Carcassonne Cuisine

The walled French town of Carcassonne has been on our radar since 2005, when Bec's lovingly-constructed European tour itinerary included it as a stop between Bordeaux and Barcelona. Due to forces beyond our control, we never made it then, and have been meaning to "tick it off" ever since. We finally managed it over the first May bank holiday, taking our second RyanAir (boo! hiss!) flight of the year to the lovely South of France.

Carcassonne is famous for the lovely castle/château that looms over the river, quite literally lording it over the "New Town". And rightly so:


The Old Town is still fully-functional, albeit dominated by tourist traps and restaurants these days. Actually staying within the town's walls is possible but ludicrously expensive, so we took the economical option and stayed in the Ibis just over the other side of the Old Bridge, getting a great view and plenty of exercise climbing that hill!


We determined that two days in Carcassonne is exactly the right duration - you could potentially "do" the town and be gone in one day but then you would miss seeing the sun set over a scene that really hasn't changed much in hundreds of years. Also, you'd be depriving yourself of another 6-8 courses of delicious French food. Indeed, we seemed to spend most of our time deciding where to eat next! The local speciality (and hence centrepiece of countless prix-fixe menus) is Cassoulet, a slow-cooked white-bean casserole of duck and pork - delicious, but there were many other things to enjoy, the only exception being a very rough pork sausage that Bec chose as an entrée, which was a little too pig-sty-esque for our tastes!

We ate like nobles, we took a turn around the château with surely the finest view in all of France, and then we ate like nobles again. Life is tough...