Normandy Culinary Experience Tour

Our range of tours with a culinary theme has proved very popular over the past few years with highly successful tours to Crete, Italy, Sicily, Spain and beyond. A big omission to the programme has been to one of Europe’s most famous culinary destinations, France, which has now been corrected with this superb new tour to delightful Normandy, just across the Channel from the UK but a world away in terms of cuisine. Based in the delightful seaside town of Trouville, our tour looks at the region’s superb produce – including cheese, calvados and cider with tours and tastings, a cookery class, fish market, Rouen’s famous Festival du Ventre (Belly Festival) and delightful, typically Norman towns and villages.

ITINERARY

Day 1: Eurostar to Trouville.
Travel by Eurostar from St Pancras to Trouville-Deauville via Paris. Transfer to the hotel for check-in for seven-night stay. Evening welcome drink at the hotel with evening free to explore the culinary delights of charming Trouville-sur-Mer.

Day 2: Trouville-sur-Mer guided tour and welcome lunch at a local restaurant. Afternoon free.
A morning walking tour will show you the delights of our charming base for the week, the graceful resort of Trouville-sur-Mer, with its atmospheric town centre, lively fishing port, wooden pier leading to the orange-topped lighthouse, Belle-Epoque casino and Villa Montebello Museum with collection of art. Our tour will end with lunch at a typical local restaurant to get our culinary adventure underway with the afternoon free to discover more of the elegant and atmospheric resort’s delights. Evening free.

Day 3: Calvados tour and tasting, afternoon Honfleur.
Normandy is renowned throughout the world for its apple products – notably cider and calvados, a refined spirit that its aficionados would argue rivals the finest cognacs. This morning we will visit reputed producer Christian Drouin for a tour of the distillery’s manufacturing process as well, of course, tasting the delicious results – cider, calvados, perry and Pommeau. We’ll then transfer to the gorgeous port of Honfleur set around its bustling harbour. Colourful half-timbered houses jostle for position on the quays, along with art galleries and restaurants. Packed with things to see and do, it’s not for nothing that Honfleur is one of the most popular places to visit in France and time will be allowed for lunch (not included) at one of the many tempting seafood restaurants that line the harbour. Then, it’s time to work off the culinary excesses with free time to explore this delightful town. Sights include the Vieux-Bassin old port, Lieutenance, Church of Sainte-Catherine, Maritime Museum, 17^th century Salt Granaries, 17^th century Chapel of Notre-Dame-de-Grâce and museums dedicated to two of the town’s illustrious sons – Impressionist painter, Eugene Boudin and composer Erik Satie. The stunning Pont de Normandie spans the Seine between Honfleur and Le Havre and was the longest cable-stayed bridge in the world when it opened in 1995. Evening free in Trouville.

Day 4: Cooking Class at the House of the Normand Chef with lunch.
A day of hands-on cookery this morning with accomplished chef, Elisabeth Tirel, who will guide you through the process of preparing and cooking a typical Normandy lunch of Suprême de volaille sauce camembert, pomme fruit rôtie, pomme de terre paillasson au beurre followed by Bourdin aux pommes glace à la crème. You need to concentrate, though, as you will be eating your achievements afterwards and hopefully enjoying the results. Return to Trouville mid-afternoon with the rest of the day and evening free.

Day 5: Cider route to Beuvron-en-Auge and Liseux
This morning we will travel along the Cider Route, a well-signposted tourist route, some 40km in length, focusing on cider-making traditions in these parts and passing via the archetypically Norman village of Beuvron-en-Auge, one of the 174 “Le Plus Beaux Villages de France,” filled with local producers offering tastings of their wares and antique shops. From here we will continue to ancient Lisieux one of Normandy’s oldest towns. The religious city of Lisieux draws vast numbers of Catholic visitors and is considered the second most important pilgrimage site in France, with more than 700,000 pilgrims annually, thanks to its 19th-century saint, Thérèse Martin. Thérèse’s popularity also explains Lisieux’s extravagant 20th-century hillside basilica, which outdoes its medieval cathedral and is often compared to the basilica of Sacré-Cœur de Montmartre in Paris. We’ll visit this architectural extravaganza before heading into town with the option of a sweet treat (not included) at the renowned patisserie, Recreation Sucree par Nicolas Barbet. Evening free.

Day 6: Fete du Ventre Festival Rouen with over 160 producers in Normandy’s historic capital.
A chance to participate in a truly French activity today as we head into Rouen for annual “Belly” festival where more than 160 producers – of fruit, vegetables, cheese, chocolate and alcoholic drinks - gather to sell their wares and offer a tasting or two along the way. Dating back to the 1930s, the festival takes over the old town in the old market district and is a wonderful place to wander at leisure, tasting and learning from the producers in a convivial atmosphere. Rouen has plenty to offer the culturally inquisitive too, with its fabulous Musée des Beaux Arts that houses a wonderful collection including Monet’s Rouen Cathedral and works by Boudin and Dufy, as well as a delightful old town and Gothic Cathedral, the tallest in France, that was such an inspiration to Claude Monet that he painted it more than thirty times. It is where Joan of Arc was burned at the stake with a strikgin modern church and museum dedicated to the martyr.  For more details about the festival please visit https://feteduventre.fr/

Day 7: Camembert with cheese tasting and lunch in a local village.
No culinary visit to Normandy is complete without a visit to a fromagerie and our delightful tour, of course, offers just that, in the eponymously named village of Camembert itself and the Clos de Beaumoncel Cheese Factory. Here you will be shown through the manufacturing process and, naturally, enjoy some tastings of the delicious produce. Our final culinary adventure will be at a typical local restaurant for a farewell lunch to end a delicious week. Evening free.

Day 8: Train from Trouville to St Pancras via Paris.
Transfer to station for return train to Paris and onwards by Eurostar to St Pancras.

NB: Exact order of excursions may vary according to local conditions and tour manager's discretion.

Please note the maximum group size on this tour is 20 passengers. 

INCLUDED

• Return standard class Eurostar and SNCF to Trouville-Deauville via Paris
• Seven nights’ bed and breakfast at the four-star Mercure Hotel, Trouville, based on shared occupancy of a twin/double room
• First night welcome drink at the hotel
• Cooking class with lunch at the House of the Normand Chef
• Two lunches at local restaurants
• Coach throughout the tour including tours, tastings and visits as detailed
• Tour manager throughout

NOT INCLUDED

• Double for sole use supplement
• Holiday insurance
• Meals other than those stated
• Items of a personal nature such as drinks, laundry, telephone calls etc
• Porterage and gratuities 

HOTEL

Mercure Trouville

Modern four-star hotel in the heart of town close to the port and the beach, the hotel offers a spa (extra cost), bar and comfortable bedrooms with all modern amenities including en-suite bathroom, TV, telephone, wifi, air-conditioning, safe, minibar, hairdryer and tea/coffee making facilities. Trouville is a delightful base for this tour with a host of restaurants within walking distance and a lovely promenade for an evening stroll.

Hotel Website