That Time Taste Went From Compass to Lightning Rod
The best way to describe Aix-en-Provence’s French bistro Les Vieilles Canailles? Superb. Delicious. Chaos.
I’ve made a lot of claims across eighty-six Tessera about my favorite meals, bites and sips and restaurants. And without having to backtrack on any of them, I can confidently say that my experience with Taste at Les Vieilles Canailles was truly, from start to finish, like none other.
There, on a Thursday afternoon in late October, I watched Taste transform from my compass to my lightning rod. I have never felt so alive and so fulfilled tasting anywhere. It was as if for those two hours at lunch, everything in my life was in just the right place. My mind, body, gut and soul. My taste buds. My dreams. My career.
Me.
I have zero reservations about this two-top at Les Vieilles Canailles being exactly where I was supposed to be on October 29, 2026.
As dramatic as it still sounds, during my meal there, I felt a sudden, heightened connection to Taste, as if I had arrived at a destination with it that I didn’t even know we’d been traveling toward.
I was overtaken by a rush of extreme gratitude.
This rush was about so much more, though, than Taste finding the right flavor, the perfect plate or an exceptional wine pairing. And it went well beyond a discovery or a sharpening of discernment around any one of my passions, preferences or proclivities. No, this visceral connection with the infallible instrument that had been guiding me these last two years pierced more deeply. It was spiritual, almost metaphysical.
It was as real as it was reassuring.
It was solidarity. By trusting my inner voice and following what moved me, I had managed to claw my way to this next checkpoint and chapter in my journey. And it felt like I had been invited by Taste to join it for a but-first: one grand celebratory meal.
In researching restaurants for Provence and Lyon, I was determined to steer clear of Michelin-star, World’s Best hype on this trip. I wanted authentic, real French food. No fussing, no doting, no formalities. No purse stands. No caviar bump. No one folding my napkin when I got up to use the restroom. And definitely no crumbers or tweezers.
Before I laid actual eyes on it, I had a gut feeling that Les Vieilles Canailles was going to be the kind of place that I would long remember. I wasn’t the least bit deterred after I got a mixed French reception when making my reservation in person between the lunch and dinner services. (It was that or by phone, and my cheap Airalo eSIM wasn’t letting me make any phone calls.) Whether the cold awkwardness had been the result of a language barrier, fatigue, uber confidence in the end product or indifference to me as a guest, honestly, it didn’t matter. I just wanted to sit at one of those twenty seats inside.
When I finally did take my place on the long gold velour banquette, I made every effort I could to absorb and record every vibration in the scene around me. And it was chaos. Pure superb chaos.
Not surprisingly, it took a hot minute for someone to check in with me after I was seated, but I wasn’t the least bit put out. How could I be? I watched on in amusement as two servers gracefully maneuvered around the cozy, cramped space: seating guests, refilling wine glasses, clearing plates and taking orders. But my absolute favorite part of all of it was listening as the sommelier/waiter gave a most rhapsodic delivery of the white wine-by-the-glass menu.
Each soliloquy started with him deftly, if not miraculously, transporting five open bottles of white wine to his target audience’s table. Then a riveting performance would begin, always with the same exquisite intensity as the one he’d given before. There was genuine intonation in his voice. His body language played a convincing supporting role, and his eyes lit up as he talked about each one of those five wines’ aromas, structures and finishes. Beaming like they were all his favorite children.
God, I thought. I want to show up in the world loving what I do that much, too. And I want to share that love with others as fervently and contagiously as this man did.
It gives me goosebumps to think about it just now.
I wouldn’t get to see the impassioned act myself until after a glass of champagne. The same som/waiter had recommended I start with it, and I half wonder, lovingly, if it was because he wasn’t yet ready for another, in a second language no less, run-through of his performance.
As I sipped my champagne, a mother and her two teenage daughters were seated just to the left of me. As I drift back to that afternoon, I am still kicking myself for not remembering the way the som/waiter had described the vintage he had poured me. His perfect, elegant little sales pitch had made me want to start every meal I ever took from that point forward with a glass of those very same bubbles. I know his words had made me feel all the more confident and chic merely sipping that champagne.
As the mother at the next table listened to him talk about the wines, I exchanged knowing, sideways smiles with the teenage girls. I couldn’t help but wonder what had brought this family in that day. Had they been in before? Were they tourists like me? Was it a special occasion?
Later, when the girl I was sharing the golden velour banquette with ordered the same main as I did, I watched as she pulled out her cell phone to frame up a picture of it. She stopped her mom and sister from starting their mains until she could snap a photo of their plates too.
Joy flushed and warmed my cheeks. I thought about my own sisters and mom and how in another life that could have been us. I felt that same sense of extreme gratitude overtake me again. It felt like I was sitting next to a younger version of myself from a different place and time.
When the chalkboard menu finally came around, I was torn between so many good options. I eventually settled on a starter course of fresh tuna before taking the duck tartare as my main. And as per the chalkboard instructions, I put the kitchen on alert that I would be partaking in a Paris-Brest pastry. But not before I foolishly thought, “That pastry? What’s so special about that one?” I had always skipped right over it in every pastry case I ever looked at.
If I have learned anything from my travels, however, it is to always try it again. I had just won that battle with an almond tart in Lourmarin days before. And I would win it again in Lyon with a bowl of the most amazing chocolate mousse I could have ever imagined, sprinkled with peanuts and olive oil. I have also never been one to turn my nose up at a dessert that requires advance notice.
I don’t need a fancy compass to tell me that’s a bet worth making.
The head-spinning Paris-Brest pastry at Les Vieilles Canailles in Aix-en-Provence
That Paris-Brest still makes my head spin in the most worthy and spectacular of ways.
As fabulous food and wine came and went, each course, each pour besting the one that came before it, the room stayed abuzz with the most incredible bistro energy. But the signs were there that lunch was winding down.
The family next to me paid and we said our goodbyes. I watched on as an older couple, maybe in their eighties, chatted over espressos. At one point, the man reached over and caressed his wife’s hand before completely enveloping it in his own. There was such a sweet tenderness to the gesture and the way that they looked at each other that I couldn’t believe that I had been lucky enough to see and feel it.
And then, incredibly, the song I’d been humming ever since I’d arrived in France came on. I knew it would be impossible to stop the two fat teardrops that spilled out of the corners of my eyes and trickled down my face behind my eyeglasses.
As Edith Piaf’s “La Vie en Rose” played, I let it all digest.
The family, the couple, the som/waiter.
The tuna. The duck tartare.
That glass of champagne.
The Paris-Brest.
A lifetime-in-the-making meal with Taste was so very much like seeing life through rose-colored glasses.
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