Le Bonheur Suit Son Cours – Vaison-la-Romaine
Le Bonheur Pouruit Son Cours in the pretty Romanesque village of Vaison-la-Romaine in Vaucluse serves interesting dishes that are not at all pretentious to accompany the very well-chosen selection of biodynamic and natural wines.
We were once lucky enough to buy a house with some frinds in the nearby village of Caromb. It was a short and pleasant drive from there to Vaison and we often made the short journey to buy cheese at the fabulous cheese shop, pasta (virtually next door to Le Bonheur) of various varieties that changed at the whim of the owner, chocolates and ice cream of excellent quality to name just a few of the specialties of that interesting town.
Every visit to the town seemed to end up with us seeking out natural wines in Le Bonheur Poursuit Son Cours, or ordering a pleasant lunch and sitting on the outside tables with a glass of wine to while away an hour or so.
They have many of the more interesting ‘new’ wines of France. We go to Vaison to buy wines such as those from Lapalu, Séléné, Richaud, Lafitte and Roure just to name a few. They even have Drappier zero dosage Champagne!
And speaking of this Champagne, we dropped in for a quick lunch recently and started with a glass of the zero-dosage Drappier. It was excellent! Bracingly acidic, but with a lovely yeasty, creamy mouthfeel. And the food was as pleasant as ever.
A tartare of organic beef was presented with a well-dressed lettuce salad on one side and fried potato crisps on the other. The tartare had lots of capers chopped through and a bottle of Tabasco was served on the side for additional spice.
Our other dish was a Saucisse Grillee which was a nicely-flavoured, dense sausage served in the same manner as the tartare but with mustard and tomato sauce on the side.
We accompanied the two meat dishes with a sensational bottle of Domaine Prieuré Roch Bourgogne Grand Ordinaire Gamay. This was a stunning bottle of totally natural wine with a freshness and liveliness that was immensely appealing. The Grand Ordinaire appellation allows vignerons to make a 100% Gamay even though it is classified as a Burgundy. Don’t get your hopes up for trying this wine any time soon (unless you go to Vaison) because only 937 bottles were made.
For dessert we enjoyed a strawberry soup (being late April the famous Carpentras strawberries are readily available and had ripened beautifully in the warm weather) and a technically perfect crème brulée.
This is how we like to eat in France. Simple food done well and a choice of natural wines is as good as it gets.
A few more words about the wine list. The wines are all classified by their level of commitment to natural vineyard management. There is one smiley face if they are in conversion, two if they are organic and three if they are biodynamic or practice cosmoculture (such as Viret). Wines are awarded a ‘sun’ symbol if they are ‘sans soufre’ at 20 milligrams per litre or less and two symbols if they are less than 10 milligrams per litre.
A trip to Vaison is also worth it for other reasons such as the excellent cheesemonger (established by Josiane Déal who deservedly earned the prestigious title of “Meilleure ouvrière de France” and now run by her son Romain) and a very good chocolate shop.
Additional information
Name: Le Bonheur Suit Son Cours
Street: 20 Cours de Taulignan
Suburb: Vaison-la-Romaine, Provence, 84110
Phone number: +33 4 90 46 45 27
Opening hours: Check their Web site
They do have some information on Facebook here.
We have also included this site in our story about which natural wine bars to visit in France here.
