the pigeon in puff pastry with young cabbage. The pigeon was cooked perfectly and a real treat since it's not something I normally get to order. The puff pastry was delicious as well, filled with....foie gras!

By this point, my wife and I were starting to get pretty damn full but we kept plugging away. Next up was the cheese course and just as they did at Taillevant, the staff brought up over a huge board of cheeses. Unlike Taillevant though, the staff at Bocuse left us try as many as we wanted. A good tip coming up here: some of the cheeses Bocuse serves are from Richard Mere who also has a stall in Bocuse's marketplace - grab some cheese there and enjoy with a bottle of wine for an affordable picnic.

With cheese out of the way, finally came the wave of desserts. First up was this decadent chocolate mousse - fantasticly smooth, rich and creamy. Wonderful texture.

 



The waiter also dropped off this collection of petit fours, candies, chocolates, and truffles.

 



The staff then proceeded to wheel over two carts filled with all kinds of desserts and pastries. They encourage you to have as many as you want.

We were already really full at this point, and my wife was down for the count after having a few madeleines, but I pressed on. I was determined to try at least a few bites of most of these desserts. After all, we came all this way and paid all this money!

Above was the Ile Flotante, or "floating island" - a very traditional French dessert that features a mound of baked meringue covered with fruits, nuts and caramel and sitting on top a pool of creme anglaise. This was probably my least favorite of the desserts.

I also tried this chocolate cake with a raspberry filling. It was served with some fresh berries and a scoop of both vanilla and strawbeery ice cream because I asked for it.

Below was the last dessert I tried - the very classic and traditional tarte tatin. This is still one of my favorite desserts of all time. The apples were caramelized perfectly, nearly all the way through from edge to edge. Really impressive.

 

After the meal, Paul Bocuse came out of the kitchen and greeted us at our table. The man is so old now and he doesn't do any of the cooking, but he's still in great shape. He still proudly wears his chef's coat and high top hat. We asked for a picture with him, and he gladly obliged.

 

Not everyone has the opportunity to travel and eat at a restaurant of this caliber, so for that I'm truly appreciative. Meeting Bocuse and having a picture taken was another great treat, as was the staff offering up a copy of the menu to us to take home as a keepsake. The food was the definition of classical French cuisine. While absolutely delicious, it wasn't overly inventive...but it wasn't trying to be. Sometimes tradition is wonderful too.