The south of France as you've never seen it before
Two fishing villages at either end of the Bay of Marseille guard the city's coastline like a pair of crab claws. At the northern edge of the seafront is L'Estaque, with its bohemian artistic past; at the southern limits is Les Goudes, which looks set for an increasingly bourgeois future.
For generations, both have been popular day-trips for the Marseillais, but today, the villages are drawing a more Parisian crowd.
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West Australian
24-05-2025
- West Australian
The big five in Bordeaux
Just over two hours south-west of Paris on the high-speed TGV train, Bordeaux is undoubtedly one of the best cities to visit in France. Brimming with history and beauty, boasting an arresting mix of antique and cutting-edge sights and attractions, it's also the launchpad for multi-night cruises along the Garonne, a river that helped Bordeaux evolve from rural backwater to one of the world's richest trading ports. Here are five highlights in and around the city. You'll find countless wine shops and bars, plus the show-stopping Cite du Vin (City of Wine). While its bold, sinuous contemporary exterior is said to conjure the 'soul of wine', inside themed galleries with engaging, interactive exhibits take you back through the centuries, telling the story of wine globally and regionally. You can also sign up for workshops that let you taste different tipples as you deepen your knowledge of wine (while becoming slightly merrier and light headed). As you'd perhaps expect, Bordeaux wine pairs nicely with the region's cuisine, whether it's a glass of crisp sauvignon blanc with Atlantic oysters or a full-bodied red with a coq au vin or magret de canard (duck breast). Classic and contemporary bistros pepper the city and you'll also find more cosmopolitan eateries with recipes, trends and tipples from across the world. Other options for food and drink are the old-school markets and modern food halls that offer a range of flavours under one roof. Possibilities include Les Halles Bacalan, opened in 2017 opposite the Cite du Vin, and La Boca, which launched south of Bordeaux's Saint-Jean station the following year. Steeped in history, with roots in the mid 1700s, Marche des Capucins is perhaps the city's most alluring market, a sensory feast offering everything from regionally-sourced meats and seafood to South American empanadas and desserts. Thanks to its close links with royalty — Eleanor of Aquitaine, daughter of Richard the Lionheart of England, married Louis VII, King of France here in AD1137 — Bordeaux was one Europe's most important cities in the Middle Ages. And as transatlantic trading routes opened up, the city became wealthier still with the prosperity evident in the buildings sprinkling Bordeaux's strollable historic core. You will see handsome spired churches, gated remnants of the city's medieval walls, elegant squares and theatres, and Parisian-style palaces, shopping arcades and boulevards. One of the best places for viewing the mix of architecture is along the riverside promenade, especially by the Miroir d'Eau. Created in 2006, the world's largest reflecting pool mirrors the Place de la Bourse, a square edged by a neoclassical-rococo-style former stock exchange. While Bordeaux has a beautifully-preserved old core — Victor Hugo was a fan — it's not a city that rests on its laurels. New districts are being built on disused land — with modern apartments and construction cranes rising either side of the railway station — and the city's tram network has been extended several times since 2003, most recently to the airport. Around the city, previously abandoned or derelict sites have been repurposed into visitor draws and community hubs, including the Darwin eco-camp, which has galleries, bars, shops, street art and skateboarding facilities at a former military barracks. Another waterfront diversion is the Bassins des Lumieres, a huge digital arts centre with exhibitions in a former World War II submarine base on the docks of the Bacalan district. You could gladly spend two or three days drinking in the pleasures of central Bordeaux (and more if you'd like to check out its fine arts, history and maritime museums, and its tidy parks and botanical gardens). Away from the wine-related tours and day trips, and cruises that sail on the Garonne and Dordogne rivers, you could venture towards the Atlantic coast either by car, e-bike or rail. One mesmerising location is the Bay of Arcachon, a huge tidal lagoon fringed by pine forests, Europe's highest sand dunes and cute and chic beach towns where you can tuck into seafood lunches and hop on and off sightseeing boats and ferries. The best-connected hub for the bay is the town of Arcachon itself. It's about 40 minutes on the train from Bordeaux and a little bit longer to drive, but well worth the journey, especially if good weather is on the horizon. fact file + For more information on visiting Bordeaux, including attractions and accommodation options, see
AU Financial Review
21-05-2025
- AU Financial Review
The south of France as you've never seen it before
Two fishing villages at either end of the Bay of Marseille guard the city's coastline like a pair of crab claws. At the northern edge of the seafront is L'Estaque, with its bohemian artistic past; at the southern limits is Les Goudes, which looks set for an increasingly bourgeois future. For generations, both have been popular day-trips for the Marseillais, but today, the villages are drawing a more Parisian crowd.
