Welcome to Watel's in Dallas and Guesthouse in Burgundy.
We cater, and we conduct Cooking Classes, Tours, and Dinners.
Our GUEST HOUSE IN BURGUNDY is a restored 17th century house in a charming medieval village in Bresse.
It is available for events, or as a private apartment for vacation and holiday rental, dinners, and cooking classes.
The house is in Cuiseaux, one the most beautiful villages of Burgundy, conveniently positioned between the magnificent historic cities of Lyon and Dijon in central eastern France.
It is close to two international airports (Lyon and Geneva), and a TGV station (2 hrs to Paris).
We cater, and we conduct Cooking Classes, Tours, and Dinners.
Our GUEST HOUSE IN BURGUNDY is a restored 17th century house in a charming medieval village in Bresse.
It is available for events, or as a private apartment for vacation and holiday rental, dinners, and cooking classes.
The house is in Cuiseaux, one the most beautiful villages of Burgundy, conveniently positioned between the magnificent historic cities of Lyon and Dijon in central eastern France.
It is close to two international airports (Lyon and Geneva), and a TGV station (2 hrs to Paris).
Above: Rampartts from eleven hundreds (one block away from our guesthouse)
SERVICES & RATES
Guest House (your own private 24hr keyed entrance, free public street parking)
2 bedrooms, one bath, large open kitchen, bar, and sitting area:
400 Euros per 3 nights on weekend (Fr-Sun)
300 Euros per 4 nights during the week (Mon-Thu)
700 Euros per 7 night week
Personalized Chauffeured Tours
(Wine &/or Sightseeing):
200 Euros per day for 1 to 4 people
Meals:
10 Euros p p Continental Breakfast
60 Euros for 2-4 people box lunch
100 Euros for 1-4 people dinner
Catering in Dallas, France or Elsewhere (Have Knife, Will Travel):
300 Euros + Ingredients for up to 8 people
300 Euros for the shopping, prep time, cooking, and service.
You pay for the ingredients at cost (no mark up, receipts provided).
This is for a seated dinner for up to 8 people. Above 8 people is an extra 100 Euros for up to 16 people.
Above 16 it has to be buffet (same fees). For a buffet up to 16 people 300 Euros.
Cooking Classes (here or there):
1) We teach your group hands-on how to prepare a multiple course dinner from scratch,
the group then eats the dinner they have just prepared.
$400.~for 1 to 4 people, $25 per additional person, includes preparation and class.
Ingredients and beverages are not included in price, they are paid by you at our cost.
2) WITH SHOPPING: We take your group shopping and teach hands-on how to shop/select all the ingredients and prepare a multiple course dinner from scratch, the group then eats the dinner they have just prepared. $500.~for 1 to 4 people, $30 per additional person, includes shopping, transportation, preparation, and class. Ingredients and beverages are not included in price, they are paid by you at cost at time of shopping.
3) Demo with dinner $400 +ingredients for 1-4 people.
RESERVATIONS or more info: [email protected]
the group then eats the dinner they have just prepared.
$400.~for 1 to 4 people, $25 per additional person, includes preparation and class.
Ingredients and beverages are not included in price, they are paid by you at our cost.
2) WITH SHOPPING: We take your group shopping and teach hands-on how to shop/select all the ingredients and prepare a multiple course dinner from scratch, the group then eats the dinner they have just prepared. $500.~for 1 to 4 people, $30 per additional person, includes shopping, transportation, preparation, and class. Ingredients and beverages are not included in price, they are paid by you at cost at time of shopping.
3) Demo with dinner $400 +ingredients for 1-4 people.
RESERVATIONS or more info: [email protected]
Last week Chef Rene Peeters of Watel’s came into our home and made an awesome dinner that included a hands-on cooking lesson. It was a very fun evening and we would like to do this more often. - comment by a D reader
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"chef René came to our home and fixed the most wonderful French dinner. Chef René prepared and served us champagne plus caviar topped warm oysters on mushroom duxelles to start off. Cannot tell you how Divine. You have to experience. Then seated, he served sea scallops with champagne sauce for our appetizer with a wonderful Château de Sancerre wine. Unbelievable. Our main course was châteaubriand with Bearnaise and Madeira sauces. This was melt in your mouth heaven and served with the wonderful Campo Viejo 2007 Rioja. Our dessert was a chocolate truffle terrine. perfect ending. Larry had a great birthday dinner."
--- Sharon Cole.
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"chef René came to our home and fixed the most wonderful French dinner. Chef René prepared and served us champagne plus caviar topped warm oysters on mushroom duxelles to start off. Cannot tell you how Divine. You have to experience. Then seated, he served sea scallops with champagne sauce for our appetizer with a wonderful Château de Sancerre wine. Unbelievable. Our main course was châteaubriand with Bearnaise and Madeira sauces. This was melt in your mouth heaven and served with the wonderful Campo Viejo 2007 Rioja. Our dessert was a chocolate truffle terrine. perfect ending. Larry had a great birthday dinner."
--- Sharon Cole.
