5 places to visit Bordeaux

Gourmande, shaped by history, influenced by the vineyard, the land and the sea, Bordeaux cuisine is an art. Here are the four places to make a gastronomic visit to Bordeaux.

The girondine capital is an open-air theatre scene, with a striking charm and turned towards its port and river. Do you know that the city of Bordeaux Is registered at UNESCO World Heritage? Belle Endormie has nothing of a dead city! Many visitors flock every year to discover architectural, historical and cultural attractions.

Second French city with the most classified monuments, Bordeaux also invites to a journey in time. Its historic centre is a testament to the graceful, fantasy and ornamental architecture of the 18th century, where the baroque movement made it thanks to opulence, grandeur, materials and tormented forms. Other monuments, more formal, were built in another style: when fashion was more in strict architecture, using the Greco-Roman forms and elements. Visiting Bordeaux is also making a jump in the Middle Ages, in the time of Gothic religious buildings and paved, narrow and popular streets. On the docks of the right and left banks, when you cling to the Garonne by one of the two bridges, the rehabilitated harbour area plunges you into a bath of modernism and green spaces. What about gastronomy in all this? For today, this is what it is!

Indeed, Bordeaux and the cuisine is an infinite love story. Yes, the pleasure of the table is sacred! Here again the capital girondine invites you to travel and mix. Bordeaux cuisine has a clean and generous identity, between land and sea, influenced by Spain and the South-West, and always decorated with wine. Wake up your taste buds and discover four places to make a gastronomic visit to Bordeaux.

1. Old Bordeaux: the epicentre of gastronomy

As long as you are there, let yourself be tempted by the Bordeaux specialties that perfectly accompany these exceptional beverages. The historic heart is full of good addresses that can be found around the corner of the streets. Here is the art of making a gastronomic walk in Bordeaux while admiring historical splendour! For example, to marry your good Bordeaux wine:

• grattons, traditional charcuterie;
• the lamb of Pauillac, raised exclusively in Gironde;
• the Bordeaux coast, cooked with embers of sarments;
• the pane of ceps and girolles;
• the oysters of Arcachon;
• the medicinal attic, carcuterie based on pork panse;
• Bordeaux lamproie, stirred fish and simmered in wine;
• Grilled alose, seasonal fish from Gironde.

Otherwise, in the event of a mild post-urban walk, push the doors of a chocolate-maker or a specialist in Canelé. It is impossible not to taste the latter, whose caramelized dress and soft heart became the emblems of Bordeaux. Also in a Bordelais cap (small oven at the Fine de Bordeaux), a Guinette (griotte confite to the Armagnac enveloped with chocolate), a Sarment du Médoc (spitting wine reminiscent of the vines), a pearl of the Médoc (alliance of grapes and chocolate) or a macaron of Saint Émilion.

The Capuchin market

Drink a coffee by observing the morning ballet of the barges and taste the counter kitchen. After all, a scallop or shells at dawn, it's tempting! Otherwise, more classic in the wake but also local: Bordeaux pastry! Enjoy the sweetness of the White Dunes (choose with a vanilla cream and sprinkled with sugar) and the Love Puits (honey paste topped by a mix of meringue and pastry cream, caramelized and airy).

The Halles de Bacalan

The quality of the products premiums on the quantity since you find here "only" twenty-four stands. Friendliness is the other highlight of the Halles de Bacalan: it lives, it's awkward, it's a laugh and it's a pleasure! There you make your music market and each merchant invites you to taste its local products.

3. La Cité du Vin: the vineyards put to the spotlight

Located on the docks, this place is a true temple dedicated to the mythical drink of the city. The museum, unique in the world, retraces the history of wine and offers immersive and sensory experiences. Much more than a simple visit, it is an initiatory journey. Then follow one of the wine tasting workshops offered on the site. No codified and ritualized rituals, the City of Wine teaches you to appreciate and know the wine by reversing the usual codes. Each of your five senses is requested. You can even make a true oenocultural journey through wines from all over the world, in a unique sound and olfactory atmosphere. Rest assured, children also have the right to their gourmet journey, but without alcohol.

4. The quays of Bordeaux: the festive and convivial epicurism

Enjoy, for example, the traditional cuisine of a bloated, relaxed or romantic guinguette or a cruise dinner on the Garonne. Otherwise, choose the terrace of a brewery or restaurant specializing in typical products of the terroir and the sea. Maybe you just want to drink a drink and watch the sun set on the magnified facades? Then trinify with a glass of Lillet, whose aromas of wine and fruit exalt the Bordeaux aperitives. Finally, why not make a gastronomic visit to Bordeaux with specialities put in box and a good picnic on the river and gardens? Test the tartines with Lou Gascoun, the pig liver paté from Bordeaux suburbs and the Jock Cream for dessert, made only on the docks on the right bank. Not to mention a good cheese with black cherry jam and a Cacolac brick to taste it!