Although arguably France’s second city, Lyon’s renown is mostly for its food as the so-called “gastronomic capital of the universe”. That might be a bit of an exaggeration, but it’s at least widely known in gourmet circles for its well-developed and refined local cuisine and its star local chefs like Paul Bocuse. Although Bocuse died earlier in 2018 just shy of age 90, the restaurant be founded is still running strong, but being well outside the city and with price fixe menu over 150 Euros, it’s not going to be somewhere I’m going. Bocuse was, of course, also known for being a pioneer of Nouvelle Cuisine, the light, silly fru-fru reaction to traditionally rich French food. Nouvelle cuisine is also really not my thing, unless they figure out some way to beef up their portions. Restaurants by star chefs don’t really impress me much anyway. They’re displays more of a single person’s artistry with food than handed down culinary traditions of a culture.

For the latter Lyon also supposedly excels, its small traditional family run restaurants called Bouchons and differ in style from better known Paris-style bistros and brasseries. Historically Lyon is a working-class city of weavers based around silk and textile mills, so it has both heavy and homey foods as well as the more refined.

Anthony Bourdain did an episode of “Parts Unknown” around Lyon a couple years ago, although as best I can recall he spent more time in the countryside at the restaurants and country homes of start chefs and producers of famous products than on the city’s urban cuisine.  With the prevalence of unusual things like offal and snails, Lyon would also have been a great place for Andrew Zimmern and his “Bizarre Foods” show, but I don’t know if he ever did one here.

Real Lyon cuisine differs from that of other regions of France based on the availability of local products. Being landlocked in eastern France, there’s not much seafood but freshwater fish and crawfish appear in famous dishes instead. The wide range of ingredients doesn’t typically include many subtropical or Mediterranean origin. It’s heavy on the meat and potatoes with onions definitely favored over garlic or shallots as in Provence and the Southwest. There’s plenty of chicken but goose and duck and less popular. The meat-based cuisine relies heavily on beef and especially pork with an immense variety of sausages and salamis, and mince mixes that make their way into pates and terrines, often baked en croute. Particularly notable is the wide and inventive use of offal of all kinds in traditional city specialties. And the variety of cheeses from the region is enormous. Of course, in modern times all the foods from throughout France and from around the world are available in Lyon.

With a goal of trying many of the local specialties, I did a little more research ahead of time on Lyon restaurants than I normally do and targeted a list of bouchons as possibilities that were recommended in publication writeups as being among the best. And I did find them to be significantly better than those I picked from the longer list of Bouchons Lyonnais I got from the tourist office.  My faves were Bouchon Chez Paul and Café des Federations, both small places with only a few tables and a single waiter or what looked like a married couple running everything. While the other places operated in the standard style of offering three-course fixed price menus with a variety of options under each, at the real traditional ones most was fixed, the appetizers and desserts served family style for a tastes of several traditional dishes. These two also featured a cheese course in addition to a dessert and at Café de Federations a poached egg in red wine even before the salads as a pre-starter for five effective courses. And then there was Bouchon Aux Trois Cochons, a bit more touristy near the commercial heart of Lyon but true to a menu weighted heavily toward pork products.

With only four days in a city there are only so many things you can try. I had already made a couple determinations for what I did not want to eat in Lyon that was considered local specialties. First of these is Andouillette, a sausage stuffed with chopped chitterlings (intestines) served in mustard cream sauce. It’s something I’ve had twice before and vowed the first time I’d never eat again. The second time I was in a remote mountain hut in the Pyrenees with the alternative of going hungry that night. I can also avoid the gratins made with Andouilette and potatoes and cheese – essentially chitlins casserole. No!

Lyons has multiple ways of cooking tripe too, either fried and served with tartar sauce, stewed, or otherwise with names like Gras Double and Tablier de Supeur. I’m wise to them when they’re on menus. Rognons (kidneys) aren’t terrible, but they’re not great either, as are sweetbreads (Veal thymus glands). And cervelles (brains) is something I’m keeping a distance from too. So that significantly narrows down a typical Lyonnais menu.

One dish I was eager to try was Quenelles en Brochette, a kind of dumpling traditionally made with pike, a freshwater fish. I believe the fish is ground and mixed with starch and fat to made a light dumpling that’s boiled, them baked, and finally served au gratin with a crayfish cream sauce. This dish alone is so good it redeems Lyons cuisine from all that offal.

