Lyon!

This weekend, we headed off to the city of Lyon, for a gastronomic tour of epic proportions. With 27 Michelin-starred restaurants, Lyon is known as the culinary heart of France, which means it’s also considered one of the top eating destinations in the world. Since it’s only an hour and a half train ride, we decided to hop the TGV and make a weekend of it!

First of all, the food…as many of you know, Sophia doesn’t mess around when it comes to eating. She knows her chefs, her ingredients, and is among the best restaurant-searchers I know. As a result, we were able to get reservations to the brasseries of two of France’s most famous chefs, Paul Bocuse and Georges Blanc. And let me tell you…they served some heavy dishes! Escargot in a thick butter and herb sauce, chicken in a rich butter sauce, quennelle that melted in your mouth (probably with some butter thrown in there somewhere)…everything was so good, that we even tried liver! It also was ridiculously good. The bonus part of all this, is that each meal was still cheaper than the average meal in Geneva…as such, it’s going to be tough to ever surpass this in terms of an “eating weekend”.

The city of Lyon itself is pretty cool. It has one of the larger old towns in Europe, as well as some decent Roman ruins. There is also a great view of the city on a nearby hillside, where one of the most impressive and ornate cathedrals I’ve yet seen sits. That said, the city itself is kind of…dull somehow. I think it’s due to the fact that almost every street is filled with chain stores and bank branches. Outside of the old town, none of the streets had much of a personality, which is kind of the exact opposite of Paris. Also, there were an inordinate amount of pubs. We counted 8 just on Saturday, and we weren’t even exploring like we usually do. Only ran into one Starbucks though…which is odd, because in most French cities the pub-to-Starbucks ratio is the other way around! Lastly, there was a huge mall there – one of the biggest in Europe, apparently. As we were walking through it, Soph and I both looked at each other and said “this reminds me a lot of Columbia Mall (in Baltimore)”. Weird.

We didn’t have too many dealings with the locals, but in true French fashion we did receive at least one dirty look. We were on the subway, and Soph winked at a little child who was staring at her. The kid scrunched up her face trying to wink back, at which point the father barked at her and glared at us. Ahh, France…on the other hand, we went into a wine store (which was ridiculously awesome), and the guy went over my list of wine producers and spent about fifteen minutes telling me the story of each one, and what made them good / bad. Wine store guys rule!

On the whole, this was a fun weekend – especially for a Valentine’s Day. Soph got to eat at a lot of good restaurants; I got to walk around a cool Old Town; the weather was sunny (although cold)…what’s not to enjoy?

Next weekend: More skiing!