The ultimate temptation to overcome vegans and calorie-counters must be Les Halles de Lyon, the covered markets of the French city of Lyon. The devil himself seems to have marshalled every object of gluttony to display in the glassed-over counters. At a stall run by chocolate maker Seve, there is row upon row of dark shining sweets and ‘coussins de Lyon’ – a marzipan filled with chocolate. At Maurice Trolliet, Lyon’s best meat store, there are bresse chickens. At the stand of 85-year-old Madame Sibilia, every kind of sausage is on offer - rosettes, pistachio-filled dry-cured sausages and truffles. Around the corner, a moody shaven-headed man is frying frogs’ legs in a garlic-and-parsley sauce. At Rolle, another shop, customers wait in line to purchase their foie gras tartes of cherries and grapes, or truffles selling at 990 euros (1,355 dollars) per kilogram. City tour guide Anneliese Dogas says Paul Bocuse, an elder statesman of French cuisine, orders cheese for his restaurants at nearby Mere Richard. Bocuse’s surname has been officially appended to that of the market, which is now officially named ‘Halles de Lyon - Paul Bocuse’, in gratitude for the great chef’s work: he has made his native city a destination for gourmets from around the world. Nowhere in France are there more restaurants per capita than in Lyon. Fourteen of them received Michelin stars in 2013. Bocuse’s own L’Auberge du Pont de Collonges, which lies slightly outside the city, has been a three-star restaurant since 1965. Over the years the 88-years-old has opened up a number of brasseries and luxury snack bars. At the Institut Paul Bocuse, a cooking school located at Place Bellecour, amateur cooks can learn to create dishes like the Master. Bocuse learned his trade from the women who laid the foundations for the City’s worldwide culinary reputation, the ‘meres Lyonnaises’ - mothers of Lyon. These were originally female cooks who worked for wealthy silk-manufacturing families of the City, up until the start of the 20th century. Their cuisine was spoken of in tones of reverence. When the families could no longer afford to keep servants, some of the women opened their own restaurants and became famous. Among them was Mere Fillioux, but the most eminent of all was Mere Brazier - the first woman to gain a three-star Michelin rating. She taught Bocuse how to cook. At Daniel & Denise, in the old city centre, the tables are arranged close together. “This is for people to be able to (really) talk to each other,” explains tour guide Anneliese Dogas. The decor is one of red-and-white checkered tablecloths, with a paper covering atop, and the walls are decorated with old copper kettles, steins and paintings. The menu is in French and English, an acknowledgement of the tourists. The specialties are braised beef cheeks in a red wine sauce, pork belly confit, chicken liver terrine and andouillettes - slices of coarse-grained sausage made from innards. “These are family recipes that were originally meant for the silk weavers…and they had quite an appetite,” Anneliese says. “That’s why we have these ‘bouchons’ - large-sized servings with lots of meat, fat and cream.” But first the appetizer – ‘grattons’, or chunks of deep-fried pork fat. Tourists love these traditional worker-style restaurants. There are so many, in fact, that the Lyon tourism office in 2011 designated only 23 of them to be authentic bouchons. The restaurant owners have to apply for such recognition, and then an examiner shows up with a catalogue of criteria covering everything from what’s on the menu to the furnishings…and even the surface of the floors.
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