Lyon, France

Now this place was cool.

Potentially one of the coolest days in my life thus far.

This whole trip was orchestrated by my professors as a fieldtrip for us EcoGastronomy students, and was included in part of the curriculum.

AKA a free trip.

And I love free things. It’s one of my favorite prices.

So the seven other UNH students, myself, three of our professors, plus a handful some Master’s students from another University piled on to this bus and drove 2 hours south to the city of Lyon.

First stop: The Paul Bocuse Culinary Institute.

This was such a neat experience. This institute is fairly new, but has already acclaimed quite a few laurels to its name. And has quite the rigorous acceptance process.

This Institute was originally a castle, and the owner of the castle sold it to the Paul Bocuse Institute before the owner’s death. Upon that transaction the Castle was completely gutted and renovated to accommodate culinary students.

Look here, chefs in their natural habitat.

After our morning coffee and tea, our group got an entire tour of the Institute. This place really has it all. From Tea studies, to coffee analysis, to research opportunities, bread making, and multiple fully equipped state-of-the art kitchens – the students here are really able to stick their fingers in a lot of pies and experience a lot of different things.

(no pun intended)

(Okay, maybe a little intended…)

(I can’t help that I’m so punny!)

(Alright I’ll stop now…)

And then, at the end of our tour the culinary students, at their in-house restaurant, treated us to a fabulous lunch!

There was a small catch to this lunch though, and that was that we didn’t know what we weren’t allowed to order, and that our menu was fixed depending on what chair you sat in at your table.

And let me tell you, I chose the right chair that day.

Here’s what I had:

Basil Cream on the bottom with olive jelly in the middle, and some salty foam on top to "open up the appetite"  

Foie Gras with Asparagus and Grapefruit on crackers

Cuttlefish with Artichoke hearts, roasted red peppers and Truffle sauce with Risotto.

Ask me how much I love Truffles.

Do it. I dare ya. 

Chocolate ganash cake with vanilla sauce. Need I say more?

And a French lunch wouldn't be complete without a little coffee at the end. 

That's what the French do, ya see, you have wine with lunch to bring you down and take the edge off and then finish with Coffee to start your day back up again.

It's great.

Definitely something I will bring back with me to the States.

So at a place as high-quality as this, you can’t really go wrong…but man, all I’ll say is that I’m real happy I didn’t get served the Sardines or the Pigeon.

Yes, I said Pigeon.

I’m an adventurous eater, but even that really pushes the limit for me.

The woman who got it at my table actually said it wasn’t that bad.

So I’ll just have to trust her opinion on that one.

Next up, we piled on the bus again and headed out towards the vineyards of Lyon – about a 30 minute drive outside of the city’s center.

And here is where things started to get even cooler.

We’re driving along and slowly start to approach the foothills of these vineyards, when what appears to be out-of-nowhere, our bus stops and we pick up this middle aged man on the side of the road.

He gets on the bus, kisses the cheeks of all of our professors and continues to tell us about the vineyards we are approaching.

It was tough to follow what he was saying because his English was a little broken, and I was absolutely captivated by the views.

This was seriously one of the most breathtaking moments while I’ve been alive. The shear simplicity, beauty, and enormity of these vineyards was so incredible. The history of the earth was almost palpable in the air, and it was very emotional at times.

The weather also made it really interesting too because we kept getting these snow flurries that would come in for five minutes and then leave again.

My professor joked, “You guys are getting to see what the vineyard looks like during all the seasons!”

And it was true! We saw it when it was cloudy, sunny, and snowy.

And the horses were a nice touch too.

After poking around the tiny village that was a top this vineyard…

 Hi Mom!

We piled back on the bus to visit the brother of the man who jumped on the bus with us.

About ten minutes later we arrived at Chateau de L’Hestrange.

And were greeted whole-heartedly by chickens, and the Chateau’s Border Collie, Merlot, who I totally would have taken with me had he not already been living the Life o’ Riley on a French Vineyard.

Here the brother, who turned out to be the owner of the Chateau and makes and bottles his own wines on site, met us. And we were told we would have the opportunity to taste some of his wine!

And when I say taste, I mean straight out of the barrel.

That is what made this experience s’darn cool. There we were, just a couple of college kids and their professors, in this guy’s wine cellar, drinking wine that he pulled out of the barrel from what looked like a turkey baster to pour into our glasses, and then proceeded to discuss the aromas and the effect it had on our palates.

For any of you who are fans of NBC’s The Office, it took all my will-power not to quote Andy “the Nard Dog” Bernard during all of this…

“Ahhh yes, it has a bit of an oaky afterbirth…”

Have I ever told you how hard it is to stifle my natural tendency to be just a tad irreverent in these sorts of situations?

A few glasses of outstanding wine later, we float back on to the bus and head back to the house of the man who originally jumped on the bus and started giving us a tour, for a homemade authentic Bourgogne dinner in his own wine cellar.

This family, man, I’m tellin’ ya, they really like their wine.

This man’s estate was incredible. Unfortunately it was too dark at that time to take pictures, but his house was enormous and had this beautiful barn/cellar attached to it where this man kept all of his wines, and where we had a lovely Boeuf Bourgogne prepared by the Estate’s very own cook…aka, the wife.

But this lady did not disappoint. The food was incredible.

And did I mention the wine?

Because there was more.

Ohhh, was there more…

And followed by cheese…

And then finally, to conclude the evening, we sang an original Burgundy song which one of our Professor’s taught to us.

So we bid adieu to our lovely host and promised our return someday in the future. And with that, we piled on to the bus one last time, and with a full belly, we all fell soundly asleep until the brakes of the bus halted us to a stop, and awoke us all from the dream of a day we had, and pulled us back into reality from the celestial adventure we had in the rolling vineyards of Lyon.