Episode 15
30 minutes
Lyon is known as the gastronomic capital of France, but what does that mean when you sit down to eat and drink there? In this episode I talk to Caroline Fazeli, co-host of the Fishwives of Paris podcast and founder of Lyon Wine Tastings, who has lived in Lyon since 2017.
Caroline explains what makes a real Lyon bouchon, from the red checked tablecloths and the pot of wine to the kitsch décor and the owner who sets the tone, and where to go when you want something more elevated. We then turn to wine: the regions Lyon considers its own, how Gamay compares with Pinot Noir, why Côtes du Rhône is such good value, and why you will rarely see Bordeaux on a table in Lyon.
If you are planning a trip to Lyon and want to eat and drink the way the city does, this episode is for you.
Featured in this episode
- Lyon Wine Tastings: comparative tastings in English in a 19th century silk loft in the Croix-Rousse
- Fishwives of Paris: Caroline’s podcast on French gastronomy with Parisian food journalist Emily Monaco
- Le Mercière: a traditional bouchon on Rue Mercière
- Brasserie des Deux Rives: a brasserie on Rue Mercière from a Parisian restaurant group
- Carbone: cooking over fire, with a chef’s counter, in the 6th arrondissement
- Alebrije: Mexican and French cooking from chef Carla Kirsch Lopez in the Croix-Rousse
- Café Terroir: traditional Lyon cooking, with one of the best wine lists in the city
- Vignes et Vins: a wine shop in the 6th arrondissement, family run for 39 years
- Malleval: Lyon’s oldest wine shop, founded in 1869
- Les Halles de Lyon Paul Bocuse: Lyon’s covered food market
- Comptoir Gueuleton: a lunch counter inside Les Halles
- Quenelle de brochet: a pike dumpling, usually served in a creamy sauce
- Saucisson brioché: sausage baked in brioche
- Oeufs en meurette: poached eggs in a red wine sauce
- Pot lyonnais: Lyon’s 46 cl carafe of wine
- The ten crus of Beaujolais: Morgon, Fleurie, Moulin-à-Vent, Brouilly, Côte de Brouilly, Saint-Amour, Chiroubles, Régnié, Chénas and Juliénas
Transcript of The European Compass : A Food & Travel Podcast : Episode 15
Julia: Welcome to The European Compass, the podcast where we discover the heart of Europe through its food, its markets and the stories behind every dish. I’m your host, Julia Doust, and if you’ve ever planned a trip around a meal, then you’re in the right place.
I’ve got a special guest with us today. This is Caroline Fazeli from Fishwives of Paris, the podcast she co-hosts with Emily. She’s also the founder of Lyon Wine Tastings. So Caroline, welcome to the podcast.
Caroline: Thank you so much for having me, Julia.
A Memorable Meal at the Eiffel Tower
Julia: Right, I’m going to start with a question that I’m asking everybody that comes on my podcast. Tell me about your most memorable meal in Europe. It doesn’t have to be the best, just the most memorable.
Caroline: Well, it’s funny, because it’s got to be Alain Ducasse at the Eiffel Tower. I was young when I did that, I was in my early 20s. It’s a Michelin star restaurant, I don’t know how many stars it has, but it was just very fabulous and swish and ridiculous. I was there with my sister, and we had a wonderful time, and we really went all out. I think we got pretty drunk as well at the time.
It’s one of those things that today probably would not affect me in the same way, because I’m so much snobbier about food now. I’d be like, hmm, is this actually worth every bite that’s going in my mouth, or am I just paying to be on top of the Eiffel Tower? Which is such a silly way to think about it, because of course you are paying to be on top of the Eiffel Tower.
Julia: Yes, and that’s okay. That’s part of the experience.
Caroline: I think it would be harder for me now to appreciate it if the food wasn’t as good as it should be.
Julia: But do you remember the food as being excellent?
Caroline: Not at all. I don’t remember the food at all. I could not tell you what we ate. I know we had champagne, I know we drank a lot, I think we had wine pairings. I could not tell you anything about it, but I do remember it being delicious.
