Celebrate French Gastronomy On Bret’s Table Tours

If you love food and drink, what if you were able to go somewhere that celebrates excellence in taste and execution? And where you go?

Twin Cities-based gourmet connoisseur Bret Bannon has an invitation for you.

If you join on one of his Bret’s Table Tours, you get to experience the finest the culinary world has to offer right in the place where it is celebrated.

In fact, Bret will be heading up two tours this June – both In France. One tour will center on Nice and the Côte d’Azur. “We take cooking classes together and then enjoy what we prepared with a glass or two of wine,” explains Bannon. “There is an all-day private wine tour, of course with lunch. We enjoy a walking tour of the old town of Cannes followed by an apéritif and dinner at a Michelin starred restaurant. If we are lucky enough, we might be invited to the chef’s table for our first course.”

“We travel to a restaurant where my friend is the chef maybe stopping beforehand at a goat farm to taste the most amazing fresh non-pasteurized chèvre imaginable,” said Bannon. “If time allows and we haven’t spent too much time wandering around the village we may stop at a winery or olive mill before heading back to Nice.”

Sounds like the perfect gastronomical tour. However, there is another tour Bannon is leading starting up in June in the heart of gastronomy in France – Lyon. “The tour to Lyon will begin with a welcome reception at the home of friends before we head off to dinner at one of the oldest bouchons in Lyon,” explained Bannon. “It’s a type of restaurant found only in Lyon where they  serve traditional Lyonnaise cuisine, such as sausages, coq-au-vin, “salade lyonnaise” duck pâté or roast pork. A bouchon is different from a bistrot, café, or even a brasserie. We’ll have a walking tour of old Lyon, a market tour and lunch at another friend’s home, a cooking class with a chef friend, an all-day wine tour with lunch… and the list goes on and on.”

Before you consider these tours compared to other such tourist excursions, consider this from Bannon: “These are not tours that you will ever find on Trip Advisor and you won’t find me holding a tour guide flag as the tours are limited to 6 clients.”

Why would you want to go on one of these tours? Bannon’s background is one reason. “I started cooking quite young as my Mom and my grandmothers welcomed me in the kitchen,” Bannon explained. “As one of six kids, Mom’s dinner repertoire was limited. I got bored easily so I would pursue Mom’s copy of the Joy of Cooking and find something that looked interesting. Mom would buy the groceries and I’d cook it.”

Bannon’s career took off after graduate school at Saint John’s University, where he volunteered at one of the local cooking schools as an assistant. He assisted some of the biggest names in the culinary arts, including Andrew Zimmern, Zoë François, the late Raghavan Iyer, and Marcus Samelson. From that point, Bannon began teaching the art of cooking.

However, it was at a cooking school where Bannon got inspired to do something more.  “I met the former owner, Kathie Alex of La Pitchoune,” explained Bannon referring to the restaurant near where Julia Child lived in Grasse, France. “Kathie and I became good friends. I would travel to La Pitchoune to be Kathie’s cooking assistant, chauffeur, gardener or whatever else for which she needed assistance. I didn’t care, I was staying at Julia Child’s home in the south of France.”

“Kathie ran the cooking for 25-plus years”, Bannon further explained, “and I was part of that journey for a good 10 years as often as she needed help. She introduced me to the markets in Cannes, Antibes, Nice, and Valbonne to name a few and to the flavors of Provence. She also introduced me to chefs/cooking instructors, some of whom I now consider friends. These are the folks that lead the cooking classes that are now part of my tour.”

These tours are open to anyone who are interested in the culinary arts. It is a way for Bannon to bridge the best of French’s passion for food and its origins. To understand this passion for the people taking the tour, Bannon will show us, for example, that “in the markets, farmers will list for example the variety of the strawberry, say the La Gariguette or the melon called a yellow Charentais. If it’s a vendor selling products they have not grown, they will state where the produce was grown.”

If you can’t make it in one of Bret’s Table Tours in France, Bannon offers private and small group hands-on cooking classes here in the Twin Cities. “Though my favorite classes to teach involve French cuisine, I also teach Italian, Indian, American Regional, and pastry/dessert classes.

If you do join Bannon on one his tours through France, he said that the most ideal outcome from these tours is he hopes that “those who return from a tour have a greater appreciation for food and from where our food comes. The French do not eat or drink on the run. They stop to enjoy it, even if it’s a croissant or an espresso. Let’s do the same. Spend time with each other. Linger at the table; have conversations.”

For more information about Bret’s Table – including the tours, events, classes, and more – log on to https://bretstable.com

Now, pull up a chair to his table – whether it is in Minnesota or the heart of gastronomic culture in France.