Gourmet Food and Wine tasting in Paris

Take a gourmet 'Tour de France' on this guided walking tour in central Paris’ most traditional food district. Sample a variety of delicious regional specialties, pick out your favourites and enjoy a flight of French wines with a typical French lunch.

Meet your friendly, local guide and join a small group (12 people or fewer) at a central location in Paris, where your ‘Tour de France’ of the best of French regional gastronomy will begin in a local bakery. Start your morning in typical French style, with a coffee and a delicious buttery croissant. We will pick up some traditional baguettes here to enjoy later in the tour.

The Les Halles quarter of Paris is traditionally known as ‘the belly of Paris’. Once home to the huge, teeming food market that fed the city each day, today it remains a mecca for food lovers, the streets lined with specialty food stores, restaurants, cafés and kitchen supplies. As the locals shop for their daily groceries, we’ll stroll along the most popular street, the rue Montorgueil, stopping along the way at our favorite boutiques. We will savor tasty artisanal cheeses from around France in a traditional, local fromagerie, and try delicately flavoured fine chocolates from an artisan ‘chocolatier’. Then it’s time for a visit to the oldest (and possibly most beautiful) patisserie in Paris, founded by the Queen’s baker in 1730 (he also invented the ‘Baba au rhum’). This store has won the award for Best Chocolate Éclair (among others), we’ll taste their delicious pastries and choose our favorites here to be savored later over lunch. Our last stop is a beautifully restored épicerie, where they still prepare their own specialities in the kitchens on site - here we’ll try traditional delicacies from Southwestern France.

Your expert guide will also point out a centuries-old oyster house (the oysters were originally rushed to Paris from the coast by horse) as well as traditional butchers, fishmongers and grocers as you wander along this fascinating street. For the cooks amongst you, particularly pastry lovers, don’t miss the wonderful suppliers of kitchenware, including one of the oldest cuisine stores in Paris.

Our tour culminates at an award-winning wine bar, where we will pair the foods we have selected during the tour with a flight of top class French wines served by an expert sommelier. Learn about the differences between the French wine regions, sample wines from three different appellations, and discover and how to pair each wine with your food. Your gourmet tour concludes with a typical picnic style lunch with wine, the perfect way to end a morning of gastronomic discoveries and delights.