Julia: Absolutely. Isn’t it funny how with certain meals you remember the feeling of the meal more than what you actually ate?
Caroline: Absolutely. And really, it’s so iconic to be on top of the Eiffel Tower. I was trying to think about that when you asked me what a memorable meal was. I’ve had a lot of great meals, so it’s a tough one.
Julia: I imagine so.
From Oxford to Lyon
Julia: Can you tell me a little bit about your background in food and wine?
Caroline: Sure. Well, I’ve been in hospitality forever. I got my start in wine when I was a student at Oxford. I studied archaeology and anthropology, but I also got into the blind wine tasting club, so that was how I got into it, in the UK. I’d already been living in the UK for a couple of years at that point.
Then I stayed in London after my studies, and I did my Cordon Bleu diploma, because I was very interested in cooking at that point. After that I worked in the wine industry in London and did my Wine and Spirit Education Trust diploma. That was the end of my studies, although I did later join the Master of Wine programme. I did one year of that and then dropped out, because I was like, ugh, I like my life better than that. It was during Covid.
So I’ve done a lot of different things in food and wine. I was pastry chef in a restaurant, and I’ve been a private chef, so I’ve done some food things, but more often than not I’ve been working in wine. Then I moved to Lyon in 2017, and in 2018 I started Lyon Wine Tastings. We do wine tastings in Lyon, in English, for tourists.
Julia: Fantastic. So why Lyon?
Caroline: I don’t know, it’s pretty random. I had been a chalet chef in the Alps, before Brexit, when the Brits were very much skiing in the Alps and working in the Alps and doing a season.
Julia: Right, that’s a whole culture.
Caroline: So I did a season and was a chalet girl, chalet chef, in a French resort, and that was the winter of 2013. When I came back to France in 2017, I wanted to visit my friends in the Alps for the weekend, so I came to Lyon for two weeks to study French so that I could spend the weekend in the Alps. When I was here I just got a good feeling about it, and I wasn’t vibing with Paris at that time. I was in Paris for the summer, and I came here for no reason, truly.
Lyon Compared with Paris
Julia: Yes, so for anyone that’s not been to Lyon, I would say that there is a difference. It’s not got the same vibe as Paris. It’s somehow slightly more laid back, slightly more real. It doesn’t feel like it’s putting on a show. That’s the way I felt.
Caroline: It’s just much smaller than Paris. It’s still one of the great cities in France. I think it’s number three right now in terms of actual size, so it’s not a small city.
Julia: I think the debate is as to whether it’s second or third.
Caroline: Not anymore, Marseille’s number two now. But Lyon is still a pretty big city. It’s about 600,000 people in the city centre and over 2 million in the greater area, so it’s not a nothing city, it’s a proper city. We have everything that you need. We have a big football stadium, we have major concerts. Taylor Swift came here. It’s not like we’re off the radar.
Julia: No, definitely not.
Caroline: The Winter Olympics are going to be here in 2030, so Lyon is very much on the stage. But it’s just an easier place to live. That’s the difference, I would say. I imagine a lot of your audience is in the UK, perhaps, but it’s the difference between Bristol and London, I would say.
Julia: Right, kind of, yes. I think that would be fair.
Caroline: And Bristol’s a great place to live, right? So Lyon is a great place to live, and life here is much more relaxed. We like to call it human sized.
Julia: It is human sized, yes. I like that.
Eating on Rue Mercière
Julia: So, in terms of food in Lyon. I was there very recently, and one of the roads that I saw that had most of the restaurants on it was Rue Mercière.
Caroline: Yep.
Julia: It had a lot of the bouchon type restaurants. Would you say that is a tourist street, just for tourist restaurants, or can you eat well down there?
Caroline: Both. It is definitely a tourist street, and there are some very good restaurants on Rue Mercière. One of my favourite restaurants is Le Mercière, which is on Rue Mercière, and that is a bouchon. It’s my favourite bouchon, Le Mercière. There’s also one of the big Parisian groups that just opened up at Les Deux Rives. That’s a Parisian group, and I think it’s supposed to be very good. I still haven’t been there, but people say it’s very good. So Rue Mercière, I would proceed with caution, but Le Mercière is very good.
