L’Auberge du Pont de Collonges, Collonges-au-Mont-d’Or France

Paul Bocuse L’Auberge du Pont de Collonges

Baguette with Butter

Chapeau Wheat Roll

Canapes – Cold Tomato Soup, Crayfish and Clams a la Niege, Avocado Crème

2011 Sauternes Chateau Villefranche

Scallop of foie gras – pan cooked, passion fruit sauce

Truffle soup V.G.E. (dish created for the French President in 1975) – Beef Consomme, Foie Gras, Black Truffle

Filet of sole – à la Fernand Point

Beaujolais winemaker’s sherbet

Veal sweetbreads – braised, white Ivoire sauce

Selection of fresh and matured cheese from «La Mère Richard» – Reblochon, Tomme de Savoie, Munster-géromé, Maconnais, Fourme d’ambert, Brie de Meaux, Sainte-Maure de Touraine, Fresh Cheese with Cream and Sugar, Walnut Raisin Bread

Delicacies and temptations – Traditional baba au rum, Floating island as Grandmother Bocuse made it, Cherry tart. Raspberry tart, Pistachio Diplomat, “President” chocolate cake by Maurice Bernachon, Vanilla ice creams and prunes

 

Fantasies & Chocolates – Mignardises including Apricot Gelee, Raspberry Macaron, Pistachio Financier, Cream Puff, Chocolates from Bernachon, Chocolate Pot de creme

Described by some as a culinary museum, or even worse as “Disneyland” despite maintaining three Michelin Stars for longer than many of its critics have been alive, L’Auberge du Pont de Collonges by Paul Bocuse was nonetheless booked as the first of six “restaurants worth a special journey” and although M. Bocuse is infrequently present in the kitchen at the age of 89 there is no doubt that the restaurant itself remains a temple of Nouvelle Cuisine well worth the expense for those interested in experiencing peerless ingredients prepared to exacting standards with service and setting to match.

Without doubt a ‘celebrity’ chef preceding the era of Food Network, a man awarded the Legion d’honneur and titles including Meilleur Ouvrier de France and Chef of the Century – not to mention the name attached to one of the culinary industry’s greatest awards – the influence of Paul Bocuse remains highly evident throughout the space that bears his name, and although several menus as well as A la Carte options are available featuring many of the chef’s classic dishes, a first time diner is well advised to invest three hours and 250€ in le menu Grand Tradition, a seven course tasting capped on each end by canapés and mignardise.

Expectedly a formal affair, but at the same time not overly stuffy and as such tailored to treat all who enter to a great experience regardless of language, preference, or previous dining experience, dinner at Bocuse begins with the sort of bread and butter that shows a great heritage of sourcing as well as craft, and with both the crunchy baguette and whole wheat chapeau proving absolutely irresistible beneath smears of salted butter from Normandy the biggest challenge is cutting oneself off, the opening round of three well crafted canapés in no way conveying the sizable presentations to come.

Moving onward to the Grand Tradition itself, it seemed only appropriate that the menu began with the Chef’s time-honored take on roasted duck liver, and offered as a sizable steak atop crispy polenta in a sauce of passion fruit, poached apple, and pan reduction the tender foie was absolutely beyond reproach, the texture as creamy as a fine terrine with all the sapor associated with hot preparations fresh from the pan – sips of a 12€ glass of Sauternes proving a perfect accoutrement with the rest to be saved for cheese and dessert later on.

Progressing next to what may be Bocuse’s most time-honored dish, a puff pastry domed broth crafted for Valery Giscard d’Estaing in 1975, suffice it to say that the intervening 40 years has done nothing to dampen the greatness of a soup based on clean and clear beef consommé punctuated with diced vegetables, foie gras, and chunks of black truffles, yet as good as the signature and its golden shell was it simply couldn’t hold a candle to the followup of flaky sole atop tender noodles amidst a lightly tanned sauce of wine, butter, cream – the century old recipe proving anything but ‘nouvelle,’ yet at the same time perhaps the best treatment of sole that I’ve tasted to this day.

Denied the voile a bresse en vessie as a result of dining solo, and instead given the option to select any other plat after a refreshing bowl of red wine sorbet, it was a difficult decision between pigeon, sweetbreads, and duck that presented itself for the meal’s final savory and deferring to my server as to which option he preferred it was to a fist-size sweetbread that I was treated, the substantial nugget reportedly harvested from a 7-month old grass fed calf atop a creamy sauce dotted with pan seared mushrooms and freshly shucked peas, the balance of sweetness and earth proving a brilliant balance to the characteristic taste of the lightly crisped gland.

Told that both cheeses and dessert at Bocuse can get a little bit outrageous as diners are encouraged to sample as much of each as their heart may desire, it was after a short delay and a visit to the kitchen that the boards of cheese were laid out for tableside presentation, and taking the server at his word that one can ‘never sample enough’ a plate of seven selections was made along with a sizable scoop of Lyon’s signature Fresh cheese beneath cream and sugar – each option proving as good as the last, all the way up to an aged munster that proved too funky for even my rather bold tastes.

Having heard stories of the degustation of desserts offered at L’Auberge du Pont de Collonges, but not entirely aware of just how immense the portions, selection, and generosity of the staff would be with a selection of over two dozen cakes, tartes, ice creams, fruits, and chocolates presented tableside for the diner’s perusal it was again taking the service at their word that ‘no amount is too much, or too little’ that a truly grand finale was crafted, a total of eight choices presented next to a silver statue featuring just as many mignadises – not one item any less than a textbook take on a French classic, the boozy Baba as well as the Floating island particularly enthralling and the mignardise tower almost immediately reloaded just as soon as it was emptied, even as I continue to delight in the Bernachon’s famous chocolate cake and the smoothest ice cream tasted in all of Lyon.

Undeniably a destination for classic refinement, with a space and service befitting one of the greatest chefs of all time, L’Auberge du Pont de Collonges was precisely what those familiar with Bocuse’s contributions to culinaria should expect, and although no longer reinventing itself in a manner like other local Michelin Starred spaces one would be hard pressed to name another experience that feels quite as ‘grand,’ a description to which the themepark comparisons may, in fact, be apt.

http://www.bocuse.fr/auberge-bocuse.aspx