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A trip in Camargue, even if only for a cruise stop-over, or for a week-end, is always a pleasant occasion to discover its gastronomic specialties. It would be definitely wrong, indeed, not to emphasize its exceptional quality even among French specialties, if you first mention Northern cuisine, or from Lyon or Eastern Provence, with Marseille and the bouillabaisse. Camargue cooking made out very fine dishes, and they perfectly highlight local products. The most typical are made with meat from Camargue bulls and rice, or Mediterranean seafood. A typical Camarguese dinner is usually composed with Camarguese salad first : rice perfumed with herbs, shrimps and squids ; but you may prefer anchoiade (enchovy) with raw vegetables... Then follow mussels “a la brasucado” (in a sharp sauce), grilled entrecote, or, of course, a “gardianne”, i.e. a most flavorful beef daube, as a poem to the mouth... Little goat cheeses from Northern Camargue and the Cevennes mountains, the “Pélardons”, very famous, usually eaten as they are, or rolled in black pepper. For the gardianne as for tasting, you usually find wines from Petite-Camargue : Vauvert, Calvisson, Beaucaire,... or very peculiar “vins des sables” (wines from the sands), from grapes growing along the Languedoc coast. In touristic towns, the Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer, Port-Camargue, you may find many good restaurants, whether typical from the Camargue or not, as well. As lively, and much warmer than these along the Seine in Paris, the quays of the canal in Port-Camargue just make it difficult to choose, as you can find plenty of restaurants, although there are rather bars and cafés. There are very good and famous restaurants in the Saintes-Maries. Nothing better than a tasty meal by the sea, enjoying the show of bypassing boats...
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