Julia: Absolutely. I found it had quite a good vibe down there of an evening. I was travelling solo, so to walk down there just felt nice, because there were just people everywhere out eating on the streets, and it was lovely.
What Makes a Lyon Bouchon
Julia: So in terms of the bouchon, talk to me about the Lyon bouchon.
Caroline: Well, bouchons are a very particular type of restaurant. This is our casual local restaurant, so it is Lyonnaise cuisine, and it is a casual place. A bouchon should have red checked tablecloths. It should have very small tables that are kind of crammed together. It should have a zinc bar or a Formica bar. There’s a list of what a bouchon is and isn’t. There are bouchon associations, and there are definitely bouchons that are not part of the official bouchon association.
The menu is going to be very consistent. A bouchon will have quenelle de brochet. That’s this weird fish dumpling that’s very good, but impossible to describe.
Julia: I would agree with that. I had it, and I was trying to describe it to people, and it is quite difficult to describe.
Caroline: It’s delicious. You just have to have it for yourself. We have things like saucisson brioché, so sausage in brioche with a red wine sauce. Oeufs en meurette, poached eggs in a red wine sauce. A lot of bacon, a lot of red wine sauce, a lot of pork. Andouillette, which is tripe. I think it’s disgusting, but it’s a classic.
Julia: I think I’m with you on that one.
Caroline: A pot of wine, so that is 46 cl of wine you can order, and that is often going to be Beaujolais or Côtes du Rhône.
A bouchon has to have a charismatic owner, to me. If it doesn’t have a charismatic owner, and if you’re not crammed in there and really rubbing elbows with your neighbours, it’s not a bouchon. The owner needs to be there. That’s something that is very important for a bouchon, that the owners are there and they’re part of the vibe, and they create the vibe. The taste of the owner is something that’s very important. Every owner really wants to keep it traditional, but they still have to inject their style into it, to make it a little more elevated, or a little bit more raunchy.
Julia: Some of the bouchons are very kitsch indeed.
Caroline: They’re all a little bit kitsch, yes. That is actually something I did not understand when I got here. I thought that the kitsch was just for the tourists, and it’s not for the tourists. It is part of the soul of a bouchon, the questionable pig art.
Julia: Yes, I think it’s quite important to say these bouchons are not just for the tourists. There’s something about them that makes you feel that it’s a tourist place, but the locals eat there as well.
Caroline: What makes it feel like a tourist place is that they’re kitsch. There’s stuff on the walls. There’s usually going to be a lot of stuff on the walls. There’s a very bucolic feel, red checked tablecloths, wooden furniture, little wine glasses. That is real, and the kitsch is real, but it is not for the tourists. The kitsch is part of how the owner shows their taste.
Julia: Shows it, yes.
Not Fine Dining, and Not Trying to Be
Julia: Would you agree that this is definitely not fine dining? This is traditional. The nearest I could come to was something like a rotisserie restaurant. It reminded me a lot of where the lorry drivers eat, in terms of the type of food that is provided. It’s not high level gastronomy, it’s big portions of hearty food.
Caroline: But it is our local cuisine, and you’re not going to leave a bouchon hungry.
Julia: That’s for sure. That would be impossible.
Caroline: They’re not trying to be elevated, and that’s one of the problems with bouchons in London and New York. It’s not a bouchon. If you’re serving a 40 dollar goat’s cheese salad, it’s not a bouchon.
Where to Go for Something More Elevated
Julia: Yes. So if you were going more fine dining, not necessarily Michelin star, but a little bit more elevated, where would you go in Lyon?
Caroline: I really love Carbone. That’s a place owned by a friend of ours who speaks English and has a really cool chef’s counter. There aren’t a ton of chef’s counters in Lyon, so Carbone is a really fun one, and his food is really elevated.