A second trad dish I had to try was Galette de Foie de Volaille (Chicken Liver Cake), actually more like a delicate mousse that’s steamed in a mold, turned out, and served with a light tomato coulis called Sauce Financiere. That was pretty good too.

Then there’s sausages which include Cervelas and one made with cream and pistachios. I guess I didn’t hit the right menu at the right time so didn’t try those but instead had Boudin Noir aux Deux Pommes (Black Pudding with Potatoes and Apples). Most Americans are quite turned off by eating blood despite black pudding being popular in the British Isles. I was introduced to it young by my Belgian family and quite like it.

I thought I’d be adventure and order the Tete de Veau (Veal Head) that shows up on most Lyonnais Bouchon menus. They told me at the restaurant it was tongue and cheek (or maybe tongue in cheek). I’ve had both beef tongue and stewed pork cheeks, both of which are very good, so I was optimistic about my order. What arrived though was terrible, like a strip of calf face skin wrapped around a piece of bone – slimy, elastic, smelly, and with almost no edible meat on it. I guess that’s the problem with young animals in that they just don’t have much muscle on them yet. That was practically a vegetarian meal for me.

One of my winners was Poulet au Vinaigre, chicken in a cream sauce but flavored with vinegar instead of white wine as more typical in France – yummy if you like things a little on the sour side. Navarin de Agneau, essentially a lamb stew with vegetables was really good too.

When salads were served family style I tried them all. You can’t go wrong with lentil salad, betterave (beet) salad, or cocos (white beans) in my book, but the Museau was kind of weird. I figured out later that it was a salad of thinly sliced brawn, effectively head cheese or boiled cow head meat held together with gelatin.

In France they don’t eat much worthwhile for breakfast, just some bread with spreads or a croissant or two. Then they eat breakfast food as meal first courses. Salade Lyonnais is what I’d call breakfast salad, some greens and dressing, big chunks of bacon lardons, croutons, and a poached egg on top. Oh, and then there’s Ouefs en Meurrette as a first course – eggs poached in red wine with bacon. I could handle those for breakfast too!  And to top off the salads was one I had with Oreilles de Conchons Confits on top. That would be sliced pig ears confit style. I’ve had pig ears once before in Lithuania. They’re not my favorite but definitely edible.

Lyon has a great variety of cheeses, but it’s difficult to achieve the ideal of being able to sample small quantities of multiple. At Café des Federations, though, I got to. They brought out a cheese board with about six cheeses and some spreads. I asked how many I could pick, to which the waiter said I could try them all, which I did. The common local Saint-Marcellin is actually one of my favorites. One spread he warned me about, though, almost like a fermented butter rather than cheese was intensely strong and pungent. Whew!  One option for the cheese course on most menus in Lyon is Cervelle de Canut, which translates to silk worker’s brains, but is actually a spread of yogurt, garlic, shallots, chives, and herbs.

One of the supposed top attractions in Lyons is Les Halles Paul Bocuse, a large food hall in a newer commercial area near the city’s main train station. I went hoping to sample a wide variety of local products, similar to what you can do in many markets in Europe. I specifically had in mind La Boqueria on Las Ramblas in Barcelona. I have to admit to being a little disappointed, though. Despite there being numerous stalls selling meat, fish, charcuterie, cheeses, traiteurs, and sweets, it’s mostly a restaurant complex in a glassy modern building serving the lunch needs of the modern office towers that surround it. The restaurants struck me as rather overpriced and heavily serving standard French food (lots of raw oysters) than Lyons cuisine. I found a quite good nearby bouchon for lunch instead.

I was glad to find the center of Lyon has several Starbucks. Who would have ever thought Starbucks would catch on in France. Actually, despite their reputation, most younger French people seem very open to foreign cultural influences like McDonalds, Irish and English pubs, Italian trattorias, all kinds of Middle Eastern and Asian foods.  It felt great to have a full adult size venti coffee after weeks limited to mini portions of sludge in a thimble. I usually think of France as mostly a wine-drinking country, but there’s no question beer is very popular in Lyon with people hanging out in the afternoon and evening drinking full size pints of draft beer like they do in Britain. I also came across a stat that there are over 200 small micrebreweries in the greater Lyon area, although I only managed to taste the produce of two of them.