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Notes from guest Ken McAlpine
-Ken McAlpine’s travel writing assignments have provided him unbridled opportunity for play; from diving with white sharks, to running the Inca trail to Machu Picchu, to sparring with the world shoot fighting champion, to visiting Cuiseaux ;^)
He says: "Yes, Cuiseaux is a charming medieval village in Bresse, Burgundy, not far from Lyon and Dijon; from the nearby town of Bourg-en-Bresse it is two hours by train to another world called Paris. Yes, Cuiseaux nestles against the foothills of the Jura Mountains. Gaze west from those foothills, across the Bresse Plain to the hazy blue mountains of the Massif Central, and you will understand the meaning of lovely distances. Yes, Cuiseaux, home to 1,500, still boasts portions of its original 12th century ramparts, and some have called the village one of the most charming in Burgundy, but if you have been to Burgundy you know this is quibbling, like comparing South Pacific sunsets. Here you have wine and cuisine of the highest order; and some of it you can consume only here en Bourgogne, because frankly why would even the wine and cuisine leave this place?
In Cuiseaux you must sit quietly on the stoop of the former chapellerie (hat shop), now known as Rene and Terri’s place, and watch evening shadows creep down the stone-walled church as sparrows drop from the eaves and the happy clatter of diners drifts from the restaurant a stone’s throw away. At noon (when the village rests) the same stoop affords a view of a lone butterfly negotiating the town square.
You must also walk. In the early morning, stroll to Boulangerie Nico and admire the bread, croissants and pastries baked by Nicolas and arranged by Marina, (also a fine place to meet townsfolk, for, as one villager puts it, “The French must have their bread, or they will revolt.”) Walk the narrow cobblestone streets (eavesdropping on strains of conversation drifting from windows, for this is a great way to improve your French) to the thrift shop (a lovely party dress for 5 euros), or visit with Thierry in Brocante, his thrift store a cellar-cool tunnel filled with treasures and bargains.
In Cuiseaux, you must also stay home. Inside the chapellerie, run your hand along cool stone that may date from the mid-1600s (not an opportunity that comes every day). Lay in bed and listen to the rain and the church bells, the peal of the bells (they ring at noon and seven) all the more romantic for echoing off ancient stone. British philosopher Bertrand Russell put it ably. The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.
Bringing us tidily to meal time. Countless volumes document the joys of French food and wine, so I will say only this. There are few pleasures (licit and illicit) that surpass the French meal. Upon the long table the wealth of the land – duck and chicken, and wine and cheese, and tarts topped with raspberries from a neighbor’s garden -- and did we mention wine? All of it lovingly prepared, and paired. Equally important, these are meals that unwind as meals are meant to: in a languid fashion now lost to much of the antic world, yet still elevated to art by the French. Outside, the rain patters. Inside, candlelight flickering off wine bottles, you talk of world politics, and books, and old friendships, and travels and local gossip. Perhaps afterward, for those who are still standing/sitting after all the food and wine, a guitar and sing-along, the words to long ago songs springing to the lips for the first time since, well, long ago.
And you must leave Cuiseaux, because the surrounding countryside is as lovely as anything you will see. It is also conveniently located. Sums a Cuiseaux resident; “For the countryside, you just need to go outside.”
You choose the ribbon road. In the nearby hills you can explore the ruins of Chateau de Chevreaux (from here, the defining view of lovely distances). Or, just along the road, meet the goats who made the cheese you ate last night, as well as the charming goat whisperer who tends them (her goats follow her like dogs, and act like children). Drive past sunflower fields to the market at Louhans, where, beneath a sea of awnings, everything is for sale, from Shetland ponies, to panties, to the best cherries you’ve ever had. Perhaps, after the hustle of the market, a glass or two (or more) of wine and a swim in the lake at Louvarel. A bit farther afield (more ribbon roads, more pastoral views), high in the Jura Mountains, lunch at Le Regardoir, with its airplane view of le lac de Vouglans, and then, because it’s always good to be twelve again, a plunge in the same lake. And my personal favorite, a picnic in the field of your choosing with the lover of your choosing; a field where butterflies hop among the flowers, and the grass is soft and cool, and you exchange those sweet Louhans cherries without using your fingers. Memories are about splendid details.
St. Amour, Cousance, Coligny, Orgelet, Maisod, Cuiseaux; these are places far off the tourist map, stone and steepled villages where the wind of civilization is distant, the song of birds immediate.
Somewhere in this countryside (it is more fun when you find these places yourself) there is a small church with a small cemetery and a small collection of weathered headstones. Crouch before the appropriate headstone and you will read, “Le temps passe, le souvenir reste.”
Time passes, the memory remains.
This is a fine thing."
-Ken is also the author of several books. See more about him at: http://www.kenmcalpine.com/
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LINKS WE LIKE:
A vacation apartment in Cannes: https://www.vrbo.com/2139624
Art Photos and Cards by my cousin's daughter, Dominique
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Thank you for visiting, AND, YES! I do chef in private homes. For the shopping, prep time, cooking, and service, I charge $300 for my time, you pay for the ingredients at cost (no mark up, receipts provided). This is for a seated dinner for up to 8 people. Above 8 people, I need an extra $100 to pay an assistant for up to 16 people. Above 16 it has to be buffet (same fees). For a buffet up to 16 people, I don't need the assistant, so its only $300 for me. Thanks again, René