I’m actually going to try a new place tomorrow night. There are a lot of young chefs doing gastronomic or semi gastronomic cuisine. We’re very spoiled for choice on that one. There’s an infinite number of restaurants you can go to that will give you something a little bit elevated, or even very cheffy, but not Michelin.
Alebrije is one. I’ve talked about Alebrije on our podcast before. That’s owned by a friend of mine who’s Mexican. I’m not going to say it’s Mexican food. It’s cheffy food, and she’s Mexican, so it’s a very elevated sort of Mexican French cuisine that’s really, really interesting. It’s a really fun place.
Julia: That sounds fun.
Café Terroir
Julia: I ate at a place called Café Terroir when I was there, which was excellent.
Caroline: Yep. I would say Café Terroir isn’t trying to be too cheffy. It’s still very traditional.
Julia: I would say Café Terroir is not a bouchon, but it’s almost one, only much more elevated than a bouchon, and certainly the presentation was amazing. The portions were much smaller.
Caroline: But it knows where it comes from. Café Terroir knows where it comes from, it knows that it’s in Lyon. There is something about Café Terroir that I find very referential to a bouchon, and very referential and deferential to our local cuisine. I love Café Terroir. That’s probably my favourite restaurant in Lyon, but I don’t put it in the same category as the cheffy ones, because it’s not tweezer food.
Julia: No, it’s not. It was just excellent food.
Caroline: It’s extraordinary, and the wine list is one of the best wine lists.
Julia: Very good value for money as well. €32 for the lunchtime menu, I thought, was really good value for the quality there.
Caroline: You can definitely get spendy there, because if you go with more than two people you get a whole chicken, and when you get the whole chicken they carve it tableside, or you get a huge steak. The chicken is where it’s at. You get the whole chicken, it’s insanely good. And like I said, they have one of the best wine lists in Lyon, so I’ve thrown down there, that’s for sure. At dinner you start with snails, then you get the whole chicken, then you get pâté, you get this, you get that, you get dessert too. But it’s still cheaper than a super fancy tasting menu. I love Café Terroir. Well done for going there.
Julia: I was very pleased, I must say. I was very pleased with my choice.
The Wines of Lyon
Julia: So, on to wine. Obviously Lyon is on the Rhône River, so you’ve got a lot of wine areas around you, and it’s not far from Beaujolais as well. So talk to me about the wine in Lyon. What would you say really represents Lyon?
Caroline: Well, Beaujolais probably, Beaujolais and Côtes du Rhône. Lyon is in between Beaujolais and the northern Rhône, so we drink a lot of Beaujolais, we drink a lot of northern Rhône, and we drink a lot of Burgundy. Burgundy is just north of Beaujolais, and we still consider Burgundy to be one of ours. Lyon basically claims Rhône, Burgundy, Beaujolais, and the wines of Savoie as well. There are some very interesting wines coming out of the mountains now. There’s some wine in the Auvergne as well. We have a ton of wine that flows into Lyon, and that’s one of the reasons why I settled here, for sure.
Beaujolais Beyond the Nouveau
Julia: So Beaujolais. Everybody thinks of Beaujolais Nouveau when they think about Beaujolais, but Beaujolais isn’t just the Nouveau. The Nouveau is that year’s wine, but you can get good Beaujolais that isn’t from this year.
Caroline: For sure. Nouveau accounts, I think, for about 20% of volume at this point.
Julia: Only 20%?
Caroline: Yes, and even that would be much less for good producers. The good producers make a little bit of it, obviously, because it’s fun, but they’re not making a lot of it.
Beaujolais is a bit like Burgundy, where it’s a Russian nesting doll. There’s Beaujolais, then there’s Beaujolais-Villages inside of that, and then there are the 10 crus of Beaujolais. The five that you are likely to encounter, certainly outside of France, are Morgon, Fleurie, Moulin-à-Vent, Brouilly and Côte de Brouilly. The five that you are less likely to see are Saint-Amour, Chiroubles, Régnié, Chénas and Juliénas, and those are all going to be village-level crus.