The Age
19-05-2025
- The Age
Your guide to ordering at this of-the-moment wine bar (once you manage to snag a table)
Dining at Suze feels like watching the zeitgeist evolve in real time, says Besha Rodell, a fan of its bold cooking. But you'll need to follow her game plan to avoid an all-out acid trip. Previous SlideNext Slide 14/20How we score Contemporary$$$$ Here's an equation: Take a small Melbourne restaurant, and multiply it by the power of wine bar. Add the coolness of Fitzroy North and two longstanding hospo professionals. What does it add up to? Suze. Located in the two-storey corner building on Newry Street that most recently housed One Trick Pony, Suze is all angles and old windows and slate grey walls punctuated by bright angular modern art. Downstairs, a central slab of a bar is surrounded by tables tucked into the wall, while a staircase leads to a first floor open kitchen facing the intimate dining room. Anchoring the kitchen pass, which has more cooks in it than seems physically advisable, is Steve Harry, a chef who has worked at Napier Quarter, Auterra and a host of other notable Melbourne venues. His partner, Giulia Giorgetti, oversees the front of house, which operates with the kind of friendly, informed cool that the inner north does best. Is Suze an amalgamation of all the experience these two bring from all the other Melbourne wine bar-type restaurants they've had a hand in? Or is it a progression, a leap forward? I can't quite tell – there's a certain Parisian cool to the place, a move away from Italy as inspiration. It wouldn't be the first time (or even the fifth) that Melbourne made this sidestep, but it feels very of-the-now at Suze, as if you're watching the zeitgeist evolve in real time. Harry's menu is both familiar and wild, with dishes that might appear on other menus but wouldn't taste nearly this bold or flavour-packed. There's a house-made ricotta covered with a layer of lush sliced persimmon and doused in pepperberries that are downright prickly on the tongue, a punch of spice that's as unexpected as it is beguiling. Raw fish – silky slabs of meaty tuna the day I ate it – swims in Tasmanian wasabi with puckery desert lime. A spanner crab linguine is a high-acid, high-intensity flavour bomb. If you look at the descriptions above, there are a lot of adjectives somewhat synonymous with the word 'acidic', and that's the biggest issue with the cooking at Suze. Individually, these dishes sing, but one after another? The acid trip can go off the rails. If there's one piece of advice I'd give to every chef it is: Sit in your own restaurant and eat a full meal, all the way through. Because so many dishes are amazing as one-offs when you're in creation mode, but when strung together with every other dish, the experience can be wildly different to what you encounter while standing in the kitchen with a tasting spoon. If I were to try one bite of any dish at Suze, then I'd be swooning. As a single bar of music, this food is glorious; when you play the whole album, there is too much treble and not enough bass. It would be unfair for me to say that every single dish on this menu is wildly acidic, it's too easy to wind up going in that direction. But there are ways for diners to mitigate this potential. Have the Bay of Fire cheddar gougeres. Pick either the raw fish or the ricotta, but not both. If you're going for the whole fish, a glorious flounder in a very perky caper sauce fattened up with bone marrow, pair it with the agnolotti, delicate and heavy on the comte, with an overload of nutmeg that's bold and brilliant. Maybe save the vinegar-forward braised rainbow chard for another day (say, when you're in the mood for the lamb rump). Whether you're on acid overload or not, I'm going to say you should still order the grapefruit sorbetto because it's maybe the best grapefruit dessert I've had in Australia, embracing the bitterness of the citrus while tamping it down with the sweetness of Suze, the restaurant's namesake French aperitif, and giving it spiky energy with a smattering of pink peppercorn. There's also a tulumba, a dense Turkish doughnut, coated in a syrup made from black garlic that's so umami-rich and dense that it almost reminds me of Vegemite. It works! I swear! 'As a single bar of music this food is glorious; when you play the whole album, there is too much treble and not enough bass.' It's not easy to get a table at Suze these days, and I can see why. The vibe is perfect for this moment in time. The cooking is bold and creative. The wine list is varied and approachable and full of bargains. It's an immensely fun place to spend an evening or a leisurely Sunday afternoon. And Harry and Giorgetti are a formidable team, so much so that I expect to see their influence in Melbourne restaurants for years to come, acid and all.
