Dijon Food, Wine & Culture Guide
Visit on A Taste of France Culinary Tour
Burgundy in June is deep green and unhurried — a patchwork of walled vineyards, honey-stone villages, and a ducal capital whose kitchens gave the world mustard, cassis, and some of the greatest wines ever made. Here A Taste of France slows to the pace of a long Burgundian lunch.
History & Culture
For a century and a half in the late Middle Ages, the Dukes of Burgundy were richer and more powerful than the kings of France, and they built their capital, Dijon, accordingly — a city of palaces, half-timbered mansions, and glazed-tile roofs that survives almost intact. Spared by the wars that scarred other cities, Dijon is one of France’s best-preserved historic centres, and every lane seems to lead to another courtyard, church, or covered market.
The Dukes of Burgundy could not become kings, so they did something harder: they made their table the envy of every court in Europe.
On Dijon’s golden age
Must Visit
The Palace of the Dukes of Burgundy
At the heart of Dijon stands the Palais des ducs de Bourgogne, the vast ducal palace from which one of medieval Europe’s richest dynasties ruled. Today it houses the Musée des Beaux-Arts, one of the oldest museums in France, and its tower and great ducal kitchens speak of an age when Burgundy set the standard for courtly luxury.
Landmark
Notre-Dame de Dijon & the Owl
The 13th-century church of Notre-Dame is famous for its extraordinary facade of carved false gargoyles and, tucked around one corner, la chouette — a small worn owl carved in stone that Dijonnais have rubbed for luck for centuries. Following the brass owl markers set into the pavement is the classic way to discover the old town’s courtyards and mansions.
Market
Les Halles de Dijon
Dijon’s covered market, its iron framework designed in the workshop of Gustave Eiffel, is the belly of the city — a hall of Burgundian produce where cheesemongers, butchers, and growers set out the raw materials of one of France’s great regional cuisines. It is the natural first stop for anyone who has come to eat.
Iconic Experience
The Route des Grands Crus
Beginning just south of Dijon, the Route des Grands Crus runs through the most storied wine villages on earth — Gevrey-Chambertin, Vosne-Romanée, Nuits-Saint-Georges — a ribbon of walled vineyards, or climats, so precisely mapped they are UNESCO World Heritage. To drive it is to read the very origin of the idea of terroir.
Culinary Specialties
Burgundy is where French cooking is at its most generous and its most serious. Over three days the tour dives in — a hands-on class in the ancient art of cooking escargots, a visit to the Fallot mustard mill where Dijon’s most famous export is still stone-ground, and, as the crowning dinner, a table at the three-Michelin-star Maison Lameloise. All of it is poured, naturally, against the greatest wines in France.
In Burgundy the question is never whether the wine will be good. It is only which of the great ones you will be lucky enough to drink.
On the Burgundian table
The Tour Table
Dinner at Maison Lameloise
The tour’s Burgundy climaxes at Maison Lameloise in Chagny, a three-Michelin-star institution that has held the highest honours in French gastronomy for generations. A meal here is the definitive expression of Burgundian haute cuisine — precise, unhurried, and matched to a cellar of local legends. It is one of the great tables of the whole journey.
Hands On
An Escargot Cooking Class
Burgundy is the home of the escargot, and the tour rolls up its sleeves for a class in preparing them the classic way — in the shell, under a lid of garlic-and-parsley butter. It is a hands-on, convivial introduction to a dish that is pure Burgundy, and one you will make properly ever after.
Local Icon
Dijon Mustard at the Fallot Mill
At the Fallot mill, Dijon’s signature mustard is still made the traditional way, the seeds crushed slowly by stone to keep their heat and aroma. Tasting it at the source — sharp, fine, and worlds away from the supermarket jar — is to understand why the word Dijon became shorthand for mustard the world over.
Regional Classic
Boeuf Bourguignon, Gougères & Époisses
Burgundy’s classics are the backbone of French home cooking: boeuf bourguignon and coq au vin slow-braised in red wine, oeufs en meurette, warm cheese gougères, and the formidable Époisses, a washed-rind cheese so pungent it is said to be banned on public transport. Finished with a kir — white wine and Dijon’s own crème de cassis — it is a cuisine of deep, wine-dark comfort.
Wine Country & Village Life
Burgundy is a landscape measured in metres. Here the same grape, grown on two sides of a single lane, can make wines worlds apart — and centuries of monks and vignerons have mapped every fold of the Côte d’Or into named parcels, the climats, now recognised by UNESCO. Between Dijon and Beaune lies a countryside of walled vineyards, stone villages, and cellars where some of the rarest wine on earth quietly ages.
Nowhere else on earth is a field worth a fortune because of which side of the path it sits on. That is Burgundy.
On the mystery of terroir
Wine Village
Beaune, Capital of Burgundy Wine
The walled town of Beaune is the wine capital of Burgundy, its centre dominated by the Hôtel-Dieu, a 15th-century charity hospital roofed in dazzling glazed tiles and funded, to this day, by a celebrated annual wine auction. Beneath the town run cellars stacked with barrels; above, the squares are made for lingering over a glass.
Landscape
The Côte d’Or
The golden slope between Dijon and Santenay is the most valuable strip of farmland in France, its east-facing vineyards catching the morning sun that ripens Pinot Noir and Chardonnay to perfection. Walking or driving its lanes, past hand-painted village names that read like a wine list, is a pilgrimage for anyone who loves wine.
Craft
The Cellars & Climats
Burgundy’s genius is its obsession with place — more than a thousand individual climats, each a named parcel with its own character, walls, and history. Visiting a domaine’s cellar, glass in hand as the vigneron explains why one row differs from the next, is the region’s quintessential luxury.
Iconic Experience
A Kir on a Village Square
The kir — a splash of Dijon’s crème de cassis topped with cool white Aligoté — was born here and remains the perfect Burgundian aperitif. Ordered on a shaded village square as the afternoon lengthens, it is the simplest and most civilised pleasure the region offers.
Burgundy in June — A Taste of France Weather Guide
The tour reaches Dijon and Burgundy in mid-June
🌡️ Temperature
Burgundy in mid-June is warm and settled, with highs of 23–26°C (73–79°F) and cool, dewy mornings over the vineyards. Evenings ease to 13–16°C (55–61°F), ideal for a long dinner in a courtyard as the light fades.
☀️ Sun & Rain
Days are long and mostly sunny, with the occasional summer storm rolling over the Côte — brief, dramatic, and quickly past. The cellars stay cool year round, so carry a layer for tastings underground.
👗 What to Wear
Smart-casual for Michelin dinners and comfortable, flat shoes for cobbled old towns and vineyard visits. A light jacket for cellars and cooler evenings; Burgundy dresses well but never fussily.
💡 General Tips
Book cellar visits ahead in June, and take the tastings seriously — eat well and hydrate between them. And always save room for cheese: a Burgundian meal is not truly finished until the Époisses has been offered.
Ready to Taste France?
Burgundy is the slow, wine-dark heart of a journey that runs from the cellars of Champagne to the oysters of Bordeaux. Reserve your place on A Taste of France and let our specialists arrange every last detail.