All Beaujolais is going to be Gamay. The Gamay grape, it’s red, unless it’s white Beaujolais, of which there’s very little, and that’s Chardonnay. So mostly you’re dealing with Gamay.
Julia: So it’s Gamay rather than Pinot Noir. In Burgundy you’ve got your Pinot Noir, and that’s what changes as it comes down to Beaujolais. You change grape to the Gamay grape. Is that right? I thought in Burgundy it was all Pinot Noir.
Caroline: Yes, the vast majority of it is Pinot, but there is a little bit of Gamay in southern Burgundy.
Gamay and Pinot Noir Compared
Julia: Okay. And what would you say the difference between a Gamay and a Pinot Noir is, for beginners?
Caroline: Well, Gamay is a lot cheaper. That’s the biggest one, it’s a lot cheaper.
Gamay and Pinot are both very light. They both have, when they are good, a delightful sort of juicy fruit. I would say Pinot Noir has more complexity and is harder to do well. Pinot Noir is notoriously difficult, but it does make extremely refined and beautiful, perfumed wines.
Gamay is very productive. Gamay wants to grow a lot and give you a lot of juice, and it’s easy to make bad Gamay. So the best producers are really limiting their yields. The best producers are working with Gamay the way a Burgundy producer would work with Pinot, in some cases. But it’s just a different grape. Gamay really can be very, very light. I mean, so can Pinot Noir, but they’re just different grapes. They have different profiles. But they are similar enough that I think if you like Pinot Noir, you should definitely check out some of the higher quality Gamays. They’re still going to be a lot cheaper than Burgundy.
Côtes du Rhône
Julia: Yes. And then going further south you come into the Côtes du Rhône. Now, I would say that Côtes du Rhône is one of my favourite wines, because I think it gives you great quality for the price. It’s so much cheaper than something like a Bordeaux.
Caroline: Yes. It’s obviously a lot richer than a Burgundy or a Beaujolais. You’re getting into the much deeper, richer wines. Côtes du Rhônes are going to come from all throughout the Rhône Valley, but most of them come from the south, and in Provence, around Avignon and the Aramon area. Vacqueyras and Gigondas are some of the appellations in there, and further south around Châteauneuf-du-Pape. There’s not a lot of it in the northern Rhône, just because the northern Rhône is much smaller.
Côtes du Rhône is really interesting, because it comes in a lot of different shapes and sizes. There are something like 27 different grapes that can be in a Côtes du Rhône. There’s white, there’s red, they’re blending a lot. There are Côtes du Rhônes that are very fine wines indeed. There are single vineyard Côtes du Rhônes. But most Côtes du Rhône is cheap and cheerful, but consistent. I think certainly on the export market Côtes du Rhône is a safe bet, and it is cheap and it is good. That’s something I drank a lot of when I was living in London. It was really the house wine, and it’s a really good house wine.
So we drink a lot of Côtes du Rhône in Lyon. I do think we probably get access to more of the northern Rhône Côtes du Rhônes, which tend to be Syrah based instead of Grenache based, but they’re always going to be a blend for the most part. It’s actually a really exciting appellation because of its diversity. There’s a lot going on in Côtes du Rhône.
Julia: Yes, I think it’s one to watch, definitely.
Bordeaux and Value for Money
Julia: I live in the west of France, so we tend towards Bordeaux here rather than the Côtes du Rhône, but I think Côtes du Rhône offers better value for money.
Caroline: I think that there is inexpensive Bordeaux, and certainly in the southwest there are some inexpensive wines. I’m blanking, but from Cahors and all of the southwest, there are some good value reds. But I think it’s less consistent. Certainly the cheaper Bordeaux are less consistent in terms of whether they’re going to be good or not.
Julia: But there’s a lot of good Bordeaux too. When you get up to the good level of Bordeaux. I did a visit down to Margaux recently, and if anyone’s watching, there is a YouTube video about my trip to Margaux, so just a quick tip there. The level of wine that’s coming out, not necessarily just Château Margaux but Margaux the appellation, some of the wine was excellent.
