Maison Pic, Valence France

Our visit to Maison Pic was an enveloping embrace that began the instant we stepped from the sidewalk into the lobby, and continued until the next morning, when we were tucked back into our car along with care packages for the road.

There are many three Michelin star restaurant/hotel combinations in France, and it’s not hard to see why.  Instead of a few hours for dinner, it’s an immersion into another world of elegance and grace.

Each room is a bit different – ours had a tiny balcony with a view over the rooftops to the mountains beyond, and an open bathroom with a très moderne tub and Hermès toiletries in opulent emerald green bottles.

And there was a dreamily comfortable bed, which is just the thing to come home to after a grand dinner!

After checking in, we relaxed in our room and poked around the small garden out back; D even took a dip in the beautiful, but unheated, pool.

I found a window to the dining room, which made me think of an enchanted looking glass. Isn’t it beautiful in there?

Before dinner that evening, we met in the salon for champagne and a few little nibbles, an unhurried opportunity to read over the menu options.

Then, into that lovely dining room – serene and glimmering with pink and silver and crystal.

Dinner deserves your full attention another time, but it certainly lived up to its stars…

After a very good night’s sleep, I met my uncle for breakfast in the salon (my aunt and D, being a bit less gluttonous, decided to walk to L’Epicerie, Pic’s café down the street).

This is an amazingly indulgent breakfast by any measure.  Our table was almost immediately laden with juice, coffee, and a series of white porcelain dishes containing pastries, butter, preserves and chocolate-hazelnut spread, yogurt, berries, a sort of île flottante, and even an assortment of cookies.  To top it off, we ordered eggs – a mushroom omelette for my uncle and oeufs brouillés (scrambled eggs) for me.

I started with a raisin pastry and croissant with preserves, then moved on to yogurt and berries.  Each raspberry was filled with raspberry jam!  Amazing attention to detail, which may sadly have ruined me for plain raspberries.  (Just kidding.  I think.)

As for my scrambled eggs, they were as much like the eggs I make at home as the Mediterranean is like my bathtub.  They were soft as satin, with the creamy texture of a broken custard, topped with a cheese wafer and a single flower petal.

And what breakfast would be complete without dessert?  I ate the delicious île flottante, but simply couldn’t manage any of the cookies.

By mid-morning it was time to press on to the south, so we checked out and were given little bags with bottled water and candies for the road.  (And I may have also asked to have our breakfast cookies boxed up.)

I wish I could have stayed longer in the magical world of Pic… though on the other hand I think even I would have been bested by one more meal there!

Still to come from France: Ménerbes, Arles, more from Lyon, and of course our Maison Pic dinner.