Les Prés d'Eugénie (Michel Guérard)
Eugénie-les-Bains, Beaune
Cuisines: Spanish, French
About
This Relais & Châteaux property is the creation of Michel Guérard, the chef whose cuisine minceur started a culinary revolution in the early 1970s that emphasized presentation over portion size. It attracts a stream of diners who appreciate the calm surroundings and the much-publicized cooking. The menu includes both cuisine minceur, so that calorie counters can still enjoy well-seasoned flavors and fresh ingredients, and the heartier cuisine gourmand, influenced by Basque and classic French recipes. Dishes are constantly evolving, usually tapping into regional sentimentality, as in the case of "bourgeois style" veal chops fried "over low flame in a corner of the fireplace." Specialties include cream of crayfish soup, freshwater crayfish roasted with limes, whiting in white-wine sauce, lamb steamed with fennel, and a variety of simply steamed fish with fresh vegetables. Those unwilling to pay the stratospheric prices in the main restaurant sometimes book a table in a satellite restaurant operated by M. Guérard, La Ferme aux Grives. The cuisine focuses on rural specialties of the region, offering a single fixed-price menu for 46€ ($67). Comfortable and rustically elegant, it's open for lunch Thursday to Tuesday and dinner Thursday to Monday. A typical specialty is brochettes of free-range chicken cooked on a skewer. In addition to the restaurants, there are a variety of accommodations. The most comfortable are the eight high-ceilinged units in an outlying annex, Le Couvent des Herbes. They cost 290€ to 380€ ($421-$551) for a double, 350€ to 520€ ($508-$754) for a suite. Slightly less glamorous are the 35 units in the main building, which rent for 300€ to 360€ ($435-$522), or 420€ to 540€ ($609-$783) for an apartment. Rooms are decorated in the style of a country manor house. Less expensive, and geared to the family trade, are the 30 units in La Maison Rose, where doubles go for 110€ to 150€ ($160-$218), and suites cost 165€ to 250€ ($239-$363). Some units contain kitchenettes. If you're planning on truly experiencing the spa, you won't really get an insight into its methodologies unless you come for a full-immersion sojourn of a week or more. About 25% of the clientele opt for an R&R, health, and revitalization routine, the cost of which, with full board for two persons, is 4,930€ to 6,210€ ($7,149-$9,005) per week.