Caroline: It’s beautiful, yes. But right now in Bordeaux they’re having a bit of a crisis, because there’s so much Bordeaux that’s not from one of those villages on the Left Bank, or from Saint-Émilion or Pomerol. So they’re trying to really get the word out about Cru Bourgeois, and Côtes de Blaye, Côtes de Bourg. There’s so much better value wine in Bordeaux, but I think it is again less consistent than Côtes du Rhône.
Regional Loyalty in French Wine
Caroline: But you did point out something that’s very interesting. The regionality here is really important. In Lyon we don’t drink Bordeaux. I think in Bordeaux they’re more open minded about drinking wines from other regions, but around here we don’t drink Bordeaux, and it’s crazy. I say it to my husband, he’s a wine merchant, I’m like, “Dude, why aren’t we drinking Bordeaux with this steak?” He’s like, “Oh, we’re having Burgundy.” I’m like, “Why? We should be having Bordeaux. I know you have it, let’s drink it.” So I’m always pushing for Bordeaux. I have a soft spot for Bordeaux too.
Julia: Yes, I think you might be right about that. I visited Burgundy not long ago, and I’ve got another YouTube video about Burgundy, and I did find they are quite snobby about the wine from Burgundy. They won’t touch a Bordeaux, it’s all about Burgundy wine. For my personal taste I prefer a richer wine. Burgundy wines are what I would call a lunchtime wine. I like a Burgundy at lunchtime.
Caroline: It’s very much something that you get used to, and even I have found my palate has adapted to being here. Even the biggest reds that we have from the northern Rhône are still not as big as the big Bordeaux. They’re not as big as the big Napa cabs. And so our palates over here in Lyon are much more geared towards lighter reds than they are towards heavy reds and oak. They’re very sensitive to oak here, and once you’ve recalibrated, I’m like, oh, that is too much oak. I find myself doing that as well.
Julia: It’s interesting. I find that people in France, and probably everywhere that they make wine, tend to be very, chauvin is the French word for it, almost nationalistic about their regional wine.
Caroline: Yes, and so in Lyon that is Beaujolais, Burgundy and Rhône.
Julia: Yes, I can understand that. In the Vendée we do actually have a very small amount of wine made, the Fiefs Vendéens, and even elsewhere in France people haven’t heard of it. I don’t think any of it gets exported, but we make some really quite good rosé. If you’re on the lookout for a good rosé, have a look for the Vendéen rosé. It’s excellent.
Inside a Lyon Wine Tastings Session
Julia: So when you do your wine tastings, if someone came to you for a wine tasting, what does that involve?
Caroline: Well, first of all, you’re probably not going to be with me at this point. I have a sommelier who works for me who does my tastings. But you arrive in this 1800s silk loft apartment, a really very sort of secret space, and we have crémant de Bourgogne around the couch with introductions. The table’s already set, so there are two whites and two reds. There’s always Burgundy, Beaujolais and northern Rhône, and then a wild card, which is often Savoie. And there is a planche, which is a little cheese and charcuterie board.
It’s an educational tasting. It is fun, obviously. I tell this to people when I’m doing training for it: this is fun, it’s not class, it’s not school, it has to be interesting and it has to be fun. But I want people to do comparative tasting, where you taste two whites and two reds side by side, because that really allows you to get a better understanding of wine vocabulary. I know from talking to so many people over the years how much anxiety there is about wine vocabulary, and it’s really easy to understand, but you have to have wine in front of you. It’s much easier to understand what tannins mean when you have two reds and one of them is light on tannins and one of them is heavy on tannins.
Julia: Yes.
Caroline: That’s how we make those connections. It’s a blind tasting, and it lasts for two hours, and we have air conditioning, which I know right now we’re in October, but if you’re listening to this in the summer, it’s a great programme.
Julia: To be fair, it was actually quite hot when I was in Lyon. It was only a week ago, and it was 29 degrees.
Caroline: And now it’s freezing.
Julia: That sounds like an amazing thing. How many people do you have at these tastings?
Caroline: We can fit 10 people around the table. It’s cosy at 10. I think in the summer it fills up, but often in the lower season we won’t be full, although I wish we were. But it’s nice when it’s smaller groups too.
Julia: That sounds like a great thing to do. It is such a great thing to do when people are travelling to different regions, to actually sit down and taste some local wine with someone who knows about it and can actually explain it, and explain these differences, because otherwise it can get a bit lost.
Caroline: I think it’s nice to also explore Lyon’s wines without having to leave the city, because as much fun as a vineyard trip is, it really takes you out of the city for a whole day.
Julia: Yes, and a lot of people visiting Lyon are only visiting for a day or two.
Caroline: Yes. I think a three day trip is a good length of time. I think Lyon deserves three days.
Julia: I agree.
Caroline: You can spend a day in the vineyards, and it’s nice, but you don’t have to. You can also spend two hours with us in an evening.
Julia: So you do daytime and evening?
Caroline: No, it’s at five.
Julia: At five, okay. So a nice sort of aperitif leading in towards dinner.
Caroline: Exactly.
Julia: That sounds like an absolute dream. I think that’s a great thing to do on holiday. Unfortunately we didn’t cross paths when I was in Lyon, so next time I’m in Lyon I shall make sure to come and do some wine tasting with you, Caroline.
Caroline: That would be great.
Vignes et Vins and Malleval
Caroline: And you’ve got to come to my husband’s wine shop, Vignes et Vins, because it’s the best wine shop in Lyon, obviously. It actually is the best wine shop. There’s one wine shop, Malleval, which is amazing and very, very old and has been around the longest, and then I think VV is the second longest. It’s been around for 39 years now. My husband’s father started the shop. They have over 3,000 references. It truly is enormous and fantastic, and it’s a beautiful shop.
Julia: Is that in the Presqu’île or is that in Vieux Lyon?
Caroline: It’s in the sixième.
Julia: Okay, so for anyone listening, that’s the other side of the Rhône, out towards the train station.
Caroline: It’s not the train station, it’s the Halles, but on that side of the river. It’s a nicer neighbourhood than that. If you know where the opera house is, if you take the bridge that’s right behind the opera house, you’re about two blocks away.
Les Halles de Lyon Paul Bocuse
Julia: Right. So I did get over to that side of Lyon. I went to the Halles Paul Bocuse.
Caroline: Yes.
Julia: Which I thought was absolutely fantastic. The quality of some of the food in there is just amazing.
Caroline: Les Halles is nice, and Les Halles is near the train station, so that’s an easy thing to do when you come in or leave. As you come or go, you can do Les Halles.
Julia: That’s a good little tip. And I also found that the prices for eating in there were very reasonable compared to elsewhere in Lyon. I thought it was a very good place to stop and eat.
Caroline: You can definitely have some lunch, and my favourite place for lunch there is Comptoir Gueuleton, but there are a lot of great spots in Les Halles.
Julia: That’s an absolutely great tip for travellers.
Fishwives of Paris
Julia: Well, thank you so much for joining us on the podcast, Caroline. I’ll make sure that I put links below to Caroline’s wine tastings and to the wine shop.
Caroline: Thank you. And can I plug my podcast to your listeners?
Julia: Of course, I was just about to say. Plug, plug away.
Caroline: Thank you. Fishwives of Paris is my podcast with Emily Monaco. She’s a Parisian food journalist, and we tackle French gastronomy. Every episode is about something different. We’ve tackled things from mayonnaise to climate change induced cheese regulations to the birth of new wine regions. We talk a little bit about everything, but each episode has a subject, and it’s very nerdy and very deep dive. We do lots of deep dives, so it’s good fun.
Julia: It is a very good podcast. It’s one of my favourites.
Caroline: Thank you. Thank you so much for having me.
Julia: Thanks for joining me on The European Compass podcast. If you enjoyed today’s episode, then share it with a fellow food traveller, and don’t forget to subscribe for more delicious adventures. Until next time, bon appétit and happy travels.
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